Prairie View

Friday, December 19, 2008

A New Woman and Other Good Things

The other night when Steve P. visited Mom in the hospital, he told her, "Mary, you will get better. Today is my Mom's 78th birthday. When I talked to her on the phone earlier and she told me what all she's been doing, it made me tired." Steve's Mom had the same valve and artery replaced as my Mom did. Her surgery was in September.

Steve was right about Mom getting better. When Dad told her doctor yesterday that a lot of people are taking an interest in how things are going, Dr. B. said, "Tell everyone she's a new woman." He said this after announcing that all the numbers looked good on her blood work, mentioning her hemoglobin specifically. He listened to her heart and said it sounds very good. Ditto the lungs. He said she has good kidney function. He sympathized with her earlier digestive problems by saying he knows that even if some things are getting better you can't really feel good if your stomach is upset. We had just told him that, for the first time in many weeks, Mom is enjoying the taste of her food. "Look at her walk," he said delightedly, when she returned from the bathroom to the bed. "She's getting good at steering that walker." He told us he plans to release her today (Friday).

I spent Wed. afternoon till Thurs. afternoon in the hospital with Mom and noted many evidences of her improved health. She wanted to read the paper, walk to the window to look out at the weather, and walk to the waiting room to listen to Obama introduce his financial team and take questions at a press conference. She announced that she's walking all the way to the end of the hall and did so. She prompted me to give her the gizmo that measures her lung capacity when she does her breathing exercises.

On Wednesday evening at bedtime her only meds were two potassium pills. The next morning there were only three small pills, at least one of them a baby aspirin. The connection between the absence of pills and the presence of appetitie seems obvious to me.

Yesterday in the hall I met someone who asked about my mother. She must have talked to one of my sisters because I didn't remember ever seeing her before. She told me that her father had been dismissed the same day my mother had, and returned again to the hospital on the same day Mom did. He went home yesterday afternoon. We went our separate ways then, and I didn't ask her more about her father's health, but I wonder if she feels, as I do, that, even though the time at home didn't last long, it was good for the patient emotionally. I think it gave Mom hope that the hospital stay would not last forever. But the time at home was so far from a return to normalcy in many ways, that I think she was more open to returning to the hospital when it became necessary than she would have been otherwise. This time I think it won't be long before she putters around in the kitchen again and things will feel normal much more quickly.

Hans picked me up at the hospital and we went to the airport together to meet Benji, who was returning from Thailand. It was foggy and miserable outdoors and we heard announcements of flights cancelled because of the weather while we were still at the airport. But Benji arrived safely, only a little behind schedule.

My nephews were hurrying home to get ready in time for the annual Christmas banquet for the youth group, so I got in on some interesting chatter, especially with Benji trying to guess the identity of the person he was having a blind date with that evening. Hans always caught himself before he let it slip, so I was in the dark along with Benji. I also heard tales of motorcycle escapades in Thailand. I don't think Benji's mother would have been as thrilled with all the drama as Hans and Benji were.

They also compared notes on what they expected or experienced of culture shock with the return home. "What culture?" one of them asked in the course of agreeing that it was no big deal, although Benji acknowledged that he was in some ways a different person than he was earlier, so it was likely that he would not experience everything in exactly the same way he did before. Benji also noted the presence of many cars and the absence of bicycles in the airport.

Amid all the shrieks and glad welcomes at their house when we got there, I quietly took my overnight case and tromped through the soggy snow in their backyard, over to Mom and Dad's house where my vehicle was parked.

I stuck my head inside the house briefly to check if Linda was there. She wasn't, and the house was empty, so I drove home and greeted my family and Lowell, who was just finishing up here with installing a new front door--a much-needed and providential improvement. The opening was four inches shorter and narrower than standard, and he found a custom-made door at Home Depot that was the right size. It had been returned because it swung the wrong way and was offered at a clearance price.

Health and home improvements and glad reunions are wonderful things, and yesterday I witnessed all three. What a pleasure.

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