A Hickdate

Tuesday morning, I got a text from Hick at 5:22.

"Good morning."

"Hospital life starts early! How are you feeling?"

"I feel ok my butt hurts they told me not to turn over yet bit I sleep off and on hardly no pain. Need to get up to poop have to wait on that."

"Do you know when they're getting you up?"

"This morning pt is getting .e up. Still can't see very goid"

"Tell them about it. You've barely been out of surgery for 12 hours. They might have eye drops or tell you when it will get better."

"I will love you will talk later"

At 9:40, Hick was back on the phone:

"When you want me to call let me know"

"You can call now."

Hick sounded like himself this time. He talked about 15 minutes. They had him up and sitting in a chair. He has a private room! With a table and couch and chairs. He says all the rooms at the surgery center are like this.

He had walked around the floor, using a walker. Said he hadn't pushed his morphine button since 5:30 a.m. That everything seemed to be working fine, and he wasn't having much pain. They were going to switch him from the morphine to pain pills in the afternoon, and that's what he would go home on. And he MIGHT be ready to come home on Wednesday!

"Did you tell them those pills make you sick?"

"Yeah. The doctor said what he would give me, but I don't remember. He said it's the most common thing they give everybody, but if I have a problem, to call and he will change it. But that the muscle relaxers I will get are the most important. That my muscles will start acting up tomorrow. They asked if I lived in a one-level house, and I said I have three steps to go up to get in. The PT lady said to use the handrail, but I should be okay. No bending, no stretching, no twisting.

The doctor was in again. He said that in 25 years of doing this surgery, he's never seen a case like mine. That he couldn't believe that bundle of nerves was missing. He thought I wouldn't be able to move my foot, but obviously those nerves are somewhere, because I can. He said he took some pictures, and he's already showed some of his doctor friends."

"Hope he wasn't just saying that because he cut through something! To justify it in case your foot didn't work."

"He wouldn't do that! He would keep quiet about it, not be telling everybody!"

Hick also said they still wouldn't let him poop! That a gal was coming to explain to him how to do that! But then he cut our conversation short, and said he was going to call the nurse and tell her she needed to figure out a way for him to poop!

I'm sure you're intrigued by Hick's pooping schedule, but I still don't know how everything came out! He sent another text at 1:30:

"Good afternoon supposed to walk again this afternoon. Im boarded to death the chair isn't comfortable and these compression socks are not comfortable"

Then he sent another at 5:30:

"Im going to rest in bed shortly been setting up most of day I love you"

And again at 8:12

"I just got in bed going to try to rest"

I really hope they keep Hick one more day. Then again, I'm sure they would if they can justify it. They must be making a fortune off that private room.