Back to work

Being less than a week out of surgery I was on the fence about working for the Rochester Red Wings during opening weekend. I was scheduled to work in the control room which is a lot less strenuous than camera. Saturday's game was postponed so the only one I had to work was Sunday. As soon as I walked in the door I knew I made the right choice. I love the people and the atmosphere of the ballpark. Sure I start to get sick of it in August but for the first three quarters of the season it's great! Best part is this year my boy Sam is working on the TV crew with me. Around 4pm I started to feel the strain of doing something that wasn't just sitting on the couch and watching TV. AND the game went to extra innings so when we got out of there around 6:30 I was hurting a little but it was worth it. I told my boss there's no way I'd be able to work the other two games this week and luckily he was OK with me backing out. It just felt good to be back doing a job I love so much. Here's to a successful third season!

Hockey always gives out 3 stars at the end of the game for those who excelled during the match. I'm going to give out 4 stars in no particular order for people who went above and beyond for me this week. First is Sam who drove me to Frontier Field so I could work for Red Wings and out to get dinner after the game. Second is Cassie who stayed with me both nights I was in the hospital holding my hand the whole time and took care of me when I got home. Third star goes to Kev for buying 300 Team Coozy bracelets. I'll have some later this week, if you live outside of Rochester you can buy one right from Kev and he will mail it to you. The last star is shared between a few people who share blood with me. Aunt Jeanine came to see me the afternoon I got out of the hospital to make sure I was prepped for the next few days. Mom stayed in Rochester for 2 nights and all the daylight hours in my hospital room. Dad called from Florida every day to check on me. Mike scheduled his Tuesday so he could see me in the morning and meet clients in the afternoon. Cousin Fred made the four hour round trip drive just to hang out with me for a few hours after he got out of work on Thursday. It really is the little things that make having a long term illness just a little more bearable.

Thank you

On a more positive note

Last night two good things happened. My cousin Fred came to visit. his sole purpose was just to be there, see me and talk. The Bruins happened to be playing so we got to watch our first game together in I don't know how long. That's special because this is the man who gave me my first Bruins hat when I was much younger. I think I still have it kickin' around somewhere. The second was I found out my friend Kevin bought 300 Team Coozy bracelets and didn't tell me about it until they were already made. He's selling them for $2 each, if you'd like one you're welcome to contact him through the link I added to his name or I can give you his contact info. For those of you in Rochester, you can purchase one from me directly starting next week. See, it is possible to have a good day even when you have cancer :)

At first I was afraid, I was petrified

I made it through the night, though it wasn't easy. I did sleep on and off for about 12 hours which is kinda what I was hoping for. The only down side was when I woke up around 730 I had a killer headache that was starting to make me nauseated. I took some more drugs, went back to sleep and about 2 hours later the headache is a lot more manageable. This is going to sound stupid but I'm going to say it anyway. This sucks. Nothing about it is fun. But my cousin Fred is coming to visit tonight, I'm so stoked I haven't seen him since October!

Home Sweet Home

I've been home for about 6 hours now and for as much as I couldn't wait to get out of the hospital and that bed, there's a small part of me wishing I could go back. Nighttime is scary enough even when you aren't 3 days out of surgery. If there was a problem or a small concern I had at any moment, all I had to do was push the button and talk to a nurse. As you can imagine I didn't sleep much there especially since they took my vitals every 4 hours. The up side to being there though is my overnight nurse, Stefanie is awesome! She seemed willing to stay for an extra minute just to chat and she always laughed at my lame jokes. Cassie is a nurse as well so they were able to use industry jargon and talk shop with each other. Needless to say she helped keep the two of us sane from 7pm until 7am.

Now I'm home alone. I'm not being a pessimist assuming something will go wrong but now there's nobody to talk and nobody getting paid to check up on me. I'm nervous. Chances are everything will be fine but there's always that chance. My alarm is set to go off every 4 hours now so I can take my pain meds. See ya in the morning!

And boom goes the dynamite

I had been dealing with my two night stay in the hospital pretty well emotionally, until now. They pulled my chest tube out at 1130am and that's when I seemed to crash. Once it was out I felt like I had no fight left in me and I was mentally defeated. Maybe it's because getting the tube out was a big step towards going home and on the inside I knew I wouldn't have to deal with this much longer. Typically I can go for a walk and listen to music to clear my head but even doing a few laps around the halls here didn't quite do it for me. I'm ready to just go home, sit on my couch and be done with the hospital for a while.

The past 3 days have taken a lot out of me physically and mentally and I don't know how I'll be able to put up this kind of fight again. It could just be a learning curve though since these were my first overnights in a hospital. Who knows, maybe after I'm back home I'll be able to think more clearly. Until then...your guess is as good as mine.

Let's play two

Stuck in this hell hole for at least another night, that's the bad news this morning. The good news is I have an omelet, bacon fruit cup cinnamon and 2 Gatorades on the way for breakfast. If you can keep a secret, my mom said she would sneak me outside to go for a walk since it's supposed to be 60+ degrees.

The pain overnight was almost unbearable. Add that to trying to move around every few minutes to get comfortable and I almost cried. They're adding some type of Motrin based pain killer and upping how much oxycodone by 50% so shit's starting to get real.

Cassie deserves a medal because she stayed with me all night trying to keep me entertained while I was awake. I only slept for a few hours. She says she's going home for a nap then coming back to take care of me again tonight. Mom's a trooper too, he was up at 530 Monday morning and stayed til about 9pm. Then she was back to the hospital by 7am. I'm lucky to have two such awesome ladies sticking around me.

The thought of just one dream it consumes me

I've been awake since 4:45am Monday morning. As I start writing this it's 1:05am Tuesday morning. If you don't count the time I was out for surgery I've slept a total of 20 minutes and it doesn't look like that's going to change any time soon.

**warning, it's about to get all medical and graphic and a lil gross up in here**

When I woke up for surgery I was in probably the worst pain ever, I rated it 8/10 and they kept pumping me with pain killers every 5 minutes. Since noon it's been at a consistent 4 which is better but I still can't move much. The last 2 times I was knocked out for surgery I woke up pretty well but even an ice cube wanted to come back up today. From what I've heard people can have a difficult time urinating after anesthesia and that affected me. I couldn't get started and when I did I couldn't keep it going so a couple hours ago I had the pleasure of my first catheter. Most people pass between 150 and 500 ml of urine on a normal trip to the bathroom. I had a total of 1550 ml in about a half hour with that thing in. Suddenly my stomach doesn't hurt anymore. For the discomfort of putting the tube in and taking it out, the end result was worth it.

My lunch sucked, they came by and said I was on a clear liquid diet so when they started rattling off what my options were I just said screw it bring me one of everything. Dinner on the other hand was AWESOME! I had spaghetti with meatballs, Greek salad, chicken finger (yes only one single chicken finger) and a cheeseburger. Best part is, it wasn't all crappy hospital food and I learned taht between 630am and 8pm I'm allowed to call room service and have food delivered at any time. For breakfast I'm ordering bacon with a bacon and a side of bacon. For dessert my homie Kayla (Cassie's former co-worker and nurse in the cancer center) made me a milkshake.

OK so to sum it up I have 2 IVs, pain killers include Dilaudid, oxycodone & tylenol, and xanax as needed. It looks like the chest tube is done pumping stuff out so the only other thing holding me back is pain management. I can't go home til I'm off the IV pain killers and it's starting to look like that might take a while. Now I'm about to do a lap around the nurse's station and hopefully tire myself out. Here goes nothin'...