September 2006

Well, as you know the surgery was done on Friday morning.

I don’t think that they are used to having younger patients because when they asked what kind of music I liked and I said “easy rock” they didn’t have a cd for that. So, it was classical all the way.

They did an epidural and I was awake for the event. It is quite disconcerting to hear the chisels and hammers against your bones and the impact went all of the way to the top of my spine. Then, the drills came out. I think maybe we should hire this guy for the maintenance department!

Morphine was injected into the epidural to decrease the pain as it is more long-lasting. But, I itched everywhere! Not much sleep was had Friday night with the scratching and the blood pressure/temp checks.

I was actually walking on it Friday night. With a walker, I was up to the bathroom about 3 times.

Then Sat was a tough one. The physio came aroung and got me up on crutches. And bending my knee – I managed 80 degrees bend but haven’t repeated that since. I was wacked out from exhaustion and meds and couldn’t keep my eyes open when Mur came to visit.

The surgeon came by later and said “you can go”. Since the internists had said I couldn’t the night before, it was confusing. But, it was decided that I could leave after my dose of heparin. Which I had to give myself. Into the belly, thank goodness, as that is too big a target to miss.

So, we left and tried to get the ‘scripts filled. Finally we were on the road. My temp has been spiking in the afternoon, so the 2 hr drive to Gravenhurst was on ordeal. Luckily, Mur only had to stop once for me to decorate the wayside. He wouldn’t have been happy if I had messed up the new car!

We got to Mom’s and I crashed. My sister had made dinner for all but I just had some toast later.

Today, I am some better. My leg is hugely swollen (it has 14 stitches!) and quite painful. I am trying to exercise it as much as possible. Tomorrow, we need to go Bracebridge for blood work (twice a week for that trek) and I have 2 more doses of stuff to inject into my belly. Fun.

That is all the news that I can think of. Say hello to the whole crew from me! Not sure about this one week to recoup trick. But, we shall see as the days progress.

Hugs to all, Heather (healing)

Hello all,

First, I must apologize for the lack of mail in August. Time flew by and when things slowed down at work, there was the race, my mom’s 80th birthday, training in the office and appointments for my knee surgery. But, tonight I have time and will bring you up to date on the happenings here.

The docks were mostly repaired from that big blow within the next few days. But, the final and longest dock took a couple of weeks. Meanwhile I juggled boats and tried to accommodate the reservations that we had. Most people had heard about the storm and were quite happy just to get on a dock in Killarney.

The first dock staff left us on August the 20th. And then the rest fell away rapidly. The two that were left have been sent on to work in Housekeeping and Dining Room, as those departments lost staff as well. The last week in August found Murray working alone on the docks as I was sent to train for the front office. Luckily, we do have the two trained staff nearby still as they have filled in for us to allow us to attend my mom’s birthday party August 26th. And also so that Mur can take me over for my surgery.

My partial knee replacement surgery is booked for Friday, September 8th in North Bay. I will only be in hospital overnight and will spend about a week recovering. Mom has invited me to stay with her in Gravenhurst for this time frame.

Our second annual “Round the Island” sailing race was held on Saturday and was a great success. We had eleven boats enter and raised $1000 for the Killarney Health Centre Building Fund. Everyone seemed to have a great time, even though the wind died during the race. Our friend, Gary Babiuk, drove here from Winnipeg for the weekend and help tremendously with the event. And raced with us.

And, in the midst of all of this, our Volvo puked its power steering fluid and needed costly repairs. We had been looking for a Volvo wagon and this made us get very serious. Online, we found an ad for a V70 near Ottawa, arranged for a garage to inspect it and purchased it, sight unseen by us. Jeremy arranged the viewing, took photos to e-mail us and made the payment for us! What a son! Now the plan is for Murray to drop me at the hospital in North Bay on Friday, drive to Ottawa, drop off the old clunker and pick up our new ( to us only as it is a 2000 ) wagon and drive back to visit me post-op. We are looking forward to carrying even more stuff around with us, now that we will have more room.

So, that is mostly what has been happening here. How are things will you all? Enjoying the last of summer? We sure are! Keep in touch and hugs to all.

Heather & Murray