Anniversary Appendectomy

In case anyone is wondering what to do for their significant other for your first wedding anniversary, allow me to recommend a trip to the emergency room at 2am. Last Friday, Jonah complained all day of stomach pains. At 2am, we decided it was time to get serious, and drove over to Garden City Clinic.

Surprisingly, there were few other patrons.

If you need assistance, you could hoot. Despite Jonah's lack of mobility, I wouldn't risk the R0 parking fine for parking in a handicap spot and made him walk.

After a lengthy (10 minute) assessment/form filling session, he was admitted to the 'back room' where he was given opiate-derivatives to sedate him and alleviate pain. 

While he slept (it was now 3:30am), I sat there and read, took photos, and generally tried not to hit him for sleeping so soundly. The sweatshirt doubled as a eye mask and pillow supplement.

At 4:48am, he was moved to an actual hospital room. The nurses are still giving him pain killers, as you can tell from his dopey smile. At 7am, the surgeon finally showed up and said we have a choice: the appendix comes out. That was the choice, and what we elected to do. After the brief 10 minute consultation, after approximately 6 hours of waiting, I went home to take care of the dogs.

In my 2am-not-aware-of-much-but-this-is-an-emergency state, I kindly put our sleepy hounds in their indoor fabric crate in our bedroom. They hate the cold, and I figured I'd be home before they woke up. Boy, I have never been so wrong.

Midas and Mella destroyed their crate- in that they chewed the ENTIRE front side open, and then set to wrecking our bed. I should note that not a single other item was touched- not even the pile of dirty laundry on the floor. Midas ate the bedframe in a panic, while Mellie sat and watched. I know this because fecal evidence later identified the bed-eater. Not only did they eat our bed, but peed copiously all over the mattress and blankets. Normally, I wouldn't be freaking out, but almost everything I own for bed wear is down. Let the manic cleaning begin.

While cleaning up wood chips and dog pee, Jonah texted to say he was off to surgery (note that I had not slept since 2am and it was now 10:30am). After they sewed him up, I went to visit during the 3pm one hour visiting hour. He kind of knew I was there.

They accessorized him with these awesome bracelets. Almost as nice as my new silver cuff.

This easy-to-read chart helped me find him in a ward where the nurses scattered if you made eye-contact at any point during the weekend.

His progress was set outside his door, and it appeared he was doing well. 

In his room, there were these helpful picture charts to indicate what you'd like to eat.

Despite pointing furiously to steak, he got chicken curry with steamed vegetables.

Twice a day, it was tea-time in true English style. It took us a couple of tries to figure out that you steep the teapot in the silver pot and then pour it into your cup. 

Jonah was also rather impressed with his bag. Apparently his appendix was in pretty bad shape and they had to thoroughly clean his abdominal cavity. As a result, he had a drain inserted and boy, was it gross. I still can't look at this photo. Blech. 

The machine that goes 'beep.' 

Two days after surgery, Jonah had had enough of being bedridden and took it upon himself to get up an explore Garden City. Apparently the hospital is named for these nice terrariums in the wards.

After exploring the interior of the hospital, Jonah put on sneakers and dashed outside. Well, not so much dashed as hobbled.

Here is the courtyard, where most patients sat on the bench and smoked their prescribed cigarrettes. 

Thankfully, he had plenty of reading material while I was at home or running necessary errands.

However, the nurses looked the other way when I frequently overstayed the visitor hours twice a day. I also won at Scrabble.