Better Than I Deserve
I feel bad about leaving that cliffhanger of a post back in October and then not following up with further news. I have plenty of excuses but no legitimate reasons.
Let me just say that I had the surgery at the end of November as planned. Everything went pretty well. The surgeon was very considerate and took an extra hour to perform the surgery (4 hours instead of 3). He worked around the lower rib instead of removing it as is often done.
Anyway, the lower half of my left kidney was removed to get rid of the tumor as originally planned. It took a little longer to recover than forecast. I was in the hospital over two weeks instead of the 7 to 10 days expected. I could have been in a few days longer but the surgeon gave me the choice of doing that or going home with the catheter and drain still in.
Since I was getting a bit tired of hospital food and my wife was getting a bit tired of driving in and back every day I opted to go home. Besides, my wife’s good cooking and nursing were much preferable. Though I must say the level of care and the staff of the hospital were exceptional.
Less than a week before Christmas the surgeon gave me the go-ahead to remove the catheter and then a couple of days later I saw him at the hospital to have the drain removed. Well the drain had been in place almost twice as long as intended so believe you me there was a bit of ki-yi-ing when that came out.
Recovery went along slowly at home and finally on February 7th I got back in the truck and headed out on the road again. Three straight weeks of running the roads at a slightly slower pace than usual and I finally got home again. Everybody seems to want to know how I’m doing, Aside from the normal aches and pains I usually find to bellyache about I’m not doing too bad.
Far better than I deserve.
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