What She Did #1-Surgical Waiting Room

I waited for almost and hour while they prepped Bob for surgery. I hit the coffee bar, said no to the cookies.. At 8 am they took me to the prep room, and there were SEVEN people working on him. Since he was worried about them shaving his beard of 40 years, I asked and they said no, but it will be ORANGE.  He looked like Frankenstein, there were leads and tubes and both arms were covered with those. FOR THOSE OF YOU who don't have the time to read details, I say now he is fine and doing well with no symptoms of the stroke... All these details are to help my memory in the future.

A wonderful young man, was slowly attaching SIXTEEN leads to each part of his brain, with red and white wires running to a box. I said to him, if one artery is closed, and you are working on the other how will he get oxygen. He pointed to Bob's franken-arm and said those will hook to a shunt that bypasses where they are working. These 16 leads are my job. He pointed to the screen.

I will monitor his brain and warn if there is a problem and now I am taking a snap shot of his normal rhythms to compare what changes as we work.. then he said Don't Talk, his brain will react to you. And pointed at the blip when I said ok. HA HA he doesn't know me. I did not talk. But two nurses did and the screen was crazy, he asked us all to step out.

I really was thrilled to watch everything, since in the past they just whisked him away and I did not see him until surgery was over.

At 9 am, they rolled him across the hall into OR and sent me to the waiting room. She said 2 to 4 hours. I went home and let the dog out, gone 15 minutes and back to waiting room where I discovered HOT CHOCOLATE fat free and sugar free...

The board changed 4 hours later and it said out of OR into recovery at 1:01 pm... it was another long wait of 50 15 minutes and the surgeon popped in the door and said he did fine. When we move him to ICU we will stop for you.... at 3 pm I walked beside him to ICU, he was riding in a bed, silly not walking. But he was talking to me.  He is a rare person that does not go to sleep when they give him the shot, he said he was awake when they were in OR and saw dozens of people doing all kinds of things, she put a mask over his face and his eyes kept watching everything, she pointed that out and boom he was gone. BUT when they rolled him out of OR to recovery he woke up and she looked at the other nurse and said It Had to Happen Sometime. He was awake from 3 until 8 that night. He also never gets sick from the anesthesia. At 5:30 just 4 hours after surgery he ate Roast Beef, gravy and carrots with bread pudding. BUT the throat was numb, by next morning sore throat and pain would not let him swallow anything but soft food...

His day nurse for 12 hours was and Angel named Stacy...his night nurse he can't remember her name and she was the nurse from hell. Stacy went home at 7 and he never saw another person until Nurse Devil came in at 9 pm. 2 hours. 

The photo at the top and the sunny ME were playtime with my tablet and PIP. Since I only took 2 photos in 5 hours you know how upset I was. I actually thought my heart would stop beating when it got to the 3rd week hour.

My two cousins, Shari and Bonnie came by and talked, and a man I worked with for 13 years, John Allen, was waiting on his wife, and he helped pass the time.

Tomorrow is What she did in ICU... and I will quit I promise.