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lydamorehouseMy dad is currently in the OR. My mom and I are waiting in the waiting room at Gunderson in LaCrosse.
Weirdly, it's been a fun morning. We met my dad at the hospital at 7:00 am, and fell right into chatting about life, the universe, and everything. We got the nurses telling funny stories in pre-op and generally having a lot of what my dad calls, "talking smart."
The procedure is that they're going to replace my dad's hip with a "spacer," which is a custom built bone that's been saturated with antibotics. He'll keep that in until they can make him a cyborg with a mechanical replacement six months or so down the line. This will give him back the mobility he's been missing. He'll have to use a walker or a cane for a while because the spacer isn't built to last (think: temporary crown for the hip.)
With any luck, if things go well today, he can actually do his recovery at home. If not, he can go back to the recovery wing of the nursing home and do all the PT and whatnot there.
Probably the funniest part of this trip so far was the shuttle down to LaCrosse.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
naomikritzer turned us on to this option. It's basically a long-distance hotel shuttle bus. They pick up at the St.Paul/Minneapolis airport and drop people off in Rochester, Winona and LaCrosse. Given the distance, I sort of expected more of a "bus," you know, with bathroom facilities. Nope. We were in an oversized minivan, knee-to-back, and the promised WiFi was quite spotty. I did manage to write a little on the way to Rochester, but when we changed buses the fun really began. The bus drive played polka music on the stereo and one of the other passangers ate stinky food in the front seat. The only good thing was that there were a lot fewer of us going the distance to Winona/LaCrosse, so I had a bench seat all to myself. I also had a long a very cheesy military SF novel called PRISON SHIP (these are all-male, man's men, doing manly things in space with other men). This added an extra level of surreal to the trip, especially with the polka music as background.
The other thing that kept me going was that the trip just isn't that long -- even with all the various stops at hotels.
So now my job for the day is to keep my mom company and be there when my dad comes out of it.
Weirdly, it's been a fun morning. We met my dad at the hospital at 7:00 am, and fell right into chatting about life, the universe, and everything. We got the nurses telling funny stories in pre-op and generally having a lot of what my dad calls, "talking smart."
The procedure is that they're going to replace my dad's hip with a "spacer," which is a custom built bone that's been saturated with antibotics. He'll keep that in until they can make him a cyborg with a mechanical replacement six months or so down the line. This will give him back the mobility he's been missing. He'll have to use a walker or a cane for a while because the spacer isn't built to last (think: temporary crown for the hip.)
With any luck, if things go well today, he can actually do his recovery at home. If not, he can go back to the recovery wing of the nursing home and do all the PT and whatnot there.
Probably the funniest part of this trip so far was the shuttle down to LaCrosse.
naomikritzer turned us on to this option. It's basically a long-distance hotel shuttle bus. They pick up at the St.Paul/Minneapolis airport and drop people off in Rochester, Winona and LaCrosse. Given the distance, I sort of expected more of a "bus," you know, with bathroom facilities. Nope. We were in an oversized minivan, knee-to-back, and the promised WiFi was quite spotty. I did manage to write a little on the way to Rochester, but when we changed buses the fun really began. The bus drive played polka music on the stereo and one of the other passangers ate stinky food in the front seat. The only good thing was that there were a lot fewer of us going the distance to Winona/LaCrosse, so I had a bench seat all to myself. I also had a long a very cheesy military SF novel called PRISON SHIP (these are all-male, man's men, doing manly things in space with other men). This added an extra level of surreal to the trip, especially with the polka music as background.The other thing that kept me going was that the trip just isn't that long -- even with all the various stops at hotels.
So now my job for the day is to keep my mom company and be there when my dad comes out of it.
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Date: 2011-07-13 05:15 pm (UTC)Stinky food in the front seat?
I AM SO SORRY.
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Date: 2011-07-13 05:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-13 06:07 pm (UTC)And, as for my dad, yep... that's basically the deal. Because he has this infection that's settled into his bone, they have to do this first step with the spacer. Then, once all the infection is gone, they can do the "real" hip replacement surgery.
I believe that with the real deal, he'll get both ball and socket replaced. Right now, they're only replacing the ball joint and some of the bone... which is a bit of a bummer because the socket has gotten worn down and the MD is a bit worried that it won't support full weight and the ball joint will "slip out." (But that wouldn't be an end to all hope, just a differnt, slightly more painful recovery with a lot less weight going on the foot... ie a walker instead of crutches/cane.)
On the up side, the doctor, who is an extremely gloomy gus, seemed down right positive about how well things went. So fingers crossed.
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Date: 2011-07-15 10:21 am (UTC)re: polka music on buses -- I heard a lot of that while on a student tour of Scotland back in high school. Did you see the movie Diva? [if not, never mind]