Jack had his surgery this AM, and it was fairly quick-- ... I think it just took the amount of time reading a chapter in the Laura Leone book I was reading on my PDA. Jack still isn't conscious, and didn't squeeze back when I took his hand and asked if he heard and understood me, would he squeeze back BUT the nurse says that when you have a lot of fluid retention, patients report that their extremities "don't feel like they belong."

Met with the social worker again during surgery post-recovery and she had some of the information we requested and lots of stuff we'll need for applying for Social Security disability. I figure it's worth a shot. Yeah, I expect they'll turn us down but how would that make us worse off than we are now?

Mark Owings, his wife Jul, and his brother-in-law Jud drove out in the driving rain to be with me. We had a pleasant visit, considering the circumstances.

For those of you who know what Jack looks like I must report that they had to shave off ALL of his facial hair to do the surgery. (I will say that I egged them on to shave extensively, because it's been hard for Jack to shower and shave lately, and asked that they cut his hair really short. It had gotten down to his shoulders, a good look for Dave, and a terrible one for Jack. It had a lot of mats in it, too, because of all the sleeping Jack has been doing.) When I came back to see him after surgery, I involuntarily said, "My goodness Jack, you look just like your father!"

My brother Chuck suggests that would be on the top ten list of THINGS YOU DON'T WANT TO HEAR AFTER SURGERY as in:

10. "Hey, they made you look like your father."
9. "What's that brown stuff coming out of your tube?"
8. (From Dave) "Man, he wouldn't want to be awake to see THAT!"

I'll leave it as an exercise to my readers what items 1-7 should be.

I was a little delayed leaving because I was chatting with the other family holding a vigil in the Intensive Care waiting room. So I was there when Optimistic Doc, the ENT who did the surgery, found me. He said the surgery went well, and I said, "Well, my husband likes to eat, and like to talk, and while he won't be happy about having to pass them up for awhile, at least he'll be alive" and the doctor said, "Yeah, I remember you saying that last night so I chose to use a more narrow tube and he should be able to talk around it. It'll be a whisper but he'll still be able to talk."

So now we're seeing how Jack reacts to being weaned off the heavy duty sedatives, and how he continues to process out the excess fluid, and then he'll be moved to a less intensive room, and then to a rehabilitative nursing home to wean him off the trach. Then he'll come home!

In a week when I thought the best case would be Jack becoming the male version of Karen Ann Quinlan, to THIS is nothing short of miraculous. I am awed at the outpouring of love and affection that has come out and continue to lean on my family, the one I live with, the one I was born into, and the one I've adopted--science fiction fans. (And they've been really kind at work, too, for which I've been grateful.)