Day 62 - Resting

Funny observation: The first couple of nights after getting out of the hospital, I wanted to follow my routine of going to the bathroom to empty my bladder before going to bed.  "Oh.  That's right.  I don't have to.  It will empty automatically."  I guess there is one advantage to being catheterized after all.  Otherwise, it's a pain in the butt (metaphorically). 

Perhaps I should suspend the Percocet for a day and take this two liter drainage bag for a spin at the local watering hole and forget about "beer rental."  Nah.

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Today I continued to share the good news with others that I didn't get to yesterday.  (Good thing I doubled the minutes on my cell phone plan last month!)  I also just paced around the living room to get my exercise and had another visitor pop over at lunch time.

I think all the excitement of the last 48 hours caught up with me because I landed back in bed by mid-afternoon for a nice little nap.  I probably need to ease up a little because I can feel a little more pain at a couple of the incision points today.  Don't want to overdo it and blow a gasket or something like that.  Still, the pain is relatively low (2-4 out of 10) and I don't want to be a complete wuss about it either.  When I'm sitting, it's the worst.  I'll find the right balance.

I do feel comfortable enough to be on my own, so my sister will be heading back to her family and job in Chicago tomorrow, weather permitting.  Before she leaves, she'll do a couple of loads of laundry and make one more run to the grocery store to get me stocked up enough to last me into early next week.

With the catheter coming out on Friday, I'll be one step closer to being able to drive on my own.  It all depends on my pain level and my ability to stomp on the brakes if necessary.  I suspect that by the middle to end of next week, I should be mobile again.  In the interim, I may need an assist to run to the store for me.  I'll fire up my coordination spreadsheets and put the call out if and when its needed.

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I had a little surprise after getting out of the shower this morning.  I'm four pounds HEAVIER than when I went into the hospital!!  I hope my scale is acting up or it's all the extra hardware that I'm sporting around, because if it's not, that's truly depressing.

Coming out of this, I really want to turn over a new dietary leaf, eating healthful foods that I can control the contents and quantity of.  My doctor says that colon cancer is very closely related to prostate cancer, and if you have to have the cancer life experience, I only want to deal with it once. 

So that's it for today.  Time to fix dinner.  (Irony, eh?)