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I'm back home today, almost two weeks after I left for Atlanta. Lots of catching up to do!
Leit is continuing his recovery, though he still runs out of energy pretty quickly. He was able to take me to the airport this morning, though I drove out so he would only have to drive home. It was nice to have that good-bye time together having breakfast in the airport, though he says he has been very tired all day (possibly because we left the house before 5:00 am!). His wound is healing slowly but cleanly, and he's very happy with the state of his kidney function. It appears that they really did get all the stones out, so now they just want to do testing to try and see the best ways to prevent them.
In some ways, a harder part of the recovery has been getting off all the drugs. He had a lot of morphine in the hospital, and then some hydrocodone at home that were making him pretty spacy. When he started tapering off, it left him rather fragile -- one day we were at the grocery store and he just got all disoriented and had to go sit down on the Old Man Bench while I finished the shopping. I think he's clear of all that stuff now, though. I'm very glad he is taking next week off work, too. I think he'll get a chance to really heal and rest.
I got a nice rest myself. The three nights we spent at the hospital were actually not bad for me. The service and facilities were really good so all I had to concentrate on was making sure he got what he needed and keeping us entertained. We watched many hours of Cash Cab, having fun picking out the New York locations as well as answering the trivia questions. We also watched some really corny old movies on TCM and took turns reading out loud from a paperback collection of The Best Short Stories of 1983. In between we got to change the bandages a lot, get CAT scans and IVs, and forage in the hospital cafeteria. As usual, he charmed the staff there and we ended up comming home with the nurses' email addresses and promises to keep in touch.
When we got back home, I went more into homemaker mode. Leit is no longer living in The House With No Working Oven, so I didn't have to poach a turkey this time. However, his new landlady is also not a cook. It looks like she ordered a complete set of kitchen equipment from a catalogue and then spent the next ten years eating take-out. There were a full set of dishes and cutlery, and lots of nice pots and pans, and almost no large bowls for mixing or serving. Although her oven worked, it was housing a toaster, a vase, some cereal bowls, two pennies, and a ballpoint pen. After carefully removing all of those and wiping out the inside, I turned it on to preheat. Leit came in and mentioned the odd smell and the smoke coming up from the burner vent. I said, "That's just the steam from where I wiped everything down." He turned on the fan but the odor continued. Finally I opened the oven again and discovered a thin plastic serving tray that had been wedged up above the electric broiler unit. OOOPS. Fortunately it wasn't too far gone, and the molten plastic actually cleaned up rather easily. Over the course of the week I churned out a cinnamon-apple-bran coffee cake, two meatloaves (one for freezing) an apple pie with oatmeal crunch topping, and a truly awesome batch of roast chicken and dumplings.
It was a bit like staying in a rented vacation house. His roommate is very sweet and we enjoyed sharing meals with her. She also lent me some chick lit for the hospital and we actually ended up trading clothes a bit by the time I left. But there was that improvisational feel to the housekeeping: What can I make with the equipment on hand? So we napped and took little walks and I cooked and did laundry and aside from calling into the office for a few meetings, it was a very pleasant and relaxing time.
It's the longest time we've spent together since we met, and we were never apart for more than a couple of hours during that time. I think it has brought us a lot closer. We got to talk a lot about our relationship and our hopes and goals and plans. I am feeling really positive and comfortable with the way everything is going for us.
And I still have the weekend to ease back into real life.
Leit is continuing his recovery, though he still runs out of energy pretty quickly. He was able to take me to the airport this morning, though I drove out so he would only have to drive home. It was nice to have that good-bye time together having breakfast in the airport, though he says he has been very tired all day (possibly because we left the house before 5:00 am!). His wound is healing slowly but cleanly, and he's very happy with the state of his kidney function. It appears that they really did get all the stones out, so now they just want to do testing to try and see the best ways to prevent them.
In some ways, a harder part of the recovery has been getting off all the drugs. He had a lot of morphine in the hospital, and then some hydrocodone at home that were making him pretty spacy. When he started tapering off, it left him rather fragile -- one day we were at the grocery store and he just got all disoriented and had to go sit down on the Old Man Bench while I finished the shopping. I think he's clear of all that stuff now, though. I'm very glad he is taking next week off work, too. I think he'll get a chance to really heal and rest.
I got a nice rest myself. The three nights we spent at the hospital were actually not bad for me. The service and facilities were really good so all I had to concentrate on was making sure he got what he needed and keeping us entertained. We watched many hours of Cash Cab, having fun picking out the New York locations as well as answering the trivia questions. We also watched some really corny old movies on TCM and took turns reading out loud from a paperback collection of The Best Short Stories of 1983. In between we got to change the bandages a lot, get CAT scans and IVs, and forage in the hospital cafeteria. As usual, he charmed the staff there and we ended up comming home with the nurses' email addresses and promises to keep in touch.
When we got back home, I went more into homemaker mode. Leit is no longer living in The House With No Working Oven, so I didn't have to poach a turkey this time. However, his new landlady is also not a cook. It looks like she ordered a complete set of kitchen equipment from a catalogue and then spent the next ten years eating take-out. There were a full set of dishes and cutlery, and lots of nice pots and pans, and almost no large bowls for mixing or serving. Although her oven worked, it was housing a toaster, a vase, some cereal bowls, two pennies, and a ballpoint pen. After carefully removing all of those and wiping out the inside, I turned it on to preheat. Leit came in and mentioned the odd smell and the smoke coming up from the burner vent. I said, "That's just the steam from where I wiped everything down." He turned on the fan but the odor continued. Finally I opened the oven again and discovered a thin plastic serving tray that had been wedged up above the electric broiler unit. OOOPS. Fortunately it wasn't too far gone, and the molten plastic actually cleaned up rather easily. Over the course of the week I churned out a cinnamon-apple-bran coffee cake, two meatloaves (one for freezing) an apple pie with oatmeal crunch topping, and a truly awesome batch of roast chicken and dumplings.
It was a bit like staying in a rented vacation house. His roommate is very sweet and we enjoyed sharing meals with her. She also lent me some chick lit for the hospital and we actually ended up trading clothes a bit by the time I left. But there was that improvisational feel to the housekeeping: What can I make with the equipment on hand? So we napped and took little walks and I cooked and did laundry and aside from calling into the office for a few meetings, it was a very pleasant and relaxing time.
It's the longest time we've spent together since we met, and we were never apart for more than a couple of hours during that time. I think it has brought us a lot closer. We got to talk a lot about our relationship and our hopes and goals and plans. I am feeling really positive and comfortable with the way everything is going for us.
And I still have the weekend to ease back into real life.