Greetings from my hospital room. I am supposed to be fast asleep until my next vitals check...however this can't happen and here's why. The meds I'm taking cause my oxygen levels to decrease to some extent...so I've been fitted with a some apparatus whose name I can't spell correctly that keeps a constant count of my oxygen level. When it dips too low, an alarm goes off, reminding me t0 draw a deeper breath. So, every time I doze off, I am awakened. I trust my nurse's judgement, but DAMN! I've had a somewhat rough 24 hours! I need some yummy REM cycles. Yeah, the RN just came in and said verbatim, "Breathing is more important than sleeping right now." Harrumph. I feel badly for Katie and Carrie who are snuggled on the AeroBed they snuck in. They are using earplugs so my No-Airraids don't turn into a group event. (And if I need them, I've been instructed to whip ice chips at them.)
Today has been rife with victory, though. The surgery went better than Dr. T. expected; as soon as I woke up on the table, I was able to move my feet, bend my knees, squeeze someone's hand, etc. It felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of the collected shoulders of Team Dana. And later, my slightly-hard-assed-but-ultimately-awesome nurse, Neringa, threw down a challenge and said that before I got ready for bed, I had to sit up and hang my feet over the edge of the bed. (It was n0t dissimilar to a Physical Challenge in the old game show Double Dare. Does anyone else remember that show?) Well, I accepted the triple-dog-dare (God knows it d0esn't get m0re serious than that), and even stood up for a hot minute! Wa-bam! It wasn't fun, but the forward progress feeks sublime.
There is so much m0re I want to say but this entry has already taken about an hour to type, for the love of crap! I am so grateful for what today has brought, and I'm optimistic about tomorrow, too. I mean, if n0thing else, it's one more day that I don't have a spinal tumor, right!? High-fives all around.
You are awesome. :) SUPER high five.
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