101 HOME

Finally, the day came, 7 weeks and 5 days after it started.  So, for arguments sake, 8 weeks.  I thought I would just be able to get up and leave, but I had to wait for a Doctor to sign the order.  Unfortunately, there was no telling when that would be.  Breakfast came and went.  I had a physio session and had been granted independent walking privileges the day before.  I went all the way to the end of a very long hallway and all the way back.  My therapist watched me from the nurse’s station, but did not intervene.

A little while later I walked down to the nurse’s station where there was a scale.  Patients were not allowed to use it un-supervised, so I grabbed my therapist and jumped on the scale.  I weighed in at 240 pounds, a sixty plus pound weight loss.  Other than surviving the whole ordeal, this is the one bright spot to come out of it.  I am determined to not only keep it off, but to lose another 15 pounds and get down to 225.  I’ll have some speed when and if I can ever get back to playing hockey.

Lunch time came and went and just as lunch was delivered, my old work partner arrived for his second visit.  After, I finished eating and while we were chatting up a storm, the nurse came down and gave me the words I had been waiting to hear.  “You’re free, the Doctor just signed the order”.  I already had my bags packed, Griff grabbed my electric fan and get-well poster and we headed for the door.  A quick call to Renee and we sat outside and waited.  Then I remembered I needed my prescriptions and trekked back inside.

MY RED CROSS LOANER
BOOKED FOR 3 MONTHS

LARRY ONE OF MY
ROOM-MATES

Renee arrived, and brought my loaner walker and loaded all my stuff into the truck.  Then she brought Toby out for our big reunion.  We had not seen each other since the evening I was loaded into the ambulance.  He didn’t even notice me at first with all the new smells around the hospital.  Plus, I was in a full beard and my voice was very weak.  Finally, he figured out who I was an gave me a great greeting.  Then it was into the truck, Renee driving as I have been banned until my air-cast comes off.

 Toby was constantly nosing and kissing me as we pulled into the parking lot at London Drugs.  I made the long walk into the pharmacy section and got my prescriptions in.  Of course, there was a long lineup.  By now, the excitement and all the exercise I had been doing had taken its toll.  I was exhausted and collapsed into the seat of my walker and began the wait.  I started getting dizzy and was sweating buckets.  Finally, I had the prescriptions in hand and started the trek back to the truck.

I got another greeting from Toby and the air conditioner blowing in my face helped me to revive a little.  Then I was home.  I sat on my walker in the visitor parking, just behind my place.  I was feeling just awful and must have looked it as well.  I had to wait while Renee parked the truck and came to open the balcony door. I was dizzy and sweating and feeling awful, I started slumping lower and lower in the seat of the walker. Because I was slumped over and looking awful, my neighbour’s daughter came out to make sure I was ok.  I assured her I was, but I really wasn’t too sure myself.

WAITING TO GO HOME

We had arrived home on garbage day, how appropriate, because that’s what I felt like at the time.  Renee was trying to turn the truck around to go park on the street and got trapped behind the garbage truck.  I had no idea where she was or what was taking so long.  It’s only a one block walk from the street to the house.  But, finally she opened the balcony door and came out to help me in.  She carried my stuff in and brought my walker up the stairs.  The 6 stairs for some reason looked so intimidating.

Finally, I got up the stairs into the house and slumped down into my recliner.  I was home after being away since June 21.  I reclined in the chair and took a nap.  Now, the rehab would begin in earnest and I would have to do it without medical assistance.  Renee was here until Labour Day and was a big help with meal preparation and all the little things that needed to be done.  I couldn’t make it up the inside stairs so taking a shower was not in the cards, nor was sleeping in my own bed.  So, I spent the night in my recliner.  Not a problem as I have fallen asleep in it many times before.

Things had changed around here while I was gone, the building right across from me was still under construction when I left, was now complete and all 6 units were occupied with new neighbours.  The main road was now open and so was the kids park up the street.  But, I was home, no matter how much it had changed.

100 PAGE ONE HUNDRED

On Thursday, they wheeled me down to the gym and just had me do the stairs, without the walk in between.  I went up and down the stairs twice and sat down in the wheelchair.  That’s when it started to happen again.  My heart rate spiked, and I got dizzy and started to sweat.  They quickly wheeled me back to my room and got me into bed.  I didn’t pass out this time, but I sure wasn’t feeling good.  Initially I was going to skip the afternoon session, but was feeling better, so I went for a short walk.

These pass out sessions resulted in yet another battery of tests.  I had a ECG done to determine if I had developed a heart problem.  It came back negative and the Doctor came in to tell me that there was no indication of any problems.  He said there was an indication that I had suffered a heart attack in the past, but that was false.

I was also sent down for an echo-cardiogram on my heart.  This test lasted for well over an hour and was basically the same test as done on pregnant women, only instead of looking at a baby, they are watching your heart.  I really hit it off with the technician and we chatted for a long time, even after the test was over.  He said that my heart looked to be in great shape for someone of my age.  There was no indication of any irregular rhythms, but he was not allowed to do a full analysis and present it to me.

When the Doctor came in to tell me these results, he saw my hands shaking badly.  My hands have always had a little tremor even when I was a young child.  It was far more pronounced now.  I put it down to side effects from the sepsis as well as the fact that I was so weak from the loss of body mass and being in bed for so long.  Because of his observations he sent me for a CAT can of my brain to rule out the possibility of Parkinson’s Disease.  Nobody ever came to tell me the results, but I assume it was negative, because I’m sure they would have told me if I had it.

But, then the problem was solved by me, quite by accident.  One of the little treats that I really got into was gum.  I had not chewed any gum in years, but it helped to keep my breath fresh and was a little treat to boot.  It all had to be sugarless gum because of my diabetes.  Caitlin and Renee would bring me Trident and one-day Caitlin brought me a plastic container of Dentyne.  I was sitting eating my dinner and had my reading glasses on and happened to glance at the Dentyne container and glaring out at me was the one word, Aspartame.  I am highly sensitive to it and in larger doses, like a soft drink, it will trigger a migraine.

Seeing that I began to wonder and looked it up on Google.  In the list of many side effects of Aspartame were the words, may cause elevated heart rate.  Curiously enough on both days that this happened to me I was chewing the Dentyne gum while doing the physio.  I immediately stopped using the Dentyne and threw the rest away.  In fact, I stopped chewing gum altogether, even though the Trident doesn’t use Aspartame.

RUNNING SHOE ON MY LEFT FOOT
TO BALANCE OUT THE CAST. MADE WALKING
SLIGHTLY EASIER

Come Monday morning, I told my therapist what I discovered and having gone three days without the gum, I was ready to try again.  I walked all the way down to the gym, went up and down the stairs twice and then walked all the way back to my room, with absolutely no ill effects.  I was a little tired as it was a long way, but I was in no danger of passing out and my heart rate remained steady.  I was back on track for my newly revealed release date of Thursday, August 29.

It, the parole, didn’t happen on August 29, I had to wait another two days before I was finally released.  The holdup here was waiting for physio to present their findings to a medical board of Doctors, nurses and physios and that was not going to happen until August 30^th.  Oh well, what’s another couple of days in this lengthy adventure.

How about that, my long, long ordeal was coming to an end.  Well, at least the hospital portion of it.  Now that it was so close, my “1” mantra was getting very difficult to maintain.  I had a date and I was now starting to focus on getting out.  Along those lines I ordered a rental walker from the Red Cross that Renee could pick up on Wednesday, the day before my release.

099 BREAKTHROUGH

Thursday, I finally made a breakthrough.  I stood up, grabbed my walker and did a full 75 steps to the end of the hall.  There I got weighed in my wheelchair and later they weighed the wheelchair empty.  The result showed I had lost 40 pounds.  However, I have no way of knowing for sure as the last time I weighed myself was in 2015 and then I weighed 290.  I would guess that at the start of this ordeal I was probably 300 pounds or more.

Friday dawned on my next attempt and this time I managed a full 226 steps and made it all the way around the perimeter of the ward.  I had to sit down and rest 4 times doing it, but I managed it.  Later that day I was told that I was on the list to be moved from the medical ward, downstairs to the rehab/physio ward as soon as a bed became available.

I figured it would be another week or so at minimum, but more likely longer than that.  For me to get to the rehab ward, someone in there would have to get out.  My current roommate, “The Complainer” had been in the rehab ward for several weeks but was now back on the medical ward.  That was one of the things that he complained most bitterly about.  The rules on the medical ward were far stricter than they were in rehab.  I also figured I would get ample warning of the transfer.

On Saturday afternoon, I packed up my stuff and moved downstairs to the basement, rehab/physio ward.  Of course, since there are no therapists working on the weekends, I was unable to practice any walking until Monday.  This is a much older part of the hospital and has not been renovated, so it’s a little dingier.  The staffing leaves a lot to be desired as well with three nurses for 39 patients per shift and it’s an 8-hour shift down here, so we get three shift changes per day.  There are also two care aides, but they only work two of the shifts.  There are lots of physio therapists, but they only work day shift during the week.

Late Sunday morning Caitlin and Trevor arrived for a visit and minutes later Karl and Lizeth arrived.  They bundled me into a wheelchair, grabbed my lunch tray and wheeled me down to the cafeteria and into the outside courtyard, where I ate my lunch.  It’s the first time since entering the hospital six weeks ago, that I have been outside, and it feels good.  The kids stuck around, and we had a great visit for two full hours until they had to leave and wheeled me back to my room.

Monday dawns and shortly after breakfast the therapists are in to get me up.  Welcome news for me as I pretty much just laid around all weekend.  They had me walk with the walker down to the nurse’s station, some 200 steps and then wheeled me back.  One therapist walks beside me ready to grab me, the other walks behind with the wheelchair in case I start to fall or get tired.  This was repeated in the afternoon.  That’s the advantage of the ward is that with all the dedicated therapists you get two or three sessions per day.

On Tuesday, I walked all the way to the gym and did the stairs.  It’s only 4 stairs but I went up and down them.  This is in preparation for going home.  I sat down to rest on the huge physio bed and started to feel dizzy.  I broke into a powerful sweat and despite sitting and resting, my heart rate spiked up to 132.  I then passed out and fell back on the bed.  When I woke up, I was feeling better.  The therapists went down to my room and wheeled my bed down to the gym.  They got me in it and wheeled me back to my room.

I missed the afternoon session as I wasn’t feeling too good and a technician came in and did an ECG on me to rule out a heart problem.  They also took blood samples.  Later, the Doctor came in to   Initially tell me that both the ECG and blood tests were negative, revealing nothing had gone wrong with my heart.  It remained a mystery what had happened.

The following day they kept me to a short walk to the nurse’s station in both the morning and afternoon.  I had been told that when I got to the rehab ward that it would be a maximum of two more weeks before I would be sent home.  I was hoping my little pass-out session didn’t delay that outcome.

098 A DETERMINED EFFORT

After the Friday failure, I got even more determined to do better the next time.  I spent the weekend trying to sit as upright as possible, for longer periods of time.  The idea being to clear my head and get it used to being upright again after so many weeks in bed.  It got so that late Sunday night I could sit upright for just over 2 hours at a time, but let me tell you, the effort wore me out.  By the time I would lie down again, I was sweating and tired, and feeling like I just did a two-hour gym workout.

Monday came, and I was sitting up and dressed by 5:30 AM, just waiting for Physio to arrive, so I could make my next attempt at walking.  I was determined to do better today.  I knew I would.  I forgot that I had to be hooked up to my IV anti-biotics, so I had to lie down again for those to empty into me.  That half hour came and went, and they disconnected me from my PICC line again.

Breakfast came, and I ate my warm bread, sitting up and waiting.  Breakfast always comes around 8:00 AM and the Physio’s always come in around 9:00 AM.  It came and went, so did 10:00 AM and still no Physio.  I was getting more disappointed that I wouldn’t get a chance to walk today.  Finally, at 11:30 AM they arrived.  But it wasn’t my usual two, so I had to explain the whole story again.

Finally, it was time, I was going to walk.  The walker was moved into position and I had forgotten Friday’s training on how to stand up.  Who would have thought one would need to be taught to stand?  Anyway, I got the retraining down and finally it was time.  I pushed up from the bed ad grabbed the handles of the walker, and I was upright.

Knees were weak, and I was shaky.  Then the waves of dizziness and nausea washed over me again, only this time I was able to fight through it and remain upright.  Now the moment of truth, I was going to walk.  Physio suggested I try walking in place first and it turned out to be good advice.  I took one step, here we go.  I took a second step and then a third.  Four, five and six and I was done.

SIX STEPS, STANDING IN PLACE

 I was shaking and sweating like I had run somewhere, the dizziness was getting worse, and I fell backwards onto the bed.  My head cleared much quicker this time and I didn’t puke so that was progress.  But it was still very disappointing.  Both Physios complimented me and told me that it was a great effort on my part.  One of them told me that some people don’t get that much done on their second try after being bed ridden that long.  It was still a blow, but I got over it quickly and was determined to do better tomorrow.

The next day, I went through the usual rigmarole in getting ready and then it was time, I took a few steps standing in place to get the feel and then off I went.  I walked across the room to the door and back again.  A grand total of 10 steps.  It wasn’t much, but it was a start.  I was pleased with myself after the effort of the past two tries.

The next day they loaded me in my wheelchair and rolled me down the hall of the newly renovated second half of the ward.  Into the physio gym we went.  It was so new that the parallel bars were still wrapped in brown paper and packing material.  They spent 10 minutes unwrapping it and I would become the first ever person to use them.  Up I went and down to the end, a quick turn to the left and back to the beginning.  Another turn to the left, and here comes the dizziness and nausea again.  I sat down in the wheelchair and they gave me a basin into which I promptly puked.

I sat there for 30 minutes with my head between my knees, until the dizziness passed, and they rolled me back to my room.  I was very thankful to get back in bed, but I made the accomplishment of getting in 20 steps.  That’s double the total from yesterday.  Things are looking up.  Well, I spent a lot of time looking down until my head cleared.  It would not be the last time this happened, but the last for awhile.

097 THE FIRST TRY

Then the day finally came, I was given clearance for weight bearing.  This gave me bathroom privileges and the chance to attempt walking.  I don’t know who was ore excited about it, me or the physio-therapists.  They had been trying for a couple of weeks to get permission to get me up.  It had started with instructions to start sitting more upright in bed and for longer periods of time.  I would crank the bed up as far as it would go, to get to an almost upright position, but not quite.

Prior to this everything was done either semi-reclined or flat on my back, including eating.  Now I was sitting in an upright position to eat, but I tired quickly.  The next step was to swing my legs over the side of the bed and eat my meals that way.  I could see out the window into the little walking park just outside.

Lying back, I could see out the window at the trees, but could not tell for sure what the weather was doing.  All the smoke in the air didn’t help.  I also didn’t know about the park until I could sit upright.  This was all to acclimatize my body to being upright after being prone for so many weeks.  I still had it in my head that as soon as I could put weight on my foot, I would be off walking and quickly regain my strength.

Finally, the day came, and I was pumped up, I was ready, this would be the first step as it were into going home.  I had Renee bring in a pair of shorts and a T-shirt for me.  Up until this point I had been stark naked under a single sheet.  I’m usually warm at the best of times, and my body doesn’t tolerate heat well.  Combine that with the fever I had been running and the summer heat, I was cooking all the time.  But I digress, I had my shorts and Dri-fit t-shirt on and I was ready to go.

I had been sitting up for about 90 minutes waiting for the physio team to arrived.  There were two of them and they brought me a walker.  I remember thinking that it was silly, why would I need a walker?  Well, apparently the physios had done this before and knew what was coming.  I didn’t, or at least had convinced myself that I wouldn’t be that guy.

They moved the walker in front of me, lowered my bed so my feet just touched the floor, and gave me a complex set of instructions for how to stand up.  Again, I was thinking, how silly, I know how to stand up, I’ve been doing it all my life.  But I followed the instructions and got set to push off.  I gabbed the handles of the walker and lifted myself off the bed.  Well, that’s not quite true, I needed the assistance of both physio-therapists to make the move because I was so incredibly weak.

Up, up and away!  I rocked back and forth and gave a heave and I was up.  First time since July 8 and this was now well into August.  Immediately, I knew things were not as they should be.  My legs were weak and barely able to hold me.  My arms were weak and could barely hold the walker.  Then my head started spinning.  I was so dizzy I could barely see, and then I started to puke.

They laid me back down on the bed and I promptly passed out.  I was out cold.  I have no idea how long I was out, but it couldn’t have been too long.  I had a cold towel over my face and a sense of crushing disappointment rolled over me.  They tried to reassure me that this was normal for someone who has been bed ridden for so long.

But, it was not how I had pre-visualized this going.  I was supposed to be up and walking, albeit with a walker.  Hear I was just figuring out just how weak I had become and the realization dawned on me that this was going to be a great deal tougher than I had thought.  I was up for the challenge for sure, and I was determined to get going, but I had to let the disappointment dissipate.  Especially since physio, shut down any further attempts for today.

Back to the drawing board as they say.  I spent an hour or two feeling sorry for myself and dealing with the failure.  Then I got determined.  I started sitting on the edge of the bed for hours at a time, getting my head used to being upright.  This was on a Friday and physio was off for the weekend, so there would not be another attempt until Monday.

096 PREVISUALIZATION

Almost from the day I got my walking cast on, I was previsualizing what would happen.  Just like I used to do before hockey games, when I would stand out by the rink and previsualize what was going to happen and what I was going to do.  It seemed to work well in game situations and I think I always played better when I did it.  I told anyone who would listen what was going to happen when I was given clearance for weight bearing.  I told my son, Karl about it and he paid me a great compliment by saying, “all good athletes do that”.  I thanked him for believing I was an athlete.

Anyway, I was lying in bed and was losing muscle mass by the minute, but I didn’t realize I was also losing fat, which was a good thing.  I kept saying that as soon as I could get up walking that my muscle mass would start to rebuild, because I would be up and walking around the hospital regaining my strength.  More on this, or at least the reality in another chapter.

I had numerous scenarios in my head of getting up and wandering around the hospital.  I did it after each of my three knee surgeries, so why should this be any different?  My Doctors, Nurses and Physiotherapists tried to tone me back a bit by telling me not to get too far ahead of myself.  Here I was breaking my cardinal rule of just living one day at a time.  Here I was thinking ahead.

No matter which scenario I went through, I visualized it to be a successful conclusion, with me getting up out of bed and immediately being able to walk around the hospital.  Maybe even outside, where I hadn’t been since July 8 and here it was late July.  I was figuring on being released by July 31 and putting an end to this lengthy three weeks stay in hospital.  Little did I know, this was a pipe dream at best.  I had no clue that I would be there for another 5 weeks.  Oh well, as they say, “ignorance is bliss”.

Meanwhile the days kept passing and the visitors kept coming.  I was using cellular data to access Facebook to keep up to date and post updates of my own.  Then suddenly I got a notice from Telus telling me I had burned through my “massive” 1 gig of data.  I had no clue about this either as I rarely ever use data.  Most of the time I’m connected to WIFI, either at home or the WIFI in my truck through OnStar.

Speaking of the truck, and possibly a premonition of what was coming.  When I headed up to the lake on June 22, I had my iPhone connected to the Apple play stereo I had installed in the truck earlier in the year.  I was listening to TSN 1040 the sports talk shows all the way to Kamloops.  On my old radio, the signal would die just before Chilliwack.

Just as I was making the turn off the highway on to the Yellowhead highway, on the last leg of the trip to Barriere.  I decided to switch to my music library on the phone.  I told Siri too play my music library shuffled.  The first thing out of the speakers was my Mother’s voice.  She said, “I just don’t know when I will be back from the lake this year”.  More prophetic words could not have been said, and it gave me chills to hear her voice, especially this close to the cabin.  Mom passed away in 1992.

The stranger part of this is that while I have several sound bytes of my Mother speaking, they are stored on my desktop computer at home and my laptop which was in the back of the truck and turned off.  There is not one sound byte from my Mother on my iPhone or iPad.  So where did the voice come from?  As I mentioned earlier, my Mother came to visit me when I was first brought into Kamloops Hospital.  So, here I was with absolutely no idea when I would be released from hospital and conversely, when I would be home from the lake.

The days continued to pass, and I continued to dream about getting out and getting home.  I expected to be weak and I expected to need rehab before I would be able to get back on the ice.  I even expected that I might end up missing a whole season, but it’s a little disappointing when the truth smacks you hard in the face.

095 STAFFING

Staffing was a major problem.  There were shortages because of low staffing levels, summer holidays and if a nurse booked off sick it leads to absolute chaos, until and if a replacement could be found.  The nurses and care aides were run off their feet.  There were for the most part, some amazing nurses and care aides, a small minority not so much.  I mentioned my introduction to the hospital and first encounter with Zoltan (yes, it’s his real name), he didn’t make a great impression on me that first day, but he changed my mind as time went on.

He was assigned to me several more times and I came to change my initial impression of him.  Yes, he was quite brusk, but was very efficient and helpful in later encounters.  He never failed to help me when needed and never failed to answer the call bell.  That wasn’t the case with all the staff.  On the medical ward that I was on, each nurse was assigned to care for up to 9 patients.  By necessity, they had to take care of the sickest ones first and I guess the complainers.

Some people would ring their call bells at the drop of a hat and for some of the stupidest reasons.  I never rang the call bell unless I really needed help, the nurses loved me for that reason.  But, they would also give me shit because I didn’t call, especially when it came to pain management.  As I was told it is far easier to control pain if you get out ahead of it, rather than waiting until it’s well established.  Then it is much harder to get under control.  By the time I figured it out, I almost didn’t need pain meds anymore.

This also worked to my advantage, because lots of times the nurses during some of the rare quiet times would come and sit and visit with me.  The company was wonderful, and it was great swapping stories.  They were all interested in this story of how I came to be there, but when they found out I was a retired policeman, they were interested in career highlights, or war stories as we call them.  They had their own stories to tell as well and cops and nurses just seem to be able to relate to one another.  I guess that’s why, so many cops are dating or married to nurses.

I mentioned Nurse Tim in Kamloops, but I also had his counterpart in Ridge Meadows.  His name was Waylon.  What makes him more significant was he was a youngish Asian fellow, with a Southern country singer name.  He explained that his Dad was a huge country music fan and a big fan of Waylon Jennings, hence the name.

I didn’t get Waylon assigned to me that often, but really appreciated it when I did.  He was very attentive and could almost sense when something wasn’t quite right with me.  We spent hours just chatting, especially on night shift when it was quieter with the bulk of the patients asleep.

CLOSE UP OF SCAR

STILL SWOLLEN

Conversely, there were the ones who weren’t quite as attentive, and I really didn’t bother to learn their names.  One I dubbed “The Ice Queen”.  She was also Asian, and tall and slim.  That all makes no never mind, it’s just to give some context.  On nightshift, she would walk around the ward with one of the heated blankets draped over her shoulders.  She would rarely come into the room and a lot of times would not bother to answer the call bell.  She would turn it off remotely and then never show up.

There was one night that she came in at 6:00 PM and that was the last time I saw her.  I had trouble sleeping that night and never saw her making rounds or coming in.  The next nurse I saw was at 6:00 AM when the day nurse came in.

LEFT FOOT AFTER 3 WEEKS
OF TREATMENT

LOOKING MORE GRIZZLED
ALL THE TIME

Of the care aides that I dealt with on this ward, the most amazing one was Marcy.  I never had to use the call bell to ask for anything from her, she just always seemed to show up at just the right time.  If the ice had melted in my water jug, she would bring me a new jug of water.  It’s too bad Ridge Meadows lost her.  She had been there for 27 years and suddenly they started screwing her around on shifts.  The administrators changed the care aides from a 12-hour shift to an 8-hour shift and took them off night shift, which just increased the workload for nurses.  Marcy decided, enough was enough and transferred to Eagle Ridge Hospital.  Their gain, I would say.