Day ?

Not sure what day in the lineup this is, Day 9? Heck, I don't even know what day of the week it is! Yesterday was a bit of a disappointment, but we did manage to find some humor. When Nate got sick after breakfast I called the doctor who told us to come over to the clinic right away for an x-ray and blood work. She wanted us to avoid having to go to the ER where we'd have to sit and wait. As soon as Dr. Lambert saw the x-ray, she immediately knew he had an ileus. She showed us the x-ray image and walked us through Nate's "new" abdominal cavity. She also showed us his most recent post op CT scan so we could see what she did in surgery. She's seriously like Mother Teresa.

Anyway, she felt it would be safest to go back to the hospital until Nate's bowel woke up again. It's not uncommon to be readmitted with an ileus after surgery. Once we decided that was the best plan of action, she paused and said, "Well, there's one more thing that's kind of dumb", then she looked down and got a little flushed. I got a little nervous about what was coming next. She proceeded to tell us that in order to avoid the ER and admit Nate from the clinic, that he'd have to go in the ambulance. To understand the irony of this, see the picture below...

 

This was taken from the window at the end of our hall on the 7th floor. Dr. Lambert's office is on the 5th floor of the building in the picture. You can see the roof of the ER in the lower left of the picture. I wondered if they might just put the ambulance in reverse, back the ambulance up to the doors, load Nate in, and drive forward to the ER doors.

Oh no, that would be too easy. They actually make them take the long way around the hospital which is all of .7 miles. The hospital knows what a dumb policy it is, so they don't even charge the patient. They eat the cost.

It ended up being kind of a disappointment for Nate's first (and hopefully last) ambulance rides. He didn't even get the lights!

 It took 5 hours for us to get admitted. You can see the "relief" on Nate's face to finally get to his room.

So here we sit, just waiting for his bowels to wake up! My kids think it's a great thing to be able to pray about!