May 13, 2012
Happy Mother’s Day!
Today we slept…. Until 3:00 pm! We’re still trying to get on a normal schedule but it’s more challenging than we thought. The rest was much needed and we both are feeling a bit less road weary.
Nothing much to write as the day was spent packing for the hospital and repacking everything else since I can’t seem to find anything. Neither of us feels up to going out so for Mother’s day I “cleaned house”, lol.
May 14, 2012
What a busy day! We took a cab to the hospital and learned that if you want a taxi all you have to do is go to the nearest stand and get in the first car in line. I’m pretty happy with that as I was thinking I was going to have to hail one ala New York style.
Almost as soon as we arrived the reporter and photographer did as well… the staff was already curious about us… the Americans who come to Germany for treatment … but when they saw the media people here they realized we were here for a special reason.
We arrived to the room to find that they really went out of the way to make us feel welcome with an assortment of drinks, and robes and towels from the hospital. For those in the US- here in Germany you bring many of your own items from home, so these are special gifts. The nurses on the unit gave Chelsea a beautiful flower arrangement.
Once they learned that we wanted for me to be able to stay with Chelsea they prepared another room instead of giving me a sleeping chair. Very nice! This way I have not just a comfy place in the hospital, but I also have a work surface and they bring me meals too. This way I can be will Chelsea as much as possible until surgery.
I didn’t get a chance to get too comfy because a lot of things had to be done… admission, labs, more paperwork… and like university health care in the US, sometimes you have to go to different buildings. What’s different though is the Heart Center here includes both inpatient and outpatients in the same facility.
Once the running around was done Chelsea settled in with her iPad watching episodes of “Bones” and I tried to read but my eyes kept closing. It’s still hard for us to get more than a few hours of sleep at a time.
Windows open here too! Thankfully so because to us it seems warm inside… owing to the fact I’m sure that our house stays at pretty much 70-72F year round.
The word “sister” refers to nurses and when appropriate nuns.
May 15, 2012
Funny how both Chelsea and I woke up at 4:00 am! It seems like when we just fell back to sleep that breakfast was being served! This morning I learned that a German Bagel is more like a roll, and it seems that it’s unusual for someone not to drink either coffee or tea, lol.
We learned a lot of different things today… EKG’s have a sort of suction cup instead of adhesive pads, so Chelsea looks like she lost a fight with an octopus because she has these hickeys on her, and the nurses don’t draw blood (doctors do), and you have to buy a phone card from a vending machine to get phone, TV, and internet access.
Indeed the language IS coming along! This morning Chelsea informed me that the cleaning lady was telling me that we shouldn’t use the toilet for 10 minutes until the solution in it dissolved! We’re understanding a bit better but not speaking it very well. However, the flip side was trying to teach Thomas and Ute how to say squirrel, LOL!
We saw a Polish priest who gave us Communion. He spoke no English or German… and we don’t speak Polish, lol. But it worked out… and the wafers were the old school style that reminded me of ice cream cones… not the waffle cones but the other kind that sometimes used to come with names on them.
We learned more important things…
We’ve always known that Chelsea is one to bruise and bleed easily. It turns out that yesterday’s labs showed that she has a delay in one of her clotting factors which means that she’s can’t have an epidural for pain management. So, all of her pain management will have to come from narcotics.
The Ronald McDonald House here is amazing! The house is based on paintings by a famous artist whose name translates into “Hundred Waters”. I only took a quick pic as all we did was drop luggage off and bring me back to the hospital.
Everybody start collecting those pop tops to donate!
Another special treat today was finally meeting my dear friend Ute. We’ve been talking for over a year now on Skype and we’ve been excited about this day! A wonderful person and I couldn’t have helped Chelsea without her. To top off an already awesome experience, she brought me a beer so I could have my first German beer with her and we could celebrate the successful journey to get us where we are…
Where we’ll be tomorrow is waiting for Chelsea to come out of surgery. She’s scheduled to start at 11:00 AM (5:00 AM EST) and she’s the only patient in that surgical suite for the day. Surgery should be about a couple of hours.
Wow… the next update will be post op!
Cat
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