Category: Miscellaneous

Cross-Post: The Event, Part 6

Lulu: “Our Dada has posted the final installment of his series about what happened during and after his ruptured cerebral aneurysm.”

Although I had been discharged, that wasn’t the end of the recovery process. As previously noted, I had to stay on the nimodipine for another three weeks, which meant waking up every four hours to take two gigantic pills. I’ve never had so many alarms set on my phone in my life. (The tone I chose for these alarms was the “Barking Dog” sound, because that was the least jolting one I could find. After 20 years of having dogs around, you get used to all the barking.)

Charlee: “Hey what’s that about getting used to all the barking?”
Lulu: “I’m sure I have no idea.”

via The Event, Part 6

Cross-Post: The Event, Part 5

Lulu: “Dada has posted another entry in his series about his ruptured cerebral aneurysm in November.”
Chaplin: “This is Part 5, AKA ‘The One Where Dada Gets Discharged From The Hospital’.”
Charlee: “Ooh, that’s my favorite one.”
Lulu: “Mine too!”

Once I was well enough to leave ICU, the hospital transferred me to the “step-down unit”, also called Telemetry. (If you never heard of a unit called “Telemetry”, you’re not the only one.) I was moved by wheelchair on Saturday evening, schlepping most of my stuff—my blanket and pillow from home, the get well cards I had accumulated, the posters made by our friends’ daughter, pictures of the animals, and, of course, Substitute Charlee—on my lap. The rest of the stuff was transported in a bag by a courier, A.K.A. my wife.

via The Event, Part 5

Cross-Post: The Event, Part 4

Lulu: “Dada has posted the next installment of his series from when he was in the hospital.”
Chaplin: “Hey, look, Charlee, Substitute Charlee is back.”
Charlee: “There is no substitute for me!”

I was in the ICU for a total of nine days while they kept my blood pressure very tightly controlled and checked me daily for vasospasms. (They got a concerning doppler reading one time, so off I went with Substitute Charlee for another CT scan; it did show vasospasms were occurring, but I remained asymptomatic, and scanned clean the next day.) My cousins and a few friends continued to drop by to keep me company, which was nice, and I had a series of terrific ICU nurses to take care of me. After a few days in ICU they decided to take out my IV and put in a subclavian PICC line, so they could administer medications and draw blood without having to stick me all the time. That was a relief, although the process of getting it put in was far from fun. Once the PICC line was there I mostly forgot about it; funny what you can get used to when you have to, and when the alternative is multiple jabs with sharp pointy objects.

via The Event, Part 4

Crosspost: The Event, Part 3

Lulu: “Our Dada has posted Part 3 of his series about his aneurysm over on his blog!”
Charlee: “Is this the post with the HBO words?”
Lulu: “This is the post with the HBO words.”
Chaplin: “I think there were HBO words a lot of the time all this was going on …”

As noted in previous installments, I spent a lot of time on Thursday and Friday being unconscious or semi-conscious, and I wasn’t enjoying it very much. When I had been passed out in the living room on Thursday, and for the next several days after that, every time I fell asleep, I experienced very unusual dreams.

via The Event, Part 3

Cross-Post: The Event, Part 2

Lulu: “Dada’s write-up about his aneurysm continues over on his other blog this week!”
Charlee: “I don’t know why he even has another blog. Why does he need one when he has ours?”
Chaplin: “I think it’s so he can use bad language over there when he wants to. Sort of like HBO.”

I remember a little more from Friday, the day after my aneurysm ruptured. Not a lot more, but a little. I woke up in the hospital with no real idea exactly where I was, how I had gotten there, or how long I would be staying.

via The Event, Part 2

Cross-Post: The Event, Part 1

Lulu: “Our Dada is starting a series of posts over on his author blog about what happened to him back in November.”
Charlee: “This will explain why our blogs went on hiatus for a couple of months and, more importantly, why I went a couple of weeks without getting my lap time in his office.”
Lulu: “This is how it starts:”

So November 7th, 2019, was the day I could have died three different ways before breakfast.

Chaplin: “It’s not the usual stuff, but we thought it might be helpful to anyone who experiences the same sort of symptoms Dada did.”

via The Event, Part 1