I think some of my hesitation has been my "why or who would really care about following our daily adventures?" I don't know why I would have these thoughts as there are several blogs I enjoy reading, even some of people I have yet to meet. But, I am determined that I want to log our progress. It has to get more interesting as time goes by, doesn't it? I hope so, but for now my procrastination has left me with much to catch up on.
As I finished our last entry we were busy getting ready for our major moving sale. We were trying to clean out closets and rooms of items we would no longer need to run our household. We held the sale at a friend's house since, living in a condo, we have no way to host such a large event. We packed and stacked our living room for several weeks before we started hauling our things over to Dick's the week of July 19th. We were able to borrow several tables from our building which really helped to display items. We piled those tables with things, and in addition, had a huge pile of things to haul out to the driveway on the sale day.
In preparation, I made several very large signs to place on the main streets around Dick's home. Each sign simply said, "Big Moving Sale Today" and a directional arrow. It made for some extra work but putting up the signs and taking them down each day allowed us to control the time we were open. Besides our big signs, the only other advertising we did was list the upcoming event on Craig's List. Since we did not want anyone to bother Dick, we only listed a general intersection. So, on Thursday, July 23rd we opened the flood gates. From the time Dale started putting out signs, we had a constant stream of folks (several hundred) perusing our sale and helping us out by giving our 'stuff' a new home. Dick's neighbor was absolutely flabbergasted at the number of people we drew to the sale. We held the sale from Thursday through Saturday and got rid of most of everything. The remains we boxed up and brought home and put out for the Disabled Americans Veterans to pick up. We had a few items we brought back home to list on Craig's List. It is so interesting to me how our "stuff" seems so important to us but when it is gone, we rarely miss it.
Knowing I would soon be 'out of commisson' with my knee surgery, we kicked it in gear to get a few projects finished up. One of them was shopping for the carpet we wanted to put in our 5th wheel. We are very excited to get the old carpet out and freshen up the interior.
So, with the moving sale behind us, it was time to get ready for my upcoming total knee replacement surgery. On Friday, August 7th we checked into St. Joseph's hospital at 6 AM. By 8:30 AM I was in la la land. What a blessing that several church friends came to keep Dale company in the waiting room during the surgery.
The surgery went well. As with any major surgery, pain is part of the equation. It is almost impossible to imagine how they can go into your knee and place a piece of hardware that nearly duplicates the original! Of course, nothing is ever as good as God's design so I will have some limitations. But, overall, I should be able to walk comfortably for distances.
I recently became acquainted with Bookcrossing at http://www.bookcrossing.com/, the World's Biggest Free Book Club-Catch and Release Used Books. This is a website for book lovers to share and track books they have read. So, why do I throw this in the middle of my knee surgery post? Because on the day of my surgery I sent my first book "into the wild". Dale left it in the surgery waiting room at St.Joseph's Hospital in downtown Denver, CO. Dale and I had recently finished reading a book by Monty Roberts called Shy Boy: The Horse That Came in From the Wild. I registered it on my BookCrossing account. It is assigned a number whereby anyone who finds it can post what they are doing with the book. Ideally, I can keep track of that book and see all the hands it may fall into. Currently, there are over 800,000 members of BookCrossing in 130 countries and almost 6 million books registered. You can find or leave books anywhere; the laundry mat, a hotel lobby, doctor's offices, bus stops, etc. In addition you can get on the website and and see where people have released books in your area. Really fun, and a great way to recycle those books you want to share with others!
So, back to my story. I was released from the hospital on Monday August 10th. At home, I navigate the
house with a walker putting as much weight as is comfortable on the 'wounded' leg. I have a physical therapist that comes to the house two or three times a week and an occupational therapist that will be making calls on me. My overall health and ability is good so I may need little in the way of occupational therapy. She is going to work with me on energy conservation next week. After surgery, all your energy in directed to healing the wound so even the simplest of tasks take a great deal of energy to perform. But the physical therapy is another story. It seems all the muscles of my leg need to be retrained to respond. Regaining the full extent ion and bend of the knee is the most challenging by far. But, each day seems to bring a little more healing and a little more ease of movement.
Before I had my surgery, I ran across this cool website. If you would like to give the medical field and knee surgery a try, check out this website which enables you to be the doctor as they walk you through doing a virtual knee placement surgery. http://edheads.org/activities/knee/
We have a very busy week ahead of us with me getting the 'staples' removed from my knee incision, 3 physical therapy sessions, and Dale's Social Security Disablility hearing.
We have been waitng over a year and a half for this hearing. We have a MetLife assigned SS lawyer that will represent Dale. Our very lives hinge on the outcome of this hearing. A judge will decide if he is indeed 'disabled' to the point of not being able to hold down a job comparable to his former position at Kaiser Permanente. Of course, if it were up to us, we would love to go back in time and have all the pain and pills be just a dream. We would much rather have Dale restored to his former healthy state and be finishing up his career and following our retirement plans.
