Is this serious dedication or what? Bad news for Dad. On August 19, while working on the walkway he's putting in from the driveway to to the back of the house, Stan slipped on a little sand that was on top of the pavers, and down he went. (He has wished ever since that he could have those few seconds back.) Anyhow, I was upstairs in the kitchen when I heard him climbing up the stairs sounding exhausted (huffing and puffing would be the technical term). I asked him what was the matter, and he said that his right foot had slipped and he had fallen with all his weight on his left foot. He said that when he looked at it, he could tell it was dislocated, since it was pointing off to the left at an angle he'd never seen before, so he immediately grabbed is foot and snapped it back in place. (The doctor chuckled and said it was a good thing he did it immediately, because if he'd waited a couple of minutes, he would never have done it.) by the time he got to the kitchen, he thought it was just a bad sprain since he'd been able to walk up the stairs on it. We were supposed to go downtown to the square with our neighbors to hear Toni Tenille sing (she lives here), but after a few minutes, I could tell that wasn't going to happen. I convinced Stan to let me take him down to Urgent Care (he was wanting to wait until morning), got him the old crutches we had in the storage room, and off we went. As soon as the X-Rays came back, it was obvious that the ankle was broken, so they put a splint on his leg and sent him home for ten days to let the swelling go down before putting the cast on. You can see from the picture, that he was determined not to just lie around being unproductive. The marimba is downstairs, and he managed the stairs by sitting on his bottom and dragging the crutches along. I bought him a stool, and later put a little box under his foot to rest it on. The main problem was that he was never able to control the pain.
Nine days later, we went to see the orthopaedist expecting to have the splint replaced with a cast, but after taking another X-Ray, they sent him straight across the street to the hospital. A few hours, a metal plate, a rod and a few screws later, he was out of surgery trying to wake up. That didn't go well. The pain meds kept putting him back to sleep and his breathing was so shallow that they had to put him on oxygen, so they decided to keep him overnight. I brought him home the next day, and as you can see, crutches have been replaced with a walker. Now he not only feels old, but is acting the part.
There was no way he was going to stop and pose for a picture since he knew it would go on the blog, so I had to catch him "on the run" as you can see by the blur. Now he spends his days lying on the sofa with his foot propped up on 3 pillows. He goes back to the doctor on the 9th, and hopefully the plan is that they will put a cast on which he will have for 4-6 weeks, and then they'll replace the cast with a boot for another 4-6 weeks.
Pretty pathetic, isn't it? I have to say, though, that he's really being a good patient, and believe it or not, he thinks I'm being a good nurse. I told him that after this, he'll never get to accuse me of being an unsympathetic care giver again. I've set him up with his laptop and a couple of file boxes on top of the coffee table, and he's been working on writing his father's history. He figures this is the good thing that can come from the whole ordeal. It's something he's wanted to do for a long time, but has put off for a host of other "projects". On a side note, he just got called to be the first assistant in the High Priest Quorum. It turns out that the quorum leader is just recovering from the exact same surgery that Stan just had. So now it's Stan's turn, and if I were the 2nd assistant, I think I'd be really careful.
Nine days later, we went to see the orthopaedist expecting to have the splint replaced with a cast, but after taking another X-Ray, they sent him straight across the street to the hospital. A few hours, a metal plate, a rod and a few screws later, he was out of surgery trying to wake up. That didn't go well. The pain meds kept putting him back to sleep and his breathing was so shallow that they had to put him on oxygen, so they decided to keep him overnight. I brought him home the next day, and as you can see, crutches have been replaced with a walker. Now he not only feels old, but is acting the part.
There was no way he was going to stop and pose for a picture since he knew it would go on the blog, so I had to catch him "on the run" as you can see by the blur. Now he spends his days lying on the sofa with his foot propped up on 3 pillows. He goes back to the doctor on the 9th, and hopefully the plan is that they will put a cast on which he will have for 4-6 weeks, and then they'll replace the cast with a boot for another 4-6 weeks. 
Pretty pathetic, isn't it? I have to say, though, that he's really being a good patient, and believe it or not, he thinks I'm being a good nurse. I told him that after this, he'll never get to accuse me of being an unsympathetic care giver again. I've set him up with his laptop and a couple of file boxes on top of the coffee table, and he's been working on writing his father's history. He figures this is the good thing that can come from the whole ordeal. It's something he's wanted to do for a long time, but has put off for a host of other "projects". On a side note, he just got called to be the first assistant in the High Priest Quorum. It turns out that the quorum leader is just recovering from the exact same surgery that Stan just had. So now it's Stan's turn, and if I were the 2nd assistant, I think I'd be really careful.
