It's been a bad week.

Monday we got a call from Jay's surgeon's office that he would be going in for his minor surgery on December 12. We thought that was good news because these days, sometimes people are waiting ridiculously long times to get in for fairly minor (or major) surgeries. We went about our business that day until the evening. We had Bible study, and about half way through that, Jay ducked out because he wasn't feeling well. Nothing new really. He has been feeling pretty bad for about 3 weeks now.

When it came time to get into bed and he pulled off his shirt I noticed a lump/boil/whatever-you-want-to-call-it on his back and I was very concerned. It was about the size of the palm of my hand, red, raised about 3/4 of an inch and hard as a rock. He was in so much pain, more than he had been in the previous few days. I said we should probably call an ambulance because he couldn't have gotten himself up and driven himself to the hospital. He has since told me that he just about told me to just leave it and we would see how it looked in the morning. Before he could debate I had called 911 and an ambulance was on the way. When the paramedics got here, they looked at the spot and thought it looked like an infected insect bite. But honestly, what sort of bugs are still crawling around at -30C outside? We knew it wasn't that, but were still concerned about it.

So at 10:30pm Monday night they drove him to St. Paul's Hospital and I followed behind a little ways so I could bring Jay his wheelchair and some clothes (though I did forget to bring him a shirt or a jacket :P) When I got there they were drawing blood samples to test and see if he had an infection. They were monitoring his heart and blood pressure. They also started IV antibiotics. That was about all they did. By around 1:30 in the morning they said he could go home, but that he should come back at 7am for more IV antibiotics. We crawled into bed around 2am, and the alarm went off at 6am for him to get up. He decided I didn't need to come with him and he went off to the hospital.

When I hadn't heard from him by 10:30am I was starting to get a little concerned. Finally an ER nurse called me and said they were admitting him and treating him aggressively with antibiotics because he had a pretty bad infection. By this point in time I had called to take the day off of work because I had hardly gotten any sleep, and I figured they might end up admitting him. I went to the hospital and he was still in the ER. Some doctors came in to check on him and looked at his back and figured they might have to cut into it to see what the problem was. Before I knew it they were moving him up to ICU and putting a direct line in his neck.

By this time I decided I should probably call my parents. I called and ended up talking to my sister and telling her everything and she passed it on to them. They were kind enough to come up and hang out with me for a while, even though I didn't ask them to. By this time Jay had asked one of the nurses what type of infection they had suspected. She said that the worse case scenario was that he had necrotizing fasciitis (NF). To a lot of you, that might not mean much....but to me, that is the infection that killed one of my mom's best friends. Also known as flesh eating disease. When they said that I was just panicking inside. The doctor decided to do a procedure called debridement to remove the dead tissue and see what it looked like underneath. He said that the skin underneath looks very healthy and was pleased with the results. Jay currently has a large open sore on his back where they did that, but it sounds like within a couple of days they will sew it up, once they are sure it is free of infection.

Thankfully by Tuesday night they had ruled out NF but they still didn't know what it was. Yesterday when I went up to see Jay he looked SO much better than he had all day on Tuesday. He wasn't feverish anymore and wasn't as uncomfortable. One of the results came back saying that one of the bacterias was strep, which interestingly enough is the one that causes NF, but I guess it depends where that bacteria gets in to. Yesterday the nurses had said they were wanting to move him out of ICU but there wasn't a bed available in observation for him yet. He is still on isolation which means you have to gown and glove to go in to see him. One of the nurses speculated last night that he will likely be in for at least 7-10 days so they can run a full course of IV antibiotics through him. Also, two of the nurses who came in to see him last night said that he dodged a pretty big bullet, and that if he had left it any longer before seeking treatment, things could have been MUCH worse for him. Jay also talked to his doctor about the possibility of having his other surgery performed while he is in the hospital, and they haven't ruled it out.

What a week it has been so far! I am so glad and thankful he is doing so much better! I thank you for your thoughts and prayers in the last couple of days. Please don't stop praying for him because he still has some recovery time ahead. The doctor yesterday told Jay that he figured it was a pressure sore on his back that had gotten infected. Hopefully we can stop any pressure spots on his back and possibly get him a new backrest for his chair. I know now that we are going to be a lot more critical of red or dry spots on his back because that's what this spot looked like before it ballooned up. Just a dry red spot that had been there ever since he started using his current chair (around the time we got married...almost three years ago!).

Well time to go start my day, and head over to visit my sweetheart. When the person you love most in the world is sick it sure puts into perspective what is really important.

Snow

With some of the first snow falls of the year occurring within the last week or so I have thought more about shoveling and snow removal in general. I kept saying to Jay before it snowed, "We really need to get a shovel before it snows, or it will snow and we will be snowed in without a shovel." And it seems to me that there is a new bylaw about shoveling your walkways within 48 hours of a snowfall in Saskatoon. The day after the first snow I headed to Walmart to pick up a shovel and some ice melt (of course it rained before it snowed so it was a skating rink under the snow). The ice melt worked very well and I got a chance to try out the new shovel the other day. It seems to work well, but we have only had a half inch of snow here or there. Thankfully we are still working on getting our base layer of snow/ice on the gravel driveway so I haven't had to attempt to shovel that. That should be fun :P

I have noticed since the last couple of snowfalls that our neighbours on either side are very keen to get out and shovel at the first available chance after the snow quits. This morning I got up and came out to the living room to look outside and the house on the east side of us hadn't shoveled yet. But by the time I was ready to go out and shovel ours (and beat them to it...), he had shoveled. The neighbours on the west side of us had also shoveled by the time I got out there. I think that this may be good motivation for me to get out and shovel shortly after the snowfall. I know it is not always possible when I have to go to work first thing in the morning, but seeing the neighbours keeping their sidewalks cleared really does inspire me to keep ours done. I am still hopeful that one of them owns a snowblower and that if we get another blizzard they will help poor little ole me dig out.

When will life get back to normal? I don't blame it on Jay, but he has been sick/in pain for the last two weeks and has that ever thrown our lives out of whack. We have both had a lack of sleep (though thankfully I am able to sleep through quite a bit), but last night was definitely the worst for me. I think it was worse because I had a full day of work today and I felt like a zombie for the better part of the day. This morning I could hardly string a coherent sentence together. And I just realized that it is Thursday and that I always do our laundry on Thursday and I completely forgot this morning.

I am glad that Jay went to see the specialist on Tuesday, as he gave some good answers to our many questions. However, one of his bright ideas for Jay resulted in our lack of sleep last night. Jay will be going for surgery sometime in the next couple of weeks which should help to alleviate his pain in the long run, but will require, what seems like, a fairly lengthy recovery and stay in the hospital. It will definitely be strange being at home by myself for a week or a week and a half.

Today at work I had to confront one of my clients about canceling too many of her appointments. We do have a cancellation policy stating that we need to have 24 hours notice or we can charge you a $20 cancellation fee. I told the client this, and she said she didn't know about it. When I first took her as a client she told me that she is on call at work all the time and may need to cancel appointments at the last minute. We always try to accommodate people so I said that as long as she could give us as much notice as possible it shouldn't be a problem. Well earlier this week she canceled three appointments in two days. I thought that that was pretty extreme and was starting to get the feeling that she didn't care too much about coming in. I told her this this evening and she told me that because I wasn't direct with her from the beginning about our cancellation policy that she shouldn't be penalized for canceling so many appointments. She said if I had told her that in the beginning that she would have not accepted shifts at work and kept her massage appointments. I was quite frustrated by this point and feeling flustered because I am not good at confronting people. She asked if I was still going to treat her, and I said I don't know. And she just kept saying that I wasn't direct with her so it wasn't her fault, blah blah blah. Finally I agreed to keep seeing her. I was honestly hoping that she might just get mad or frustrated and not want to see me anymore. I really don't want to treat her, I feel frustrated when I am treating her and I don't necessarily feel like I am giving her the best possible treatment I can because I am frustrated with her. And she is an SGI client, so I get paid substantially less for her treatments than I would for an average half hour treatment. What a hassle! Hopefully I won't have to see her too much longer, and after having this conversation hopefully she will stop canceling all of her appointments :P

I am off to bed!

I am so tired. *sigh*

I can't believe it's the middle of November already!!

I think this may be the easiest Christmas (shopping-wise) we have ever had. Since we decided to get each other some technology in October and November we don't need to shop for each other. Since we are going to be in Swift Current we will very likely miss the gift exchange with my dad's family so we don't have to buy anything for that. Then the other day I heard that The Phantom of the Opera is coming to Saskatoon and decided I wanted a ticket for Christmas in our family draw. Then after talking to my mom and some other family members we decided that the six of us are going to go as gifts to each other for the family draw. (I am so excited!!!) So now, basically all I have left to buy is something for Jay's parents, the nephews, coworkers and a few friends. That doesn't seem like such a daunting task now.

Please pray for Jason. He has had the stomach flu since Thursday morning and it is really taking a toll on him. We are at our wits end to know what to do to make him feel better. I am sure it just needs to run its course but I have never seen a stomach flu last so long.

Strange

I mixed up the dough for my peppernuts last night and let it chill over night. I had decided this year to try a new recipe. Last year I asked my aunt Margaret for her recipe because I wanted something similar to what I had eaten before and there were a lot of different recipes on the internet. I made hers last year and in my opinion they didn't taste much like hers. This year I found a different recipe with more sugar and molasses that I thought sounded nice. I thought maybe with all the corn syrup and molasses that it might make chewy peppernuts (they are definitely crunchy). I did, however, use the same spices that my aunt's recipe called for. I baked some up today, and I would say that overall I like them more than last years, but in my opinion they taste more like my aunt's than the ones I made last year with her recipe. Strange, no?? I have baked about seven pans full already, and I am maybe a third of the way through the dough. This is a lot of work, but I think it's neat to carry on a Mennonite tradition.

Inspiration

Today we were at the Lawson Heights Mall and I was inspired to bake sugar cookies this Christmas. I have never made sugar cookies on my own. I remember vaguely helping grandma sprinkle coloured sugar on some sugar cookies when I was about 7 years old, or maybe even a little younger. We were shopping in Peppers, and I saw some cookie cutters and decided that I was going to make sugar cookies. I think I will put icing on them instead of coloured sugar, but we will see. I got a Christmas tree, gingerbread man, star and candy cane shaped cutters.

I am not sure what all I will do for Christmas baking this year. I would like to carry on the tradition of peppernuts even though they are incredibly labour intensive. I know I only made them for the first time last year, but it was a neat experience and people seemed to really enjoy them. With these sugar cookies, I think I may have chosen two of the most labour intensive choices I could have made. I may just leave it at that...though I do really like mixed nut bars. Those are pretty easy though. And I know Jay wanted to try making nuts and bolts....hmmmm....

Addicted

I got my Christmas present from Jason on Friday. We had been thinking about getting a laptop, and we found one we liked, and it was on sale, so Christmas came for us this year in late October/early November. I don't mind not having much to open under the tree this year, as I feel like I am getting a little too old for presents. Not entirely, because everyone likes to get presents, but there isn't much I feel like I need. Anyway, on this laptop there was what looked like a whole whack load of 'free' games. Not until I tried a couple out did I realize that they were free trials. Once you played the game two or three times and got hooked they expect you to buy it.

Yesterday at work one of my coworkers recommended the game Diner Dash. I had never heard of it, and she said it was very addictive and fun so I checked it out. It was one of the free trial games on the laptop. I was able to play it about 3 or 4 times and got thoroughly hooked on it. Now my free trial has run out, and here I sit craving to play that game again. I somehow don't think it is the sort of game that you might be able to download for free off the internet. I doubt that it is that popular with the piracy gurus. Maybe I could find it in the bargain bin at Future Shop for $10.

High Tech Contraptions

Today Jay and I went out for lunch after church to Tony Roma's. We sat down and I felt something uncomfortable poking me in the chest. I excused myself to the washroom to further investigate and found that underwire from my bra had poked itself through the fabric and half of it was poking me in the chest. I tried to feed it back through and hopefully make it through lunch, but that was not working so I just pulled it out. It really doesn't feel much different, but I think I shocked Jay when I showed him the wire. Not sure that he realized what an underwire looked like. This bra may be headed for the scrap heap. It isn't that comfortable to begin with, guess it is time for a new one.

I think Jay and I make some of the best home made pizza around. From the easy to make home made crust (thanks for the recipe Lynette) to the leftover Kraft four cheese blend, I think that last night's pizza was the best we have ever made. Mmm mmm mmm!

Political Rant

I will be the first to admit that I don't know a lot about politics. However when there is an election going on I try to pay some attention so I can cast an educated vote. What has been frustrating me lately is how a lot of people (ie NDP and their supporters) are so afraid that the province is going to practically come to an end if the Sask Party gets elected. They say that the Sask Party will privatize all of the crown corporations, but the Sask Party denies that. I don't think that they would just say that to win votes. That would not be very good for their reputation if they said they weren't going to do something and then they did it. I realize that all the parties make promises that they really never plan on following through on. Take for instance a few years back when the NDP promised that they were going to start paying for the first year of university for all graduating high school students. That sure never came to fruition. Not that it was a very smart idea to begin with, but I am sure some people voted for them based on that idea.

One of Jay's home care workers was saying how if the Sask Party was elected that she would be out of a job. I just don't see how people can think things are going to change so dramatically. Home Care has been around for a LOOOOONG time, and it works. I don't think that the Sask Party would get rid of it just to save a few dollars when so many people depend on that service. It also seems from my limited experience that when a new party does get elected and they do make some changes that they do not happen over night. Most things seem to move as slow as molasses when it comes to the government. So many people were so worried about the Conservative party being elected federally, but what have they really changed? In the last year that they have been in power not an awful lot has changed. I heard the other day that there is a budget surplus and they are lowering the GST by one percent. That isn't much, but that seems to be the way governments move. People are freaking out for no reason.

I have really lost any respect I might have had for Lorne Calvert in the last month or so. I was saying to Jason the other day, I don't know that I could vote for a leader who's last name has the word 'wacki' (wacky) in. I am not saying that I love Brad Wall (I kind of thought he looked like the Joker in his pin striped suit during the leaders debate the other night) but he seems like a better choice.