Jan 4, 2009 - second day in the hospital

During my first night at the hospital, they regularly checked my vital signs and made sure I was not showing any bad neurological signs. The night duty nurse became alarmed when my pulse dropped to 45. I wanted to say that was normal, considering my cardiovascular conditioning. It seemed to me if my pulse rate was 55 during the day, it could slow down when I was sleeping. Eventually a doctor told her it was ok.

On Sunday morning, two ladies came to see me and introduced themselves as physical and occupational therapists. They wanted to evaluate me to determine if I needed to start any kind of therapy. After doing all kinds of little tests, they said they wanted to watch me walk. We began walking down the hallway with one on either side. Without warning one of the ladies would swing her hip over and bump into me. They did this twice. I did not fall over so they decided I must be doing ok for now. It’s not like I was having major functional impairment. By this time I knew I had some numbness in my right hand, but I wasn’t doing any kind of critical assessment. I was just tired and wanted to sleep. The IV stand and tubes were annoying as well. It was difficult to get comfortable.

I hoped to get evaluated by the speech therapist so I could get released to eat something. Such was not the case. It did not matter a whole lot. I was not that hungry. The other big event for Sunday was a lot of MRI testing, with and without dye. I guess they were backed up. I did not get in for that testing until about 7p.m. It seemed like it took a long time. I ended up falling asleep in the MRI machine while they were running the tests. Some people get claustrophobic in these machines. I just get bored.

I was hearing that I might get released the next day. It seemed to me that my condition was stable but I would never heal sitting in the hospital. So I went to bed, exhausted and ready to see the next day.