Joint Camp

The day started early for us with a trip up to the rec center for the Tuesday morning coffee and donut treat at 9AM.  We had a salesman from USA Insurance & SKYMED provide the donuts and also a short sales talk.  Most of his talk was directed at mobile home owners so it was easy to tune him out.  Then we had a lady from the Food Bank give a little speech about what is available and how to sign up for free food.  A number of people in the park volunteer at the food bank and every Thursday they bring back some fresh vegetables for all of us to enjoy.  Lastly, a lady from a community service group explained what they do and was looking for volunteers.  Triple header!

Yep, Gerry and I went to camp today and joined a few other campers to hear what lies ahead for me with my knee replacement on Feb 4.  It's bad enough I have to have it done, now they are explaining in detail all the things I have to go through.  It reminds me of the advertisements on TV about new prescription drugs that are wonderful, except for all the side effects.  The side effects would keep me from trying any of them unless I was out cold and didn't know they were giving them to me.

The Joint Camp is required of all people who will be going through hip surgery or knee replacement.  It took almost 1 1/2 hours and they presented the information very clearly.  I imagine this is typical for all hospitals that perform these surgeries, but I found it very informative and interesting.  Gerry will be my coach through this and it seems like she has a tougher job than what I will be going through, except she won't have the pain.

Now I have to measure our shower enclosure and also the lip on the entry to the shower.  Our shower is a sort of semi-circle and may be the biggest obstacle in this adventure.  They recommend you have a chair to sit on so you don't fall down.  I'd have to get a bicycle seat to sit down on if that is required.  No, not really that bad, but it would be a small chair.  Hmmm, I wonder how long I could go without a shower before Gerry takes me outside and hoses me down?

They stressed pain management and will be asking me how much pain there is on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the highest and most pain.  This is always subjective and depends on how much pain an individual can stand.  The therapist said I was lucky since my kidney stones would be a 10 and the knee pain would be less.  Of course the kidney stone pain was for a short duration the knee will be a lot longer.  Great!  

Gerry and I went out for an early lunner (lunch/dinner) and stopped by Applebee's and managed to get there in time for happy hour.  We went with the 2 for $24 meals with an appetizer and walked out of there full to the gills.  Neither of us even wanted to think about eating anything later, but we did manage to eat a small piece of the Blueberry cheesecake that we bought at the dessert auction.  It just filled in a few cracks and was more than enough for us.

The beautiful weather has been holding up and today was the nicest one this year.  It was up around 82 with a clear blue sky.  It doesn't get much better than that.  I do feel sorry for our daughter Cassie and her family back in Maryland with temps down around 0 tonight.  Now that is cold for that part of the country.  Hope it warms up real soon for them.