All’s Well

That ends well.

Today was a very very long. For me getting up at six a.m. hasn't happened since I rode AIDS Lifecycle. My normal get up time is eight a.m. then I spend the rest of the day doing pretty much nothing.

Today, Jerry and I were out of the house at 6:30 a.m. to catch an early train to New York. Of course, after I bought the non-refundable tickets our appointments were pushed back an hour. Turns out that was not such a bad thing because it took quite a while to get from Penn Station to the Hospital for Special Surgery.

And the address the HSS MyChart gave me turned out to be wrong, but we had time to get to my first appointment, which was to x-ray my femur.

I was prepared for the surgeon to tell me I needed to wait a few more weeks before progressing. After all, I am old, and I have osteopenia, the precursor to osteoporosis. So despite taking multivitamins and calcium, I figured the standard four weeks post-surgery was not going to cut it.

After x-rays, we went to my surgeon's office and waited. And waited. Jerry told,the receptionist that we did have a train to catch and it was not much longer before we were ushered in to see the surgeon.

Much to my surprise and delight, he was thrilled with my bone growth, and he said I could start weight loading. Simply put, every day, four times a day, I spend 15 minutes putting weight on the rod inserted into my femur. First day, 15 pounds, next day 20, and so on. After a month I will be able to start learning to walk on my prosthesis, that will attach to the rod protruding out of my thigh.

So despite missing lunch and waiting for literally hours, we left New York incredibly happy. We got home, ate leftover pizza, drank some Zinfandel and ordered an analog scale.

I will sleep incredibly well tonight. And for people with two legs, standing for 15 minutes doesn't sound like much, but for me, who has spent most of the last year in a wheelchair or in bed, the real work begins. And I couldn't be happier.

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