Storyline: Advantures in our back yard
“Here, take the keys and let yourself in. I’ll go for my fast walk now.”, “That feels so weird”, Alex says. “Text me if you need some help”, I continue as I watch him entering the house. Usually, it’s the other way around. He’d walk with me and my short-legged “fast” pace, then give me the key and continue on his fast walk, reappearing an hour later. It’s day three after the operation to evict his messy gallbladder. He has it all chronicled, but let’s set the scene:
Remember this, from our 2019 visit to Malacca, Malaysia? “Attitude is the difference between an ordeal and an adventure!”
As many of you know we were to be on the road to the east coast by now. And some probably think we are. Not so, or not yet. They say that sometimes some unwanted and unexpected events happen for a reason. So here:
Doranya, well stocked with food, clothes for all seasons, and all necessary accessories and amenities, was plugged in, waiting patiently in our driveway, to take us to another advanture. It was Wednesday, just over a week ago and I had gone to Vaughan Mills Mall to exchange a pair of shoes I’d bought the previous day. Being in a rush I’d taken the wrong credit card. Still with Covid restrictions on the number of people allowed inside the mall, I lined up outside about 15 min before opening time, making sure I was in with the first batch of people. Not wanting to lose my place, I called Alex to bring me the card. There was time and he could also do some shoe shopping (how exciting! – A).
He hops into the van and drives away. 15 cm away! A groan. And a stop. Wait, wasn’t it plugged in? He’s checked that everything inside was well-secured and ready for a ride. But outside?! Well, you guessed it. The 30 amp receptacle was ripped out of the van, which I only knew when back home. “Let me tell you what this cost you” Alex says and shows me the damage.
He had driven to the mall to hand me the credit card, and had hurried back, with the excuse of having too many things to do. Strange I thought, but hey, I may have forgotten about something that needed to be done.
After trying to fix it himself we both agree that it’d be better done by the professionals. And off he went the next day to Gananoque, 3½ hours away on the highway (and in the direction of our intended travels! – A), to our dealership and service center. In the meantime, Carolyn, our optician, had called. Our glasses were ready for pick up. It was pouring outside and me huffing and puffing, checking the forecast and making sure there was a day left in case the repair took longer and Alex had to overnight there, decided that we’d go pick up the glasses the following Tuesday, not Friday or Saturday. We then would be ready to depart on Wednesday, Jul 14. I had already booked some campsites in Quebec and was in process of deciding on the New Brunswick ones.
Alex, wallet $92 lighter, and Doranya fed with gas, arrived late Thursday evening.
Saturday morning, waking up somewhat slow and grumpy with tummy problems, thinking that it was the rotisserie chicken from the previous night (the chicken might well had been a very minor contributor to what followed) Alex went for a bone density scan (something that is apparently now a normal test for both men and women of a certain age – A), about which I had completely forgotten. Half an hour later he sat in his chair unable to have his usual morning tea or anything else. By noon he curled up in bed with a fever and abdominal pain, apparently stronger than usual.
We live in pandemic times. “I may have gotten Covid” he says passing me the thermometer. It shows 37.9C. “I don’t think so”, I say. “You are fully vaccinated and where would you get it from?”. The previous weekend we’d visited our Cuban friends in Burlington and had lunch with them. But we were distanced outside and they are healthy, so this should not have been a problem. That same day we visited another friend of Alex’s in Dundas, sat in their back yard, again well over the recommended 2 metres apart and then walked through Dundas before heading home. “Oh, perhaps from the streets of Dundas” Alex says. “I am absolutely sure it is not Covid! Let me take you to emergency!” He of course, as men usually do, decides that he could handle the pain and it would eventually disappear. That day I could not push a glass of water through him. Given the fact that he drinks a lot of water every day, especially in the summer, the glass I filled in the morning was gradually, disappearing, sip by agonizing sip. And not without me insisting he keeps hydrated. Watching it evaporate might have been quicker. I added a cup of peach fruit cocktail. Sleeping most of Saturday nothing was going in (aside from the glass of water), but nothing was coming out either. Sunday came with even stronger pain and fever over 38C. When he was awake, which wasn’t much or for long I’d try the emergency suggestion over and over again. He insists it must be Covid and unless it got too bad, he’d have to give his vaccinated body time to sort it out. After all he has fever, one of the prescreening self-tests on the provincial website. (I wish these pre-screening public health sites did not exist. He did the pre-screening and only because he had fever and abdominal pain, not any other symptoms, the site suggested to get tested. For God’s sake, fever can be sign of so many things! Stay calm and keep going. Don’t visit our overwhelmed and underfunded hospitals. That’s how during the swine flu epidemic in 2009 he developed his aFib problems). Eventually he decides to book a Covid test. Our local centre at North York General Hospital (NYGH) Branson is closed for the weekend, so Monday 10am it is. Sweating, suffering and sleeping most of the time, with no more than a glass of water and a cup of peach cocktail in his system for two days in a row I eventually drive him for a test on Monday morning. And guess what – “Highly unlikely you have Covid…Go immediately to emergency. You probably have an inflamed gallbladder…” the doctor who he saw tells him. He wobbles back to the car and we first stop home (it is on the way to our NYGH main site) to take some clothes and other necessities. I drive him to emerg and leave him at the door. After all it’s still Covid time and NYGH is a major Covid intake hub. He’d spend most of the day in tarp-walled isolation/examination room, before being admitted for surgery.
Men never listen, do they! Could have driven him there on Saturday! (Evil grin – A).
What happens next is for him to tell in the next post or two. We’d use our phones to text each other over the next few days (four in total) and stay connected. Apparently, this happened to his dad and he was the one taking him to emergency with a gangrenous gallbladder. I recalled him telling me the story, only after Marian, his sister, reminded us about it. And as his dad he went to hospital almost too late. Like father like son! (And I still miss him 12 years after he passed away – A)
The signs have been there for years, perhaps. The previous weekend visit with the Cubans wasn’t to be ignored. He had stomach pains then, after eating a big pork chop and some chicken… Often after a steak or lamb chop, which we have about twice a year, he’d have abdominal pain. We’d attribute this to aging and not digesting red meat well. Huh, wasn’t it me who has to have her gallbladder removed? (Here, Alex pictures himself a knight on white charger, bravely protecting his damsel in distress from the knives of the evil surgeons. What? No, I finished the morphine days ago! – A.) But I know I have gallstones (my mom had them), and have been careful. I was actually scheduled for operation this summer, but with Covid overwhelming the hospital system it was re-scheduled for next year.
On a positive note, though, good it happened now. We could have been on the road; we could have been all the way north to James Bay or some other remote place. And it would have been a disaster. So had Doranya been unplugged that misfortunate Wednesday, there would have not been a repair Thursday, we could have already been hundreds of kilometres from home, and things could have been a lot messier.
There, another one of our amusing adventures with a moral in the story: When it goes to illness and diseases, don’t ignore your family history and don’t play a hero ignoring your pain. (Hangs head and puts his tarnished armour back in the closet – A.)
Amazing blog ??