A Monday to Remember

18Jun

 Today was a busy day...my girlfriend, Elisa came in on the train from London for the morning and lunch (and cut Carman's hair for him - who else has a stylist who makes house calls - no matter where you're house is?). After my extended trip by car to Union Station with Dj last week, I’ve become wiser and walked to the station to meet Elisa! Google maps predicted a 37 minute walk, but being faster on foot than many, I covered the distance in 23 minutes and then we took the subway back together. We stopped at the Maple Leaf Gardens Loblaws on the way, so I could  share the lovely deli and “wall of cheese” with her. After some oo’ing and ah’ing we picked up some grilled vegetables and fresh figs to go with our salads for lunch. She also insisted on some flowers and gifted us with two beautiful peonies (I miss these heavenly-scented beauties, which are hopefully still thriving in what was our garden in London).

Elisa came with us to TGH for Carman’s physio 2:30-4 pm and as we were about to round the corner to the treadmill room we ran into our friend Jessica, whom we had met during assessment week in March! We were so excited to see that she is here for transplant too and had been talking about her the previous day wondering if she had gotten the call to come as well. We've now exchanged contact info and plan to get together on the weekend. This journey has brought us in touch with so many old and new friends!

The venturi mask the therapist has Carman using while on the treadmill has been working well for him. He had another great workout yesterday (even suggested she might crank it up a bit next time), got his heart rate up and kept his blood O2 saturation above 90! They have given him a Rollator to try out this week as well. Its one of those walkers on wheels with a basket (where he can place his O2 stroller) and a seat he can use when he tires. He finds it very helpful and it allows him to walk to physio, rather than travel in a wheel chair, so we'll be shopping to get one for him and return theirs. 

Elisa left early to catch her 4:00 train and after physio we returned home for a quick change then back to TGH for an education session from 5:30-8. The “all about transplant” presentation added well to what we already knew and answered many questions we’d yet to ask. We especially enjoyed Nurse Andrea’s summary of “what you’ll see in ICU” and I shed tears of joy for Ernest as he shared his personal transplant experieince with us.

From there we hustled over to One King West to meet up with the McCormick Sales & Mktg team, who are having their annual meeting there today and held a meet and greet last night. Thanks to our good friend Donna for coordinating our visit with the team, we caught the last half hour (lucky Carman, just in time for birthday cake - 2 people in the group were celebrating), then Carman continued to hold court for another 50 minutes with the many who were willing to stay later. He stood the whole time...the longest stretch of standing he's done in a long time. I was able to catch up with a number of the staff I had worked with while at McCormick or got to know thru Carman as well. It was great to chat with Barb (and compare notes about kids),  Colleen, Joe (more notes on kids), Keith (news about kids and grandkids), Margaret, and Mark (and hear news of Loy and Bonnie - congrats on citizenship and a driver's license Bonnie, well done!).  During conversation we found out that one of the staff would have been at the education session with us, if not for the pre-scehduled work events of the day...it turns out her father is here for a lung transplant too! We are continually amazed by these encounters!

I think it was one of the most action packed days Carman has had (and thoroughly enjoyed) in many months so tomorrow he will be in full-blown recovery mode!

and now that I know he can stand for that long...I'm going to make a list of things we should do, while here in TO!