All Quiet on the Western Front

Chelsea here!  The recovery so far has been smooth sailing.  Ken drifts in and out of consciousness, waking up for 1-2 minutes at a time before drifting back off into morphineland.  He's been able to get up and go on a total of 4 walks so far since the surgery, some of them up to 20 minutes long!  He has four drainage tubes that get emptied every hour or so, and the nurses come in every two hours to take his vitals.  Fortunately the night nurse has a gentle enough touch that he didn't even get woken up last night when she came in.  He also has leg squeezers, which are cuffs around the calf that automatically inflate and deflate, to help the blood circulate to reduce the risk of clots.  He also uses a "puffer," which is a little plastic tube that he takes very deep breaths in and out of, 10x an hour, to help his lungs expand all the way to reduce the risk of pneumonia.  Jennifer gives Ken a full sponge bath and a long massage each day, as the nurses drool with envy.

The hospital room is looking nice - Jennifer hung up a large family photo and other homey touches.  It's a private room with two large windows.  I bought a "Get Well Dad" balloon (though I was pretty close to buying one that said "It's a Boy!!!"), and Levi (a friend in Chicago, son of Ken's close friends from law school) brought over some flowers.  If you want to send something, here is the info about the hospital's gift shop; you can text Jennifer or me for Ken's room number:

Delivery to patient rooms is available for purchases of more than $5.00. If you would like to send a gift from the Mitchell lobby gift shop, please call (773) 834-1360, Monday through Friday 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Central time zone. The gift shop accepts MasterCard, Visa, and American Express for phone transactions. Callers must have all patient information, including first and last name and room number, before an order can be placed.

The room was really, really hot when we first got here - 84 degrees!  They cranked the thermostat all the way down, and called maintenance (who arrived 12 hours later).  Maintenance checked the thermostat, and then the guy pulled this little walkie-talkie-looking device with a laser beam on it out of his pocket and pointed it at the ceiling.  He said he could use it to detect heat coming from the ceiling.  I wondered if he had been sneaking some of dad's morphine drip.  But the room cooled off eventually.

The staff here is excellent.  Dad's day nurse, Kelly, is fantastic and very responsive.  We've also met the social worker, the case manager, and several other nurses.  The doctor has come by to check in as well. Everything seems to be going great - thank you for all your continued support.