I spent the day at the hospital with Jess, and left at 4pm to go home, cook for the week, and take a nap. I'm at work now, taking a bit of a break to provide an update here.
Jess has a wonderful new scar from the top of his head, just above his right eye, curving down to just in front of the center of his ear. He was curious about it, so I took a picture of it with my cell phone and showed it to him. Um...that may not have been the right thing to do. I would post it here, but not everyone gets as excited about the beauty of well-executed medical procedures as I do, so I've opted not to.
I was a little concerned when I first arrived at the hospital about the amount of pain Jess was in. The nurse gave him a nice round of morphine, and although it took a bit for him to respond, he finally did. As Lester later pointed out, that's about as invasive as surgery gets. He's right, you know. For me to expect there to be no pain at all was a bit unrealistic. Still, I was happy to see him respond to the medication and that the afternoon seemed downright restful for him. But, I'm ahead of myself here.
I arrived at 9am thinking I would find Jess in a new room. Remember, I didn't see him at all yesterday. I was surprised, and a little concerned, to find him still in NICU (neurosurgery intensive care unit). When I got in to see him, I was pleased to find him sitting up in a chair beside the bed. The nurse told me they were getting him ready to be moved to his room. After his shot he relaxed a bit and was able to sleep some. A little after noon the nurse administered another shot of morphine. I was actually thinking the second round was overkill as he was finally resting well, but figured out what it was all about when she began pulling monitors off, removing IVs, and getting him prepped for the move.
Right before the wheelchair came to pick him up, Jess received some unexpected visitors. Johnny and Martha Ramirez came by for a visit! Johnny and Leo grew up together in the valley, and Jess' wife Grace often served as the "older sister" to both boys. Leo, Johnny, Martha and I have spent enough time together over the years to know that we enjoy each others' company a great deal, even though we don't get together often. It was a nice surprise for both Jessie and I when they showed up for a visit.
Jess' move to his room was uneventful. He is in room M548 and has a direct telephone number into the room. Today would not have been a good one to call as Jess slept for almost the entire time. If you want to call, I'd wait for tomorrow or Tuesday. The number is 713-441-0965. Uncle Walter went back to Lubbock early this morning, and Trevor went back to check on things in Port Lavaca and get things ready for Jess to go home. I spent the day in a [very comfortable] chair in his room reading my textbook (school starts next week!) while Jess slept. Lester is still in town and came and went throughout the day to check on Jess' progress. I expect him to stay another day or two in case he is needed. I wish I didn't have a couple of projects with deadlines to work on this week...I would like to hang out with Jess some more. Still, if I can take a couple of days off next week to hang out with him at home, I'm guessing we'll both enjoy that.
Anyway, just wanted to let everyone know that Jessie is doing fine. He speaks coherently [always; no episodes of confusion at all] and looks very good. His coloring is good, and as I pointed out before, the scar is quite pretty (if you go for that sort of thing). Today I could see a little bit more swelling around his right eye than yesterday, but the nurse assured me that was reasonable and temporary. In my opinion, things are going quite well.
