March 29, 2008

Talked to Stew on the phone. He said he'd tried to call me but got a busy signal. That's odd -- he should have gotten my voicemail. Then again, those hospital phones . . . I've given him my personal 800 number, and told him he can call it anytime.

He sounds tired. Well, duh, he just had major surgery, lost part of his intestines and part of his colon and his appendix and . . . he doesn't remember what else they told him. Has other things on his mind. Said the doctors found what they expected to find -- pile o'cancer. But there was something in his voice that was different from two days ago, back when he'd been dreading the surgery because, well, hell, surgery is to be dreaded, is it not? He'd never had surgery before, and before he went in I'd told him it was not nearly as scary as it sounded -- they'd give him something, he'd fall asleep before he even realized it, and when he woke up, it'd all be over.

I didn't tell him that was the easy part. One thing at a time. Now comes the recovery, a part of I've never particularly cared for myself.

Something was different today. Relief, I think partly. Relief that the surgery part was over, and that they'd taken out most, if not all, of the intestinal cancer. Of course, there's still the liver, and there's nothing to be done about that, but one thing at a time. This is what's been making him so miserable, made him unable to eat, made him vomit seemingly continuously.

Time for the next step. The recovery part.