The day finally arrived and I drove Adrian to the hospital. You tell yourself everything will be ok but you still worry. It took about an hour to check him in before I was told to say goodbye. We were told it would be about 5 to 6 hours before he would be back in the room. It was 11:30am now; ok then I would be back at 6.

I kept myself busy and the time passed surprisingly quickly. I decided to go to the hospital at 5 just incase he came out early I wanted to be there. The surgeon came and saw me at 6 saying everything had gone well and Adrian should be back in the room in half an hour to an hour. Great. I let all family know everything had gone well. The catering staff brought Adrian’s dinner around and I waited. Time ticked by. Adrian was having chips and mince for dinner, time ticked by. I stole a chip, then another one, time ticked by. The catering staff came to take Adrian’s dinner away. I explained he wasn’t back and could they leave it. Ok. Time ticked by. All the chips were gone and I was eyeing off the dessert. Time ticked by. I was beginning to worry. I had seen people being transferred back into their rooms and still no Adrian. It was eight o’clock. I would give them until half past then I would ask. Time stood still. Finally a man came to get the bed from the room. ‘He won’t be long he told me. ‘Thank you’. Time 8.27. Time ticked by. Finally they wheeled Adrian in, it was 9.15. The nurse, who came with him, explained he had stayed under the anesthetic longer than they thought he would. It isn’t unusual for people to do that. Good to know. Adrian was still groggy but with it enough to let me know from his point of view he was ok. I told Adrian I had kept his dinner for him without telling him his chips had long since disappeared. The nurse told me off as the food had been sitting around for too long. She took the tray away saying she would be back with a cup of tea and a sandwich. Dam I could have made the dessert disappear after all. Adrian ate a quarter of the sandwich, drank the tea and said that was it for him for the night.

I arrived the next morning at about 9 am and Adrian was up sitting in a seat beside the bed. He had had breakfast and was ready for a shower but had been told he wasn’t allowed to take one on his own so he was waiting for a nurse. I had been there only for about 10 minutes when the physio came a calling with a walking frame. He was happy to see Adrian already out of bed and promptly got him up for a walk. Adrian seemed a little surprised. So soon. Yep. The physio had Adrian walk the length of the corridor and was happy with his progress. He left taking the walking frame with him, leaving instructions to walk some more and he would check in the morning and if he was still happy Adrian could go home. Great. That was better than we were expecting. After the physio left the nurse came in to give Adrian his shower, seeing me she told me I could do it while she made the bed. I laughed when I was helping Adrian. I did think he would be somewhat older before I would have to start bathing him.

Adrian was happy to be walking out the door the next day. The hospital staff were nice and looked after him well but he didn’t really get any sleep. There was always something going on.