Have I ever told you that a very large percentage of the time when I fly I get the guy or woman that likes to lean their chair back, oftentimes way back cutting into my precious airspace?

In the past while setting my head down on my pull-down table, just when my eyes finally close – I get hit in the head, or my cup of water almost gets hit and spills.

It is just like my thing I guess.

So, this last flight, early as heck – we board at 6:05am and don’t take off officially until 6:45am. I had noticed when I sat down that the chair in front of me wasn’t fully up, so I tried to fix it before the person came down the aisle to sit down, but I couldn’t get it. So, I knew already this could be an issue.

The guy comes down the aisle, matches his seat number and takes a seat. Within minutes before taking off, he leans his chair back.

Before taking off he leans his chair back – that is against the rules. I have to deal with the chair situation after we take off, but not before.

To note, there was a large group of people in the chairs around me that did not speak English. I am not sure if he speaks English or not.

I knock on his chair like I am knocking on a door – “You can’t lean your chair back before take-off.”

He does nothing.

I knock again. “You can’t lean your chair back before take-off.”

He flips it up into the upright and locked position.

Thank you very much.

For the entire flight, he didn’t touch his chair. I was so happy. I think I scared him.

This is what happens when you are in a room for two weeks with not a lot of freedom, with lines almost constantly connected to you, with beeping machines, vitals every four hours, them constantly checking my sugars sometimes while I am eating, and oxygen on at various times.

He also was a little odd, because he was sitting in the aisle seat and when the folks next to him needed to use the restroom, he just moved his legs to the side and did not stand-up. I smiled at the passenger trying to squeeze by barely while he smiled back.

Being in-house is not real life. It is necessary at times – and I needed it without a doubt. But it is not real life. It is a box life. I think after a while a true condition starts to form.

When the docs came in and I asked how I slept I said, “I slept very well between the beeps. I did see 11pm, 1230am, 130am, 230am, and I think I slept for a couple solid to about 430am, and then 6am.” This was not every night, but a fair amount of nights. To be fair because of the amount of fluid, I was up twice a night.

I just kept expressing that I need to get a full night’s sleep. I talked about food and all the wonderful calories I am going to eat.

I asked one fellow, Brian whom I saw everyday if he ever met Dr. Warwick – I didn’t think so because he was too young.

“Dr. Warwick taught me about 15-20 years ago before some of this information was more common. The easiest way to gain weight is to take a solid form of food, high calorie and fat, and take it to a liquid. That way your body can intake more and it takes much less energy, calories to break down.”

Brian nodded, listening, perhaps why is this person talking to me, or perhaps not. He was a very nice man. One of the nurses, Shelby, and I were talking and I said how much he was a Brian. I said he was probably always that good, real smart kid that other kids perhaps tried to get answers from. But, he was always patient and probably willing to help. She agreed he was such a nice Brian.

I said, “I am going to go home and slather butter – real yummy butter on my grilled cheese. I get this Kerry gold butter, pure Irish butter – so smooth. Then I fill it with obviously cheese, but I use a couple different kinds of cheese. I sometimes add ham, maybe bacon, onion, and sometimes avocado – a variation. I need 80-100 grams of fat a day to gain weight and around 2,000-2,200 calories. This sandwich alone gives me at least 50 grams of fat and probably 700 calories. Then I have my whole milk lattes and just stack the cheese on everything.”

My weight was/is down and they keep looking at that. I am saying it dropped four pounds in less than two days because I got rid of all this water weight in my legs. I was like dang it. There was a questionable calibration of the scale and operator of the scale going on as well.

But, all I was doing was shoving food in my face and my friends bringing over large amounts of food. I was ordering food from room service. Everything just takes so much energy.

I was making my case. My determination was carving my path faster than my numbers. Medicine is a language of numbers after all. There were some other various numbers going on as well – so that needed time to be figured out.

So – I am home. There is no better place.

But, it is no joke. There is a lot of responsibility and work. I can do it, it is fine – but there is a bonus when you are in the hospital. People are keeping track of all this stuff while I am just shoving food in my face and doing treatments and trying to find windows to go outside and on my walks.

Schedule: I have adjusted these times a little. They did tons in the hospital as well. You just have to do it in small increments. You can’t jump three-hours one day, it will throw off the numbers too much.

One IV drug – two-hour infusion duration: 9am and 9pm.

Second IV drug: one-hour or a little over infusion duration: 6am, 2pm, and 10pm.

Four treatments a day – four-hours apart. Numbers need a helping hand with some good healing.

Particular meds: 11am, 2pm, 6pm, 11pm.

I have gotten medication deliveries between 830-9pm at night.

Nurses often come out to visit to draw labs before the 9am infusion to get dosing accuracy.

Then, throw in doc and lab outings.

If you can throw any exercise in there that is good as well. I am not quite there yet. I am concentrating on eating and getting some sleep.

For my 6am infusion, I set an alarm at 6am, hook myself up, and fall back to sleep – so that works out nicely.  The drugs are portable. They are balls and work off gravity. No beeping.

You have to be a good patient. Stick with the schedule, and as each treatment and day passes I feel better than the last. Getting real sleep and eating good food – I feel twenty times better.

There is wholesome, healing allotted times in there as well as you can see. I think anytime being able to be home and walk with freedom is healing and so thankful for every moment.

I am thankful for every person that helped me. All my friends and my brother. I could not have done all this with one less person.

Home Sweet Home – not confined to the non-real world box. It is there for a distinct purpose and then you must leave.

In my discharge papers Brain writes, “It was a pleasure meeting with you today. Thank you for allowing me and my team the privilege of caring for you today. You are the reason we are here, and I truly hope we provided you with the excellent service you deserve.”

Shelby said, “He is the only one that writes that.”

#blessed

Enjoy every moment. That’s it people. I have work to do.