Home at Last

One year ago today, it was in the 70s and sunny. Spring had finally come. I went to the hospital on Tuesday morning, shivering and in a down coat and fleece pants, and I was going home on Friday night on a warm spring day. It was surreal.

Yes, I said going home.

It took until 9 pm or so to finish the paperwork and check out, but I was released and finally allowed to leave. I was never given an official diagnosis but the difficult thing was that, if a virus had exacerbated my antibiotic allergy, it was probably already out of my system by the time the blood tests were being run, and they weren't finding much. But my important numbers were finally getting back to normal, my fever was down, my appetite and spirit were returning, and there was no reason I couldn't continue my recovery at home since there wasn't anything more that I needed other than time.

Finally.

I was so happy to go home. To be with A. To not be woken up at 6 am to get my arm drained of blood. To not have an IV poking out of my wrist. To not have constant noise outside my open door and no privacy whatsoever. To take a real shower. To sleep in my own bed. To eat real food. To watch TV. And so much more.

It's still surreal to me, one year later, that this whole thing happened. It made me think a lot about life (what else was there to do for hours in the hospital?) and priorities. It's hard to change the system in which you're placed and the constraints within which you have to live, but I've been trying so hard to make small changes. Not having much success but reliving this experience has committed me to work harder at it. No more laziness. Time to tackle life!