Peggie Larsen

The last few weeks at our house have been a whirlwind of pain and suffering. On February 11, 2016, my husband broke the small bone in his leg, just above the ankle and really messed up his ankle. He was across the road from our house, hunting with the dog. He went to jump over a small draw and caught his foot on grass or a weed or something. His foot bent back and sideways and he fell on top of it. When he got up, his foot was turned completely backwards. So what does anyone do in that situation? Crank it back where it should be of course, TWICE! What???!!! Who does that? Luckily he had his cell phone and called his boss, who is also our neighbor. So nice he was close by. After he put his foot back in he started walking up the hill to the highway where our neighbor picked him up and took him to the ER. I was at the studio, and got a text from John, which said, “Rick is giving me a ride to the hospital I broke my ankle I love you call me when you have a chance give me a ride.” That was it. Lovely. So Tayler had the broken jaw in November and now this. I told them that if I break anything I am killing someone.

Flash forward a few weeks to February 25th. Finally. Time for surgery. Let’s get this show on the road already. It has been a LONG few weeks waiting for this. Great. Let’s go. So ready. We were instructed to show up at the Same Day Surgery at 8:30 a.m. We get in the room and the nurse starts asking the obligatory questions they have to ask everyone. She asked John if he had any metal anywhere on his body, to which he replied his earrings and screws in his head from his brain surgery in 2000. I then responded, “His nipple rings.” I was kidding of course, but the nurse could not stop laughing. We couldn’t either. I think I’m pretty funny sometimes. She then gave the instructions on what to change into and said they will be with us shortly.

Hanging out, waiting. Waiting, hanging out. How much longer? Holy crap. John is still in a shit ton of pain. Then, finally. They come and get him to take him back to surgery. It is now about 11 a.m. The surgery takes about 45 minutes. To the waiting room I go. Hmmm, look at those cookies. They look pretty damn good. They have sugar, chocolate chip oatmeal, chocolate, and a few I have no idea what they might be. Might has well have one, with some coffee. Because waiting. So I have the oatmeal chocolate chip one with a great cup of clinic coffee. Okay, now what? Magazines. Time to catch up on who’s cheating who. Well, that took about five minutes. Standing, sitting. Sitting, standing. Checking out Facebook and Instagram and Twitter. Done. That took about 30 minutes. Now it is about 11:45 or so and I see the surgeon walk out into the waiting room. He came over and told me that everything went well and it turned out exactly the way he wanted it to. Sweet! Glad it’s done. Now I can go see him.

Not so fast. Still waiting. Why is this taking so long? Maybe I’ll have another cookie and another coffee. The chocolate cookie this time. Tastes okay. Missing something. Coffee is still good clinic coffee. Then I think to myself that I haven’t really had any water today. Oh, there is a water machine. So I have two waters while I still wait. Now it is 1:30 p.m.

Finally, they come and get me. They take me to a different room. When I walked in and saw him, his eyes are all puffy, like he just woke up from a two week sleep. He was groggy as hell. Apparently he had trouble waking up after the anesthesia. I knew something wasn’t quite right. He told me all he could think about was how long I had been out there waiting. Awwwww. The nurse got him some coffee and juice and something to eat so they could give him some pain pills. It took a while for him to feel okay. She took out the IV and then went over instructions on what to do when we got home and all that fun stuff. She then said he could get dressed and she would come back in and get him to wheel him out to the car.

He was smart enough to wear shorts, so at least we didn’t have to worry about trying to get jeans on. I helped him take off his fashionable hospital robe and gown. We got his shirt on. Then it came time for the pants. He put his right leg (the bad one) in and then the left. Then he had to stand up so I could help him pull up his pants. So here I am right at his waist, he’s 6’3″, trying to get his pants pulled up. I have my arms around him and keep pulling but the pants get stuck on his butt. We both then started laughing and couldn’t stop. I seriously thought I was going to pee my pants. I had to get down in the squat position so I wouldn’t pee. We still could not stop laughing. I am sure the nurses were wondering what the hell was going on. It took us a good five minutes before we could not look at each other and start laughing all over again. It was hilarity in the middle of a shit show. So we finally are now all ready to go. It was about 2:30 by now. The nurse wheeled him out and helped him into the Jeep.

We got home and I left him in the Jeep so I could go let the dogs out. Our plan was to go up the front steps of the house instead of through the garage. I told him I would go behind him up the steps in case he fell. He could fall on me.  He started up the steps and guess what? He just about fell backwards down the first step. That would have been a disaster. We finally got in the house and got him settled in the chair. Ahhh. Home. Time to start recovering.

After I got him coffee and water and all settled, he looked at me and said, “Thank you for taking care of me.” My heart melted.

We are still laughing about the pants.

…hopefully the next 6-8 weeks go fast.