(bed)panhandling

I'd like to let you all know that our Christmas was wonderful. Fabulous time with our family and those we love. I hope you had the same.

My leg hurts. When I was admitted to the hospital today I couldn't put any weight on it. When you weigh over four-hundred pounds not being able to put your weight on something becomes much more complicated. It seems I've developed cellulitis that covers my entire calf and wraps around my ankle bone. I also seem to have developed some combination of compartment syndrome and/or a severe hematoma.

Now, to be quite honest, I'm a little too drugged up to explain those diagnoses. The short of what the doctor seemed to say was that I have an inflammation and infection of the skin on my leg and either blood or "infected fluid" have become trapped in a pocket inside my leg. The cellulitis will be treated with IV antibiotics but the latter diagnosis will require surgery. I'll meet with the surgeon tomorrow.

The pain has been slightly diminished by two milligrams of dilaudid every two hours and a wonderful nurse, Stacey, who has been a lot of fun tonight in the middle of all this crap.

I need to ask a favor. We're still broke. My first Social Security check should finally arrive on the third of this month. Me being in the hospital makes things even more difficult on Kristin than they usually are. It would make life so much easier if she had the cash to be able to buy dinner and lunch this week as she tries to work, visit me in the hospital and take care of our dog and other things at home. So, I'm not usually this direct and I'm sorry, if you can manage a couple extra bucks to take some weight off my wife's shoulders this week, I'd really appreciate it. Just click the "donate" button in the upper right hand corner of the page.

Thank you all so much for your support, prayers, love and, really, just for reading my ramblings this year. Happy new year.