We mustered through. I troubleshot, wrote letters, called, pushed, pulled this time, to try to get mom a little kinder of a ride through surgical hell.

Truly the only thing different from last November was my being prepared for each excruciating deja vu.

You can't explain. You just can't explain. Even though this person, my mother was fully on board, begging for medical help with her pain, once there, waiting for the "doctor to fix her leg," there was no way to explain what was going to happen, how, why. Each tiny step that you or I might not blink at? Torture. Simply taking her blood pressure? A terrifying ordeal each and every time.... and in a hospital that can be 10 to twelve times a day. "No, mom, it's ok, it's just the squeezy thing they put on your arm; it gets tight just for one minute and then lets go." EVERY TIME.

That being the case for the blood pressure cuff, imagine explaining the daily blood draws, especially to someone whose veins have gone into hiding. One day it took five RN's and two aides an hour to find a vein to draw blood to check her INR level.

When both of her IV's went bad in one evening and she needed a little something? You get the picture.

But she continues to surprise me. The third day, out of the blue, (she hasn't read a newspaper in years) she said, "I was reading the paper this morning and there apparently have been some very serious and unpleasant things going on in the cities around the world. It's not surprising really, but it's discouraging for sure." Then she plotted her escape route on a napkin. Every time a nurse or aide would come in she would put on a good show, do her best. Then glare at me, hissing "we have to get out of here, this is a dangerous and illegal place. And we are smarter than these people."

The PT's in rehab were my saving grace. They were so lovely and patient. Melissa and Susan, THANK YOU

Mom and Melissa

Mom and Susan

And then, all last Friday, unsettled air. All day I wished and wished for a rainbow, some magical respite from our reality. Late afternoon, there it was; we could see it out of mom's window. We danced around the room making wishes, trying to get her interested. She was the one to notice a tiny trace of the second rainbow above the first. We sang "somewhere over the rainbow" and clicked our heels.

And she got through. She is so strong. She is home, still disoriented and still plotting to "go home." Still not quite sure what happened, reeling from a new kind of pain that she doesn't understand will get better. Belligerent about having to exercise, no idea that it's in her/our best desperate interest to keep her mobile so we can hope to continue to care for her the way we have. - Not surprising really, but discouraging for sure.