300

Tomorrow is 300 days of 1A time and it marks 50 straight days in the hospital for me.  Things have settled into a routine here at Cedars.  The healthcare is awesome and the team has begun to know me.  With the familiarity comes more privileges....more rope.  I am now able to walk by myself, unescorted, and if I wake up to use the rest room I don't set off a alarm when I get out of bed.  I get my BP taken 12-15 times a day depending on the experience of the nurse.  More experienced nurses are more comfortable tailoring the rules to meet my needs.  The younger nurses are a bit more cautious; I have had over 2 pints of blood drawn and my BPs are low. Every time they take my pressures the junior nurses freak out that something is wrong.  Then I explain that I have, as of 11 AM PST today, walked 40 miles in laps around the floor since I got to step down last week and that I am not going to drop dead.  I get 30-45 minutes of sunshine every day when they take the device patients outside.  We are some crew.....3-4 Total Artificial Hearts whooshing, and 3 VAD patients.  The fact that we are limited in our outside access only lends itself to the feeling that we are in Max Security prison.

Overall things are proceeding smoothly.  There is a Capital Grille across the street and I have found myself craving a good steak.  Once I am transplanted I won't be able to have a medium rare steak every again, nor raw fish.

I sent a note to my surgical team and laid out my wishes for the surgery:

1. I would like to see my old heart next to my new heart (Human heart is the size of your fist, diseased hearts are typically the size of a football)
2. Would like my pump back and my ICD back
3. Would like to see a picture of the driveline fracture so I can see what really happened
4. Cosmetic closure....no staples.  Don't want to be in the zipper club

That's all for now.