a day in my hospital's life 🏥

Since these are my scribbles, last night I thought it would be somewhat liberating to tell people about my life during these months in the hospital. I'm here since Jan. 19 and counting.

• 5:30 circa the day starts. Nurse comes to make the daily (!!!) blood samples;
• I take my first medicine;
• half an hour later I take my second medicine;
• if I can I try to sleep again until breakfast arrives. Bust most of the times I am fully awake and then or I spend some time over Instagram and reading feeds on Reeder, or I switch on my MacBook Pro (like this morning … it's 6:20AM right now) and surf the web, update my Day One notes, write some posts following the night's inspirations [more on that later];
• breakfast arrives. It can be at 7:30 or 9:15 it depends on the day and the workload in the department. If I am hungry I use some of my foods or juices or go to the vending machines;
• My wife and my son (circa 1000km far away) call me with FaceTime before going to school and office;
• in the meanwhile nurse comes to measure my blood pressure and give me the load of morning's medicine
• I usually wait for doctors to come by and visit me, they update me on my health status and tell me which - if any - examination program awaits me in the day
• I go to bath to clean myself, most of the times before the doctor comes in… but sometimes they get early in my room so 🤷🏻‍♂️. In the meanwhile a healthcare worker changes my sheets;
• then, depending on the program, I try to do some reading (over a couple of physical books I have with me), journal on paper some thought really personal, switch-on again the Mac. If there's an examination coming, I usually spend time on the iPhone and social (Mastodon, Instagram and sometimes Facebook);
• if there's time to do so I try to make some physiotherapy, alone or with a physiotherapist (this also depends on the morning workload in the department);
• between 12:30 and 13:30 launch arrives;
• I give myself time for a power nap;
• I have another FaceTime with my wife and my son, while going home after their daily duties;
• 16:00 I take other pills
• with a couple of other patients I go for a walk in the corridors and chit chat with them about, well everything! Sometimes we get a coffee or similar at the vending machines just outside the department
• at 18:00 again a small load of medicine
• between 18:30 and 19:30 the dinners comes by;
• do some calls to my dad and mother;
• after dinner I have my last medicine for the day;
• After dinner I have another FaceTime call with my wife and son. This usually is very long, to the point that holding my iPhone becomes really uncomfortable becoming hot to be hold on my hand;
• then, if I have energy I look one or two episodes of TV shows on a streaming service (Netflix, AppleTV, Amazon Prime or Italian's RaiPlay). Else I go straight into sleep.
• at some point in the night I become awake, usually 3 or 4 hours of deep sleep. Then, depending on the occasion I get to retake my sleep nearly immediately … but most of the time I am awake, in the status of being still and with eyes closed for an hour or two. Sometimes I am fully awake and then read a book on my iPhone (at the moment I have a couple going on);
• thanks to god – or simply tiredness – I slip into another hour of two of sleep, up until the nurse comes in to say hello and take my blood.

In the hour or two while being awake in the middle of the night a million thoughts come to my mind. My desire to get back home, my desire to have a ride on my bike, the home duties that I left behind, the foods I'd like to eat when I'll be at home, and write mentally pages and pages of notes.

So here it is. I wrote it down and somewhat this has liberated me. Have a nice day. Say I love you to the people you love, and be kind whenever possible (it's always possible).