January 24th, 2011 by MIchelle

When Doctor Gorsuch walked into the waiting room with a smile on his face as he briefed us in how the surgery went, I let out a huge breath of air. This breath felt like I had been holding it since January 3rd. I felt relaxed for the first time since I got here. That weight on my shoulders slowly melted off and evaporated for a temporary feeling of relief. We walked back up to Danny’s room in the ICU and waited for his return. When the bed rolled in and Danny was situated in the room that tenseness came back. Seeing someone your care about in pain and discomfort isn’t easy, but I was still really excited about the success of the procedure.

Danny was in a ton of pain. His head was hot all wrapped up in a bandages. The nurses ended up giving him a morphine button to push every 6 minutes and Ellen sat by his side to remind him to push the button or do it herself. Finally the pain leveled off and Danny was able to relax and fall asleep.

Meanwhile, Conor, Tom, and I were fast asleep at the hotel. After being up for over 24 hours and knowing that the surgery went well, sleep came easy. I managed to read the first ten pages of In An Instant before passing out. This book was written by Lee and Bob Woodruff about Bob Woodruff, the ABC NEWS Anchor that suffered TBI while reporting from Iraq when an explosive device went off near the tank he was riding in. It took me back to January 3rd. I’ll leave you with an excerpt from the first chapter.

“You can’t know how you would behave in a crisis until it drops out of the sky and knocks you down like a bandit: stealing your future, robbing you of your dreams, and mocking anything that resembles certainty. Sudden tragic events and even slow-burning disasters teach us more about ourselves than most of us care to know.” -Lee Woodruff

-Michelle