Adventures in Hospitalization, #4

The rest of Tuesday, April 20th, passed uneventfully. Diane came by, and Genie Scott visited, leaving some magazines and DVDs. I was cut back to one cup of ice chips per shift.

I watched “Quest For Fire” which Genie had brought, that I had not seen before. This was a flick concerning encounters between prehistoric tribes of various species or subspecies of hominids as a trio of Neandertals search for fire for their tribe. The credits listed Desmond Morris as providing the behaviors and Anthony Burgess (author of “A Clockwork Orange”) as providing original languages for the film. Unfortunately, the apparent target audience was anthropologists, and this intriguing film didn’t do too well in its run in theatres. Of course, the, er, uninhibited aspects of primate/hominid behavior depicted probably didn’t help with mass-market acceptance, either.

The medical phrase for Wednesday, April 21st, is “paralytic ileus”. It’s a fancy way of saying that my guts aren’t yet moving. We’re proceeding carefully. I just completed a four-hour test of my gastric output. My NG suction was turned off for that period, then turned on and stomach contents measured. Over 150 ml would have been bad, but I had 80 ml. Now I get to do the same for an 8 hour period. How that turns out will determine if I start taking nutrition orally again tomorrow or not.