“Sarah’s Alright”

 (Guest Post from the Superhero)

The pre-operation assessment went well, I thought. Nurses came and went, and asked Sarah their questions about bloods and scans and consent – questions I’m beginning to understand, even feel familiar with. Then himself came in, the surgeon. I’ve met him a few times at this stage. The first meeting was about 17 months ago. That meeting was after his first close-up look at the infamous liver. I recall phrases like “it’s widespread” and “I know it sounds trite, but stay positive”, or the opening gambit – “how much do you know?”.

He’s a really nice guy, the surgeon. When I bumped into him after the first operation his outlook was pretty encouraging. After that chat, I hung on words like “consolidate” and “it’s going well”. It was all cordial and friendly when he popped in last week ahead of cutting my wife open so he could have a right go at her liver. He was estimating times and he figured that, after the anaesthetist was done, the operation itself would last around two and a half hours. He would phone me when it was done. Grand job. She’ll be in the recovery room by around 5.30, thereabouts, and down to the ward some time after 7pm. I’ll head back in around 6.30, I said. 

I’m getting very familiar with the hospitals of my home town. When 6.30pm came, I bounded up stairwell two, armed with a book, sandwich and bottle of water – I fully knew I might be waiting a while. “Brigid’s” was the most likely post-operation destination so I approached the nurses’s station there and waited for someone to lift her head from her paperwork. Seconds later, the nurse that had checked us in that morning passed by and kindly offered to find out which ward was lined up. She also offered to phone “recovery” to see if the operation was over.

She was nice enough, the nurse, but is inclined towards doleful expressions and slightly anxious tones. At least that’s how I perceived her when she let me know that, “no, she’s not in recovery yet”. No worries, I thought, that’s to be expected. Sure, nothing happens on time around here. The nurse brought me down to a different ward in the new part of the hospital where the observation room behind the nurses’ station had been reserved – they took my phone number and would call once Sarah was on the ward.

There’s a nice, rounded seating area in the hospital, just beyond the glazed foot bridge from the old building to the new one, with lovely views over the river and ‘Middle Parish’ in town. I sat down there around 6.40pm, reading, people watching, and checking the time on my phone every 15 minutes. At 7.30pm, I saw the same nurse on her way across the bridge and she stopped to check in with me. When I told her I had no news she kindly offered to phone again to see if the surgery was finished. On her return, she started off with (slightly dramatic inhale) “so, ok…” “hmmmm” my brain said to me. It was all fine, though, all fine, nobody told her it wasn’t all fine and they usually would, if it wasn’t, like.

What she told me was that they were likely to be in theatre for at least another hour and that I could add another 3 or 4 hours on top of that for recovery. “Do you live far away?” she asked. I wasn’t going anywhere. “Will I see if I can find a room with a TV for you?” she asked. I told her I was fine with my book (The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes, it’s quite good – I was only messing with my anxious head carrying a title like that around though). We agreed a plan. Leave it until 9pm and then go to the ward and ask the nurses to “phone up”.

I stuck to the plan. I went to the vacant nurses’ station at 9pm. When a nurse approached I explained who I was. She smiled sympathetically and said “no, sorry, she’s not out yet”, quickly followed up with “can I get you tea?”.

I found the next half hour tough enough. For one thing, some man joined me in the seating area with his packet of Hunky Dory cheese and onion crisps. For what felt like an age all I could hear was MUNch, MUnch, Munch, munch pause… MUNch, MUnch, Munch, munch pause…I’m sure he didn’t particularly want to be there either but I had to move and sit on a window sill on the bridge.

In that half hour I did have some positive thoughts, like “this is a good sign”, I also started looking at various windows on the floor above and began to wonder “where exactly is theatre?” About 9.15 I got it in my head that the next communication to me needed to be by phone. If someone started to approach me in person that would be a bad sign. I decided that the opening words of that phonecall should be “Sarah’s alright”.

At 9.31pm my phone rang. It was a hospital landline. Good. A tired sounding surgeon introduced himself, apologised for the lateness of the call, said things went well and then launched into a fairly technical account of events. At 9.35pm I phoned my mother-in-law who was minding our kids, while wondering about her daughter. “Sarah’s alright” I began…

Six and a half hours of surgery is something I can barely comprehend and when I next saw my wife she was on a trolley bound for the intensive care unit. It was less scary than I would have imagined in ICU and the staff were really sound. It was all very practical. I was allowed in almost straight away. Then ordered outside five minutes later so they could x-ray. Then invited back in. “Stand on this side”, “take this phone number”, “move that wire”, “sit down”, “dip that sponge in water for your dehydrated wife” etc. Then himself popped in again about midnight. They work hard, those surgeons.