Hello to all, this is Mrs. Towncrier. It's 11:30 p.m. and I'm just getting home from the hospital. What an un-believable day! When John called me at 9:00 this morning and said, Sue, I broke my leg - I thought he was joking. Then I realized that he really didn't sound good. I asked him where he was and he said laying on a patch of ice outside work! I asked him if he called anybody else or if he called me first. The guy he was with called 911. While he went for help, John called me on his cell phone. But I'm sure that if he had fallen anywhere near his computer he would have made a post on the board first! (I know where I stand).
I sat in the emergency room waiting area for an hour and a half before they would let me go back and see him. They were ready to set his leg before he went up to surgery. Even with the morphine it wasn't pretty. They thought that they might be able to work his surgery into the days schedule around 12:30p.m. - no such luck. We were told about 2:30 that it wouldn'd be until 5:30. I dashed home and got the kids from their after school activities because as with any emergency there is always somewhere else you were supposed to be. I had already managed to call and cancel my dentist appointment, oil change, and a wedding consultation. To top off my day I was supposed to teach a course of Funeral Flower Designs this evening. Thankfully one of my co-workers said that she would teach it as I already had all of the materials together.
I made it bach to the hospital in time to meet the orthopedic surgeon before surgery. Wow, did he really break it. He broke his ankle in two places and the bone in his leg snapped in two. The surgery took f-o-r-e-v-e-r. Or maybe it just seemed that way because I hadn't eaten anything and by 7:00p.m. I had a raging migraine. After three hours I was sure they had forgotten that I was in the waiting room. It was down to an amish family and me. Just when I decided to go back upstairs and ask someone where he was, the surgeon came out. When he showed me the x-rays they took after surgery I just couldn't believe it. He has a plate of some sort supporting the leg bone with six screws going through the bone and into it. His ankle has two LONG screws coming up through it and another coming in from the side. I asked if I could keep the x-ray just to show people! I suppose it could have been worse. I had a friend who had knee surgery that had rods sticking out of the skin when she was done.
They let me go back into the recovery room and see John for five minutes as at 8:30p.m. he was the only patient in the recovery room. He was really shaking as the effects of his spinal wore off. The nurses said that he would be in the recovery room for at least an hour before he went to a room. So I decided to drive home, check on the kids, make sure they went to bed and call mom - both mine and his. Sarah made me some tea and a piece of peanut butter toast. Right after I told her that it looked like the best piece of toast I'd ever seen, she promptly dropped it on the floor while handing it to me! She felt horrible, but I laughed like an idiot.
I went back to the hospital just as John was arriving in his room. His color was MUCH better. He told me that the doctor told him that he will have to have another surgery in about 6 weeks. I just can't believe that he messed up his ankle/leg that bad.
It was hard to tell when I first saw him if he was more upset over the fact that they cut off his new pants I bought him for Christmas or that he wouldn't be able to go to Atlanta this weekend.
I'm sure he will appreciate all of your best wishes, prayers and pixie dust. Save your prayers for me for when he gets home! I have no idea if I can say this on the DIS board or not, but if you want to send him a card here is our address:
John Hayes
1094 Berkshire Drive
Macedonia, Ohio 44056
Hey, TC! No tricks on the ice!!! 
Wishing you a speedy recovery.
Wow, what a day, for both him, and you, the kids too. Sure sounds like a doosie of a break, but then you know John the best of all, he always does things first class. 
get well wishes your way!
