What a difference a day makes!

I went to see Roger in hospital on Wednesday afternoon. He was very poorly indeed. In fact the worst I've ever seen him!
I returned home that evening with heavy heart. I got the phone call about 6.30pm. It was from the senior registrar on the chest ward. She told me that Roger has what's known as an empyema. A complication following pneumonia.
My medical dictionary gives the following description: "pus in the pleural cavity, usually secondary to infection in the lung or in the space below the diaphragm. It is a life threatening condition which can usually only be relieved by surgical drainage of the pus." She explained that they wanted to do just that, and they wanted to do it that night, and she was inviting me to come back in, so as to be near.
I rang Rob and Suze, who came tearing round to me. They hadn't eaten, so started to assemble a quick snack. Whilst that was happening, I had another call, this time from his GP to find out what was going on. I had hardly replaced the receiver when another call came from the hospital doctor. They had decided to wait until first thing the next morning. A) Because the patient before him was taking longer than expected and B)It was felt that it would be better to embark on it when everyone was fresh. In the meantime they had cross matched 4 units of blood, which he was about to be given. His haemoglobin count had sunk to 6. A normal male would have a count of around 12.something.
The next day was my birthday. The kids stayed with me and I went into the hospital feeling like a bit of chewed string. The thing I clung to was that nobody had telephoned in the night, so that was a positive! When I reached Roger's bed, he was sitting up, with a normal skin colour. The lights were on and somebody was home, as they say! He looked so well, I thought he must've already had the procedure, but no! It was all due to the blood they'd given him. He said he'd had a comfortable night.
Typical Rog, all he could do was apologise for not doing something for my birthday!!
We all went down with him to the department for his procedure. Then whilst he was in there(about 1hr.30mins) we went for a birthday lunch. I found myself suddenly hungry. Later he was back on the ward and everything went well, so we left him in peace.
I thought it was safe enough to pop out and see the latest George Clooney offering. Well! it was my birthday! Thankyou to everyone for the avalanche of birthday cards and flowers.

Suzanne