I am back at work now, it will be five weeks tomorrow since
the surgery. I am physically pretty much
recovered. Nothing hurts! The thing I notice is that my digestive
system is not yet quite back to normal and my energy level is low. I feel good when I start out the day, but if
I am up and about I tank after a four or five hours, just very very tired,
gotta-walk-slow-and-find-a-place-to-sit-down tired. Which is unlike me because I like to walk
fast. The other day I was coming home
from the library and a lady in her 80’s passed me on the sidewalk because I was
walking so slow! So I am pacing myself,
trying to do what I feel I can, and just gradually getting better.
It was my day off today, and instead of doing any projects,
I lay on the couch and watched two movies in a row. Recovering isn’t hard work, it is kind of
relaxing!
I’ve been thinking about the whole donation process. This would all have been a lot easier if I
could met or talked to people who had done this before. I know Hamilton has only had two
undesignated donors before, but I know in Toronto they’ve had several dozen.
For some reason I
couldn’t find any blogs of people who had done this in Canada, until just the
other day. I think it has to do with the fact that there are different terms
for what I did. I’ve been called an
undesignated donor, but it is also called a nondirected donor, or a
non-directed donor, or an altruistic donor.
So depending on what you google and how you spell it, you may or may not
find anything. The Canadian Blood
Service, the program that co-ordinates the matches, the program I was part of,
does not have any contact with us, it all goes through the hospitals.
In the meantime, I am back to work, which is great. I am out and about seeing people, and a lot
of people are asking how I am. I met
someone today who just found out about the donation, and she said, “And you did
it for a stranger. I knew Mennonites
were nice, but I had no idea…”