Dave Sim Recovery Update #2

Understandably there is no 'Weekly Update' from Dave Sim this week - in case you missed the news, he's been in hospital and undergone surgery. Instead, here's an update on his situation posted over at the Cerebus Archive Number Three Kickstarter site, by campaign coordinator Funkmaster John...

JOHN FUNK:
(from Kickstarter Update #10, 20 March 2015)

...I wanted to give you a brief report on my visit with Dave at the hospital yesterday [Thursday].

Dave is in great spirits and says he feels very good after the surgery. That twisted and blocked bowel must have been bothering him and causing more minor, less noticeable issues for a long time, he said, because he can really feel the improvement now. He was up on his feet the day after surgery and started walking (with his IV stand/cart) around the ring of his 6th floor ward. He said the nurses were calling out to him to 'slow down, take it easy', but he felt strong from all the walking and stair climbing he does (he climbs 10 flights of stairs daily, at our nearby city hall building). When the surgeon checked on him the next day, she tongue-in-cheek 'chided' him with  'you're wearing a groove in the floor' jest. So that's pretty good news. 

I really enjoyed spending 90% of the time just 'chewing the fat' as they say and only 10% on business. Normally, on those very rare occasions where we actually talk by telephone or in person, it's 90% business and 10% 'how are you doing?'. So that was really enjoyable for me and Dave seemed to respond in the same way.

He did want me to let everyone know that he really, really appreciates the support from everyone, whether it be in the form of well wishes, cards, faxes (no doubt his machine will be overflowing), phone calls, flowers and all of the funding, including this Kickstarter campaign. He says that his top priority is to "pass" the tests demonstrating "discharge" so that he can be discharged. But he figured that the doctor is going to be pretty careful before letting someone who lives by themselves go home to take care of themselves. So he admits that his number one (no, not a pun....well, ok, sort of....) priority will be to take care of his health and recover. I think that's a good plan... Read the full Update here...


UPDATE:

SEAN MICHAEL ROBINSON: I just spoke to Dave on Friday, 6:00 PM Kitchener time, for about 45 minutes. He's in great spirits, and says he's never felt better in his entire life.

It seems like the operation has caused tremendous relief of both short-term and long-term (possibly life-long?) physical pains. Dave said the head surgeon (not the actual surgeon who did the operation) explained to him before they operated that his "Quasimodo gut" has most likely been "flopping" between unfavorable and more normal orientations. The times of the worst pain would be when it had been in the unfavorable position. The doctor explained that it would be a much simpler procedure to open it up and "flop" it back into a more normal orientation, but that it would more likely just flop back at a later date. Since Dave is otherwise in good physical condition, they both thought it would be better to excise that portion of the gut, an operation that would be much more difficult to do as Dave progresses in age.

Describing his gut, viewed for the first time via ultrasound: "If we were all walking around on the beach and we were transparent from the front, people would be walking up to me going, what IS that?"

Dave said it was "hard to describe" the sense of relief he's been having to people who have never experienced something like this before, just as it has always been hard before to describe the pain he's felt in his gut. "Before I was a monotheist, I thought I must have been stabbed to death in a past life. That's how bad it was."

Dave mentioned that he's not only felt a tremendous sense of relief, his mind has been working on a potential essay about all of the different ways in which his work suggests this ailment, including, as mentioned before, the "Trevor and the kitchen knife" incident with young Cerebus.

Speaking for myself, it's quite the relief to call someone who's just had incredibly difficult surgery the day before, and find them so full of life and energy, joking around, making plans, asking questions about the ongoing work.

We talked a little bit about his hand. Dave says he's "probably going to see a physiotherapist" when he gets out, and  he seemed really impressed with the hospital and the level of care. "They've really got this stuff figured out." He also mentioned that this is probably the only thing that could have stopped him from working for this long, and that for God, all things are easy. Including getting Dave Sim to stop working.

Related Posts:
Dave Sim Checks Into Grand River Hospital (17 March)
Dave Sim Recovering After Surgery (18 March)
Dave Sim Recovery Update #2 (20 March)
Dave Sim Recovery Update #3 (24 March)