Door Number 3

I remember watching "Let's Make A Deal" as a kid...a game show where people where given a small prize (like $100) and then asked if they'd like to choose a different prize, hidden behind Doors Number 1, 2 or 3.

Often the prize behind the doors would have a gift of a dining set or a trip to Hawaii, but JUST as often the prize would have a donkey being led by one of the Vanna White-type models.

I just went to see my brother at the hospital tonight and he was saying how after coming in to have his arm checked out Friday afternoon, on Saturday when he had been in the hospital overnight, he was still reeling from the hospitalization when the surgeon said "We need to open that up and see what's going on in there."

Jeff said tonight how hard it's been to adjust to it all -- thinking "Did I really hear that?"

Boy, could I relate.

When I was hospitalized at 29 weeks of pregnancy, I came into the hospital that Sunday afternoon with bleeding -- thinking that I'd either 1) have the baby today; or 2) be sent home and told to take it easy.

I certainly wasn't thinking about what was behind Door #3: five weeks of hospital bedrest, followed by two weeks of my daughter in a NICU before I could bring her home.

Likewise Jeff went into the hospital ER Friday thinking he'd either get a pat on the head and be sent home with nothing seriously wrong -- or at most be told that he had an infection and to be sure to stop off at the pharmacy on the way out and take the antibiotics for a coupla weeks.

But no...both of us have been dealt that third alternative we weren't expecting.

It's been weird to be on the other end of a hospitalization of a family member. I've worked hard with my brothers to bake and get ready for Christmas when Jeff the Chef isn't available.

Right now he's in the hospital smarting off to the nurses (so we know he's going to be ok), and hopefully tomorrow sometime he'll be home.

They've established that it's a antibiotic-resistent staph infection, but thankfully not MRSA. And he will live. He will probably go to Guatamala in January with his students.

And thankfully he'll be home in time for Christmas if all goes well tomorrow!

Hopefully!