Well, 2010 is not starting out so well. I was scheduled to have my left knee replaced on January 12th. As luck would have it, I contracted pnenumonia (sp?) and spent the evening of New Year's Day in the ER. This pushed my surgery date back until February 5th.

On January 30th, I was involved in a serious car accident. I wasn't moving, just waiting to make a left into a parking lot when two cars collided at a fairly high rate of speed and one on those cars hit me. They back boarded me out of my truck and took me to the hospital, pretty scary. They were being careful because I told them about my legs. I was treated and released but I do have to see a specialist because my shoulder still hurts (it slammed into the door).

My truck, a 2003 Escape, is totalled. At first the insurance offered $7400 but upped it to $8000 after we provided receipts for brand new tires and a few other things. We will also get another $500 for the deductible once it's all settled since I had no fault at all in this.

We were having a hard time finding a decent replacement for $8000. Everything was old or had high mileage. I was getting pretty depressed since I didn't want to go into hock for another car. I loved my Escape and planned on keeping it a while.

Hubby went out today with his friends and found a 2005 PT Cruiser with only 48,000 miles, all the features I want, really clean for only $7500. The only thing I'm not crazy about is the color, off white, but the price and everything else was right. Another couple was test driving it while he was there so I told him to buy it. The dealership let him drive it home to show me since I'm recovering from surgery and it's a deal.

My surgery went well but that's where it ends. The hospital as terrible. It had the worst food I've ever had in any hospital. The pot roast was crusty and curled up at the edges and my bagel was frozen! I could actually deal with some of that but the food had no flavor at all, absolutely none!

Since it was my stepdaughter's 16th birthday and she was over that weekend, I didn't want my husband to drag her into the city to visit. Luckily, my room mates son in law got me some soup. It's all I ate for 3 1/2 days.

The pain management team was terrible. They couldn't control my pain in the hospital. They would not listen to me when I told them I had been on painkillers for a while. They sent me home with way less pain management then I needed. My surgeon was furious. They even wrote different painkillers on my discharge papers than the ones they gave me.

The social worker did not do her job and I was without a CPM machine (continuious passive movement) for two weeks until my doctor's office got me one and then Visiting Nurse dropped the ball when my physical therapist went on vacation and didn't send a replacement.

I could go on and on about the aftercare. Maybe I had it too easy with my other surgeries but I never had to deal with this level of imcomptence before.

I hope the year improves!