I didn’t want to update until it was looking as sure as possible but here we are in the early hours of Saturday morning and by all appearances my lung is still up, and more importantly…the drain is out. It was removed yesterday late afternoon after being clamped for 24 hours. I didn’t want to blog or tell anyone as each step progressed as I have been all the way down this path before to the point of packing my room up, and then three weeks later am still sitting here. However so far so good and it appears I will be heading home for weekend leave and it is all a bit surreal. These collapse episodes seem to drag on indefinitely with foreseeable solution or end, when suddenly things will turn a corner and everyone will rush to seize the chance and turf me out for some respite and freedom asap, which is what we are doing now and it is almost a bit overwhelming. I will be heading back here on Monday for a bit more rehabilitation work but we are oh so close now!

It was quite lovely timing as the doctor who removed it was one who was leaving that day. There are a really good group of doctors on the CF Team at the moment but I will still miss her an awful lot. She has been treating me since the beginning of this episode and has worked tirelessly (as do all the staff here but she just goes that extra mile) to try and get me and my delinquent lung back on the straight and narrow. It was a nice bit of closure for both of us I think, as it signifies (hopefully) the end of this particular rough patch which has taken a great deal of battling and hard work on all sides. It was quite an emotional moment.

I had some lovely visitors today although I managed to greet one group of them in a somewhat dramatic fashion by bumping into them downstairs outside Xray, demanding to be taken up by them (was bored of waiting for a porter) then dramatically running out of oxygen in the lift resulting in much chaos and formula one style racing around 1st floor whilst trying to find an O2 point. Some time later having regained composure and retrieved a new cylinder we returned to my room (where poor visitor #1 had been somewhat freaked out by the porter returning to question her as to my whereabouts when she had seen him wheel me off half an hour earlier) where I was presented with my rather spectacular present as pictured below. Those who have ever spoken to me on msn will recognize the smugface (which incidentally I am trying to replicate in the second photo, not just unable to smile nicely). Pinkandsparkly cake shall return home with me this weekend to celebrate first time at home with a non deflatey lung, nothing more to add really except a wholehearted, gleefully toe-wiggling, beaming from ear to ear and completely over excited YAY!