Jul 8, 2011 4 min read

The streak is over.

Two weeks ago today – possibly as you were reading my last column (did you miss me last week?) – I went into surgery to repair a congenital defect in my kidney. I spent four and a half hours in surgery and two nights in the hospital, the first time I’ve had an overnight stay – or even been officially admitted – since I was born. It was a good run, but The Streak – hospital-free since ’83 – was officially over.

?In the end, after years of knocking on wood after mentioning it, the end of The Streak was a forgone conclusion. Frequent readers will recall a column back in March when I discussed the late-night emergency room trip and multiple specialist visits that led to the planned procedure. For the uninitiated (or forgetful), I needed a section of my ureter (the tube that comes out of the kidney) removed because it was too narrow and had caused me to get a pretty serious infection back in January. Left untreated, I was looking at some premature kidney failure down the road. There was no rush, so by March I had scheduled the surgery for after the semester was over and, until two weeks ago, had managed to put it out of mind.

But D-Day eventually came. (S-Day?) I had to be at the hospital at 5:30?a.m., which for me is far too early to be somewhere under normal circumstances made ungodly by the fact I couldn’t even have a cup of coffee. (You know, the whole don’t eat and drink before major surgery thing.)

A few forms later and I had a wrist band. A few minutes later and I was in a gown and awaiting the anesthetist. Then I got an IV, had my bed wheeled down the hallway, got a quick glimpse of some mammoth overhead lights and a number of bustling pairs of multicolor scrubs (I can’t see much more than blurs without my glasses) and then woke up.

By the time I was out of the recovery area and collected my wits enough to ask what time it was, it was after 5?p.m.

I had lost an entire day.

In the two weeks since, I’ve been recovering nicely. This being 2011, the procedure that used to require a large incision was performed laproscopically, with robotic arms, giving me just four small holes in my stomach. For symmetry’s sake, those were matched by four holes in my arms from being poked and prodded for IVs and blood work for three days. (As I was wheeled to the car on Sunday, I looked like a low-budget character in a mummy movie.)

I laid low last week to recuperate, so hopefully you didn’t miss me too much. (I assume you read a previous column of mine that you saved so as not to go into withdrawal.) Meanwhile, I’ve stayed busy, and by busy I mean laid on the couch and was waited on hand and foot by my beautiful wife. For someone who works on vacation, it’s actually been a nice respite.

And one other unexpected plus side of my surgery was that it coincided with my sister-in-law’s moving day from her second-floor apartment to her first home. This is notable because it means as the rest of the family is hauling boxes this weekend, I’m going to get a lot of mileage out of the phrase, “I’d love to help; I’m just not allowed-doctor’s orders.” (You can imagine this being delivered with an evil grin, if you like.)

The streak may be over, but that’s not a bad silver lining.

If you’d like to call him something worse than a curmudgeon, Brandon Szuminsky can be reached at bszuminsky@heraldstandard.com.