After 52 days inside, Joe Haldeman was allowed to leave the hospital on November 10, Gay Haldeman told readers on SFF.net. Joe has moved to the Cincinnati condo Joel Zakem loaned them. He’ll continue his healing and recovery under the care of local pancreatic specialists for weeks to come, possibly returning to Florida by Christmas.

Joe himself added these sobering details to SFF.net on November 11:

Speaking of woods, I’m not out of them, quite. I get tired walking across a room (but I can do it, without the walker). I have the clumsy ileostomy bag for another six months or so, and some pretty serious surgery in store then, when they reattach my large intestine. (They removed about 18″ of it, including the appendix as a little bonus.) And of course there’s pain. 

[Thanks to Andrew Porter and Janice Gelb for the story.]

Joe Haldeman’s progress is reported daily on SFF.net by Gay Haldeman. She wrote on November 7 that the results of a CT scan showed Joe’s pancreas is functioning well. As of Monday, November 9 he completed a course of IV antibiotics and now takes them by pill. He is still in the hospital but expects to return soon to the Drake Center for more rehab work. Gay passed on this funny line of Joe’s: “We were talking about whether we have winter clothes here, since we arrived in September. Joe asked if he had a tie.  Why? ‘In case I win a Nobel Prize.'”

Joe Haldeman’s improving apace – wheeling himself beside Gay to the cafeteria, talking with a visiting friend, practicing his handwriting. Gay Haldeman quoted Joe’s new poem to readers of SFF.net:

The pancreas, a curious beast
Has functions hard to scry.
It sits around for sixty years
Then tries to say “bye-bye.”

Joe Haldeman had his first full physical therapy session on October 19, Gay Haldeman reported on SFF.net. He stood up from his wheelchair a couple of times and walked six small steps. “It was wonderful to see him standing and walking,” she wrote. On October 20 he had a longer PT session, standing and sitting. Plans are for Joe’s trach tube to be removed October 21.

Joe Haldeman made a smooth transition to the Drake Center rehab facility on October 15, wrote Gay Haldeman on SFF.net. “The gastric tube is out, so he’s trying to eat more and the food is better. He’s stronger today, able to shift in bed and hold a fork. He even read a couple of e-mails and the comics. Seems like a good place for him right now.”

“The best day so far,” Gay Haldeman told SFF.net readers on October 12.

Found Joe wide awake.  He was evaluated for swallowing with apple sauce, juice and a graham cracker. He rolled his eyes and made happy faces when he had food in his mouth.  When the speech therapist asked him to smile, he made exaggerated monster teeth faces and cracked everyone up.  He’s been cleared for a soft diet.  If his pancreas enzymes stay down, he’ll eat on his own and be unhooked from the gastric tube. The whole visiting family got to interact with him.  Physical Therapy showed up, sat him on the edge of the bed for a while and he did well.  He paid attention as I was given a lesson in caring for his iliostomy.

He made writing motions, so we dug out the dry erase board Tim’s sister Jenny gave us.  Jag asked him if there was anything she could send him.  He pointed, slowly, letter by letter, to W-O-R-L-D   P-E-A… before we caught on.

On October 13, Joe had his iPod and a smile on his face. No fever. Real food. He was on a trach cuff and when the cuff was moved aside he could tolerate room air just fine.