Downhill from here?

Well, yesterday was pretty uneventful. I went by myself to Valencia and endured the much longer weekend bus rides. Mauri was doing pretty well, but he was worried about how much they might hurt him today. We still had no idea what the plan was for him, but we knew he was scheduled to enter the OR.
This morning, after having spoken with one of the doctors, Mauri still didn't know what the plan was for him. (I guess having informed consent for procedures isn't as important here as it is in the US.) He only knew that he was scheduled to be the last surgery of the day, something that didn't exactly make him happy. Apart from the fact that it meant that he wouldn't be awake to see us during the morning visiting hour, it also meant that he would be deprived much longer of food and water. Every time he is scheduled for surgery, he cannot eat or drink after midnight the night before, and isn't allowed to eat or drink again until 6 hours after the surgery is over, usually around 8PM the night of the surgery (21 hours straight with nothing to eat or drink). With the hospital being as hot as it is, being deprived of water is especially difficult for him.
We arrived at the morning visit a bit early, but we found out from our new friend, the nurse, that Mauri had basically just entered the OR. So, we were in the waiting room for quite awhile. A couple of hours later, a new doctor, on her way out, asked us if we were waiting for an appointment, but when she realized that we were there for Mauri, she happily told us that all had gone well.
She told us that they had done more debridement on his back (aka. removal of dead tissue, as in the "cleaning sessions"), and that they had finished grafting his back.
We thanked her for the information, but decided to wait for Mauri's main doctor to come out and elaborate. (As an aside, his name is Dr. Centeno and not Dr. Herrero, something that we just found out after weeks of saying how great Dr. Herrero was.)
When Dr. Centeno came out, he explained that there were three areas that were not epithelializing on their own: two on Mauri's lower back, and one on his upper back near his right shoulder. Those areas were grafted with skin from Mauri's right lower leg (the only area that hadn't been used as a donor site up until now). I imagined Mauri awaking to see his leg bandaged up, and knew that he wouldn't be very happy, but on the other hand, I was quite happy that it was done with. In the worst case scenario, they would have just bathed him, done the debridement, and only decided what to do, waiting a few more days to do the grafting, if needed. The sooner it is done, the sooner the healing can take place, which means a quicker recovery. That, for me, is good news because I can't wait until he leaves the "carcel" (aka. ICU burn unit). Over three and a half weeks of scheduling my whole day around two measly one-hour visits through a stupid window, using a walkie talkie to communicate, is starting to wear away at my nerves.
In the evening, we went to visit Mauri, who was in the special bed, but he was in too much pain to be able to say much. He had no idea what had been done to him (information is very difficult to come by in a Spanish hospital), but he figured that grafting had been done on his back when he saw that his leg had been wrapped up. We told him what the doctor had explained to us, and also shared the good news that in the next couple of days, they plan on removing his IV's and catheter so that he will have more freedom to move around on his own. We also told him that this was the last major operation that he will have to have, and from now on it is up to his body to continue the healing process. Any possible further operations will probably only be needed to correct scarring, etc.
Mauri was in too much pain to be able to appreciate that the news we were giving him, really was good news overall. All he could say was that he couldn't wait to get out of there.
Nor can I.