The “C” Word – Day 62 Praises, Prayers & Answered Prayers

Despite the fact that they started George on anti-diarrheal meds at 11PM last night, the problem still persists.  The first dose did, however, enable us to get two hours of sleep before the first wave hit, and another each hour and a half later.  At 4:45 or so the brigade of early morning staff began.  First the nurse to do vital stats and shortly thereafter the first blood draw of the day.  By that time George was awake and our now daily routine of frequent bathroom bouts began. 

George decided this morning while sitting on the commode at 5:30 that it was time to try to shave.  He sat in a chair and between the two of us we managed to get rid of the majority of the stubble that had grown over the past eleven days.  Fresh face scrubbed clean did a lot to help his spirits during the early morning hour. 

There are orders for George to be weighed every morning before he gets anything to eat.  This morning, that happened at 5:15 after the first potty break of the day.  He has lost 5 lbs. from where he was yesterday and is now about 4 lbs. under the weight he was at home prior to surgery.  (In my estimation he should eventually be at least 8-10 lbs. less considering what they removed from his body.) 

George expressed a desire to try to eat something so we ordered up Texas French Toast and a cup of hot tea.  He managed to eat one of the two slices of toast and the tea.  Progress is made.  We now received calls from “room service” if they do not hear from us by a certain time of day so as to insure he orders something up to eat at each meal.  While he may order it there is no guarantee that he will actually eat any of it, but order it we must.

Eating is still difficult for George as they are making him orally take potassium three times a day.  For those of us who have never tried it, apparently it has a very strong taste, seems to destroy ones’ taste buds and alters the taste of anything and everything.  This has made it very difficult for George who wants to put forth an effort to eat but feels like his tongue is burning. 

After an extremely difficult night, I made the decision that George lay back down at 9:30AM and try to get some rest.  My thought that was perhaps I would get a nap in as well.  It took some time for George’s body parts to allow it, but eventually he fell asleep for about an hour and a half and I dozed off as well.  I even turned down physical therapy (which I hate to do) but today the requirement was to get much needed rest, get George’s feet elevated because he has severe edema in his feet, and get him off of his very raw butt.  Note: I had to tape a sign on the outside of our door asking staff to please enter the room quietly. That did help some. 

The morning nurse lets us know that George’s blood count was low as was potassium, calcium and magnesium.  The latter three will be taken care of by an IV drip.  The first one will require a blood transfusion of one unit during the day. 

While I sat around all day waiting for the doctor to show up, he never did come by.  Yesterday when I phoned his office to see if they knew when he would do rounds at the hospital they had absolutely no idea. Some of the nurses here have told me that he comes by every day.  There is no rhyme or reason to the timing.  He may show up in the middle of the night, the early morning, late in the day.  I don’t know if he will show up sometime tonight or not.  We do know he gets updates from the nurses on George’s conditions and sends order changes, etc.  We just would like to ask a couple of questions that come up during the day.

George made a decision this afternoon that he hopes will give us some relief tonight.  It will probably give him more relief than me.  Because it is so tedious to get in and out of bed with the constant diarrhea, quite often today he had more gas than actual “stuff”.  Tonight I have put down several layers of chux. Should he just pass gas, no harm no foul.  Should it not be just gas, I can pull out a chux and clean him up.  We are attempting to use the bedpan and from 7:00-7:45 used it four or five times.  Each time I had to take it, empty it, clean it, dry it – so you can see why this is more for his relief than mine.  We just asked for some medication and hope that this round has some affect.  Not counting the bedpan usage there were 26 trips to the bathroom since 1AM.  And the day is not over yet.  I am afraid to lay down and get comfortable because just as I do it will probably be time to jump up again.  It is a vicious cycle – one I am longing to come to an end.

I want to take time out to give thanks and praise for some of the progress made over the last day or so.  First, we received the news that the stool sample came back negative for CDIF.  This was a HUGE relief for us as that is a very difficult bacterial infection to battle.  Secondly, the fact that George has had very few incidences of nausea since yesterday.  [He is experiencing some tonight but this is the first time since last night that he has had any of consequence.  He did experience some vomiting after the blood transfusion but that is a possible side effect of that procedure.] Thirdly, he is able to eat a little bit and keep it down.  Fourth is the fact that he can walk around without the walker.  He does get winded easily but he can do it. 

We need to continue to pray that this incessant diarrhea lets up.  It has been an exhaustive three days of it.  [See next paragraph – again, answered prayer.] We pray that George’s blood tests in the morning show that his potassium levels have increased so we can cut back on some of the potassium.  If we can do that, perhaps his taste buds will come back and he will feel more like eating – and that will most certainly help him recover more quickly.  The diarrhea and low potassium are directly linked so the “stoppage” of one should lead to the stoppage of the second.  We both need some honest resting time. [More answered prayer – the doctor just told us he will take him off the oral potassium and just do it via the PICC line.]

It is 8:20PM.  The doctor just arrived.  We told him how our day went and that the meds for diarrhea are not working.  He said that since the test for CDIF was negative he could be more aggressive with the meds for the diarrhea.  He said that there was a bladder infection and he ran a round of antibiotics for that today.  We let him know that, although he had told us that the PICC line could be used for blood draws, the staff said it was not in the orders so they refused to do so.  He did not know he had to put an order in for that and said he would try to figure that out. 

George is starting to nod off.  I can tell because his mouth starts opening and fluttering from the push of the CPAP machine.  My poor tired baby. 

It appears that tomorrow will be a better day now that prayers are being answered.  Could this be the turning point?  I sure hope so.  All we both want to do is get back to our own home and our own beds.