WIld thing..

I was leery about writing today about the daily waiting room happenings, but it’s an easy way to introduce the daily update and it gets me in the writing mood. Our houseguest have stayed the same for the past few nights, but last night Quincy decided to actually stay with us again so the room was noisier than usual. Mrs. Breathe Right wasn’t present and as I was looking to see if she was here, I began to think to myself about the effectiveness of the strips. Either I’m super glad they worked a little or those things are worthless. If they worked a little, I can’t imagine the massage I would get from the rumbling in the room, it sounds more like a construction area than a waiting room with that jack hammer going constantly. The house guest that replaced “breathe right” was much quieter. She sat in the corner most of the night knitting in what I was hoping were footies for me, but I’m assuming she saw the house slippers and figured I didn’t need to keep my feet anymore toasty and comfy. It could have been a nice afghan as well, but the more I started thinking of possibilities I realized I was being selfish.

The morning started off well beside the lack of sleep, I think the overpowering smell of Quincy’s abnormally large feet was overwhelming and stimulated my chemoreceptors too much so that I could relax enough to sleep without wincing. Dad rested fairly well throughout the night. They had him pretty sedated and relaxed so he could rest for the morning. This morning he is off the vent and breathing completely on his own. He’s getting about 40% oxygen and has been tolerating it pretty well. He’s have a bit of secretions that cause him to cough, but that’s to be expected. The drug weaning is still in the process and he’s doing ok with that. His blood pressure is a little low, but that’s also pretty common especially since he’s been laying flat for quite some time.

There was actually a therapist who came in today that I liked. I think I’ve talked about it before, but the three we’ve had previously have spent 10 minutes at the most working with dad, and nothing that they did was really beneficial. It was pleasant seeing someone actually take some time to really get some good stretching and movement. I told her that I was tossing around the fact of refusing all the therapies and just doing myself because they’ve been so poor to this point. After awhile moving around his legs seems to relax him and calm him down. He’s not used to just laying around, and gets anxious to move when he’s not feeling well.

Dad still has a fever, it went down a little this morning, but it had increased a bit throughout the day, potentially because he’s working and moving around more. The cultures haven’t come back to this point in the day (2.30). They look at the cultures typically every 24 hrs to see if something is growing on them, some bacteria or infection takes a little longer to grow so they can’t see it immediately. He tolerated breathing on his own pretty well for about 7 hours. Then he began to become anxious and starting to move around a ton.

They decided to put the vent back on and put him on pressure support. He calmed down slightly but soon starting moving around like a wild man. His foot was almost touching the ground and he gave me a work out. I learned how out of shape I actually am. An hour and fifteen minutes into wrestling with him to keep him in bed and calmed down. I will actually admit I was unsuccessful even with the use of drugs. I had to admit it, but it was pleasant to see Chris walk in to try and calm him down. She surprisingly usually does a good job. She did have a difficult time as well. I’m definitely worn out from that episode, and Chris had to make fun of me because she said that’s all she did the other night when she was in his room. It looks like he’s just trying to scratch his back moving around so often, but we try to roll, turn and scratch and nothing seems to work. He just gets in the same position that looks very uncomfortable halfway down the bed. It’s frustrating at times because I don’t know what to do, I want to help him so he’s not so fidgety and agitated but I have no answers. I think this is the first time Chris is more relaxed than I am. The nurses don’t seem overly concerned and apparently this can be normal, but it’s definitely difficult to see and watch. Although I want to take things slow and not rush them, I’m ready for this stage to be over, and I’m ready for him to be with it enough so we can know what he really wants.