Difficult Night

Though she continues to do well in terms of her vital signs and healing, Heather had a bit of a bad day yesterday and also a somewhat difficult night. She has had nausea, a stomach ache, and diarrhea, which has meant significant discomfort and many (8 or 9) linen changes since yesterday morning. These are quite painful and humiliating to her because one to two nurses and one to two aides must come in, roll her onto one side, clean her off, strip the linens off the half of the bed she is not laying on, put new linens on that half of the bed, roll her over the top of the new linens onto her other side, pull the linens over the rest of the bed, and roll her back onto her back. They also often must cut off the top part of the wound dressings on her legs when they become soiled (This involves cutting off an ace bandage, replacing several layers of gauze, and re-rolling a new ace bandage.). Though the nurses and aides are very respectful, kind, and efficient at what they do, it just hurts Heather to be moved around so much. It is also embarrassing to her and she hates feeling like she is a burden to the nursing staff who have to go through this process repeatedly (even though they never indicate any hesitation or frustration with it). Then, to have an upset stomach and nausea on top of the pain and frustration, makes things miserable. She has also struggled to breathe some, though her ventilator numbers suggest that she is breathing very well.

They have ordered chest X-rays to make sure nothing is wrong with her lungs. They ordered an ultrasound of her gall bladder to make sure she doesn't have stones and to make sure her gall bladder is functioning properly. They are testing her stool for possible infection. They may do a CT scan to see if anything is going wrong with her bowels (They will wait and see how she does this morning.), and they are giving her some medication to calm her bowels down. They said that her liver enzymes are up somewhat, which suggests some liver distress. They will watch that carefully to make sure it doesn't get worse.

In the last hour or so, she seems to be feeling much better. Her stomach ache and nausea have subsided, and she seems visibly relieved. It makes everything significantly better for her. The medication they gave her to calm her bowels (Reglan) seems to be working. They also have begun giving her Methadone to replace the Fentanyl they were giving her for pain. They also give her Oxicodone for pain.

One thing that I don't think most people realize is that in some ways this period is more difficult for Heather personally than just about anything she has experienced so far. Everyone around her and everyone who has been following her experience sees how far she has come and how much she has progressed. However, she was asleep for most of that and doesn't remember it. Now, though what she is going through is much less life threatening, she must face the long road of recovery and frustration at not having control over much of anything in her life right now. She can't talk, so she can't call out for help or explain what she needs very well. She can't lift her arms or move her fingers very well, so she can't hit the nurse's button or wipe her own face very well. It is a powerless position to be in, and it gets to be quite frustrating to say the least. She vacillates (as I do too) between feeling hopeful, optimistic, and at peace and frustrated, anxious, and overwhelmed.

Her doctor will take off her wound dressings in about 15 minutes to see how she has done with with the cadaver grafts. He will decide at that point what the next step is and when they will take it. From what the nurses have seen when they have looked at her grafts when they have had to change the dressings on the upper part of her legs because of bowel movements, they feel the grafts are looking quite good and seem to be "taking" as they should. I'll let you know what they find.