Paul had a pretty fantastic day. He has the valve in the trach again that allows him to talk without plugging it with his finger and hes able to tolerate it now, so he did a lot more talking today. The jokes were flowing at a pretty steady pace, and all his nurses had to learn fast not to let him get ahead of them. He spent a lot more time sitting in the chair, which is really good for his muscles, and he didnt need to be suctioned at all. They even let him have a cup of ice chips as long as he promised to put no more than one chip in his mouth at a time. (They called them chips, but they were actually more like peas.) He said having those was like heaven since he hasnt been able to eat for over 5 weeks now. Theres still a little bleeding from his trach, so the plan right now is to leave things as they are and keep an eye on it. If they feel comfortable with everything in the next couple of days, they will begin reducing the size of the trach or switching back to the kind he had at VA. Of course, the sooner the lungs get healed, the sooner he can possibly get rid of the trach altogether.Theres still a slight chance that the trach will have to be permanent, but the odds are not leaning that way. He was moved to the 8th Floor last night, to the Burn Treatment and Intermediate Care Unit. His physical and occupational therapy will get more intensenow that hes out of ICU, which is a good thing. Whether or not hell still have to go to Des Moines is unclear at this time. I know there are people who are interested in being able to call him and I want you all to know that I plan to get him a new cell phone next week so youll be able to do just that. His other phone got wet but I didnt want to get him a different one until I was able to find out exactly what he wanted. He got a new phone for me in June and when he brought it to me at work, he said I saw the phone I want to get when its time for me to get a new one, but he didnt specify at the time which one it was. But now I know what he wants so I will get it for him as soon as I have time. I cant begin to tell you how amazed we are at the changes were seeing every day now. Yesterday there was a man in the ICU across the hall from us who looked exactly like Paul did when he was first admitted - hooked up to all kinds of IVs and monitors, tube down his throat, collar on is neck, everything. I even remarked about it to Erica. Later on in the afternoon, after we came back from a short break we took while Paul napped, I happened to look across the hall again and there was some activity going on in that room. I noticed the bed was empty and there was a policeman standing at the doorway. I said something to Erica about it and she turned to look just as they wheeled a gurney out of the room that was totally covered with a sheet. It was pretty humbling to realize that someone was leaving the ICU who wasnt given the second chance that Paul was. All of us agree at this point that we will no longer take our time together for granted, and hopefully we will remember that sentiment when this is all behind us and were back to living our wonderfully mundane lives.
Posted on: Mon, 11 Aug 2014 03:12:16 +0000
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