Nap time.

Here is what Mom did today: she didn't want to take pain pills because she thought they were making her crazy; instead she took her anti-nausea pill and it put her to sleep.  The day went by pretty quickly for her that way.  I left for an eye appointment and when I returned her room was like a dark little sleep cave.  She did wake up later but swears she's cutting her pain pills in half from now on.  Goals for tonight include a shower and hair-washing in preparation for the big trip to the doctor tomorrow (we've already picked out her outfit).

We're still here!

Yesterday was a pretty busy day.  Mom alternated between low-level nausea and feeling good (which we think is because she is not eating enough food with all her various medications; she really does like the hospital food better than anything that we can cook, apparently).  Her food intake has been interesting, as for the first part of the week, she consumed exclusively white foods: cream of wheat, potato soup, bread, apple slices.  We've slowly incorporated some orange/yellow food into that schedule with one meal each of eggs, grilled cheese and lasagna.   

She also made her first trip downstairs last night, because Anna really wanted her to and Mom said "Anna just looked so hopeful" about trying.  Mom may also have been lured by the promise of all the DVR'ed shows that awaited her if she could just get down to the living room couch.  We sat through Biggest Loser and the Top Chef reunion before Mom had to give up and came back upstairs.  She seems to feel well today so maybe we'll try for another trip down the stairs--if not today, she'll definitely have to go on Thursday to attend her first doctor appointment since she was discharged from the hospital.

She still needs pretty constant "supervision," as she gets uncomfortable or hungry or queasy-feeling regularly and takes an array of medicine every four to six hours.

Thanks again to everyone for the thoughts, prayers, cards, love and food.  We appreciate so much your support of Mom, and Mom of course looks forward every day to getting the mail or having email or messages read to her.  She still can't really read but is remembering it all much better when we relay it to her!

Feeling better

 Mom finally got to feeling better around 4 o'clock or so (but before that was begging me to blog to all y'all that she felt terrible and that you should all feel very sorry for her :) ).  She then made the mistake of telling Anna that she felt the best she had felt all day, and quickly found herself ordered to sit up for at least thirty minutes.   The weather was gorgeous today so Anna made a comfy seat in front of the big picture window and made Mom sit there while Dixie and I put on a frisbee exhibition in the front yard.  Here's Mom observing:

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Can you see her? Here's a closer picture:

 

And here's our therapy dog Dixie, thoroughly worn out from entertaining the invalid (Mom is thoroughly worn out too, and she and Dixie are both currently taking naps in Mom's bed). 

Certainly a nice end to the day, especially compared to where we started.

Monday

Mom definitely has a case of the Mondays today.  She slept really well last night but then woke up to a very unhappy morning.  She's not in pain but is very nauseous, which we're combating with a combination of anti-nausea drugs and Mary's potato soup.  Ironically, Mom and Anna are both downing the same drugs today to prevent the sick feeling (Anna's avoiding potato soup though).  Mom says in the future someone should invent a drug that just makes you sleep for a month post-surgery until you are healed.

Andrew and Andy have both returned to work--thanks to everyone who brought food this weekend and helped feed them!

Home sweet home

The Anne Caravan left the hospital around 8:30pm last night, full of flowers, a week's worth of spend the night stuff, and one semi-drugged patient.  It took a village, but Mom got up the front stairwell with Andy, Dad and Anna assisting.  Dad would take a knee for Mom to sit on while Andy spotted his back and Mom held on to Anna's hands.  Once she made it to the top of the stairs, I brought her a chair to sit on while she rested for the last shuffle to the bedroom. She tried her hardest to figure out if there was anything in the house that would roll her from the end of the hall to the bedroom but ended up having to walk (after a short rest).  Dad built her a stair to get into bed and now she is somewhat comfortably installed in her own bedroom.   She had a good night last night, has been awake most of the day and is very happy to have her "therapy dog" Dixie with her.

We celebrated Andrew's 30th birthday this afternoon with cake and ice cream downstairs, and set up a Skype connection so Mom watched us from Andrew's laptop while we sang. 

Strategery

Actual conversation that just happened in the hospital room re: renting a shower chair for Mom.

Anna (on the phone with the medical equipment rental company): How much? Ok, thank you, bye.
Anna (to Dad):  It's $55 for a shower chair, what do you think?

Dad (long pause): Couldn't we just get a lawn chair or something and put it in the shower?
Chorus: No.
Dad (joking now): What about an upside-down cooler?
Andrew: Or an upside down trash can?
Mary: Y'all stop it, you're making her laugh.
Mom: It's ok, it was worth it.

Don't worry, we found a cheaper shower chair, although it was $4 extra to have a back--but Andrew said for her birthday next year he'd float the extra $4.

Squeaky clean

Anna wins the caretaker prize of the day.  I returned from an afternoon of errand running to find Mom in bed with washed, dried, and straightened hair.  It looks extra fluffy and smells good.   The hospital was in the process of finding a tub bench to facilitate the hair-washing, but Anna got impatient so she hauled one of the glider rockers all the way to the bathroom for Mom to sit in.

Mary and Clarence just walked in and reported heavy traffic and many Razorback flags flying on the way up here. They are now in an intense planning discussion concerning where Mom's recovery nest will be set up--it may or may not involve renting a hospital bed.  Andrew is en route so we'll be a full house tonight!

Last night and this morning

After an afternoon interlude of drug-induced rest, Mom felt much better last night and downgraded again to oral pain medication.  She had a good night and got lots of sleep and woke up this morning "feeling mobile."  After visits from both surgeons this morning, we're aiming for a Saturday night discharge (because Mom is very adamant that she doesn't want to interfere with anyone's football game watching).  Her short-term memory continues to be amazingly awful but she seems mostly entertained by it.

Mary and Clarence and Andrew are all slated to arrive today, and Andy got into town yesterday so we'll have a full house to greet her when she heads home.

Our other big news yesterday came from the results of the pathology report.  Mom made, at the time, the significant decision to have the bilateral procedure as a preventative measure.  The pathology results confirmed the decision as the tests showed, in simple terms, precancerous conditions on the previously clear left side.  It may seem strange for someone to be relieved by a diagnosis of precancerous cells, but Mom feels truly reassured that she made the right decision, and that what she has ahead of her in terms of recovery, while it'll be hard, is not for nothing.

Fun while it lasted......

Mom began the morning by getting up and around, brushing her teeth, chatting, and, as a grand finale, announcing to Dad that she felt like walking and might even do an unprecedented three laps around the nurse's station. After our exciting and very busy morning, we had a tad bit of a setback--if you're reading this, you probably know that Mom thinks if she decides to climb Mt. Everest in the morning, she'll be on the summit by the afternoon.  All the optimistic out-of-bed activity led to a pretty precipitous crash about 9am, and Mom is back in bed and back on the IV pain meds for the time being, lessons learning on pushing the recovery milestones a little too hard.  No harm done and the surgeon had already delayed her "go home" day back to Saturday during morning rounds, so there is plenty of time to recuperate.

Thursday morning

Hello, any early birds out there.  Mom is back to being fast asleep after her 6am nurse check.  She had the closest we've had to a normal night last night since we've been here--we went to sleep around 10:30 and she slept pretty much through the night except for some interruptions for vital signs and to re-up her pain medication at 4am.  The plastic surgeon visited yesterday afternoon and said things continued to look good.  We've also transitioned from IV pain medication to medication in pill form, which is a good step towards being able to go home (although Mom has said several times that she's been enjoying the hospital food--she once got mad at Jackson for telling her that he liked the junior high lunch lady's turkey and dressing better than hers, but maybe the taste in institutional foods is hereditary?).

Mom also completed another lap of the nurse's station late afternoon yesterday, and has been up and out of her bed several more times than were accomplished the day before.  It's amazing how fast she went from being unable to stay awake for a few minutes to walking.  She's still having trouble remembering everything that goes on but I blame that on the pain medication.   

All Quiet

We've had a pretty quiet afternoon here. Mom ended up sitting in the rocker for almost an hour and it wore her slap out.  She woke up for lunch and perked up and smiled to see some new flowers (and one edible arrangement, yum!) that were brought in.  In fact, due to the excellent effects of the pain medication, we do a roll call of flower arrangements every four to six hours.  She'll completely forget who sent them, and I'll pick them all up one by one to show her and read her cards every time she wakes up from a nap.  She's tickled pink each time she hears who each vase or card is from--so far there are a few bouquets she has "received" up to five times, and she's just as happy every time (she gave me permission to tell y'all that).

New Shoes

Mom has just moved from her bed to the rocking chair where's she's been sitting, supported in various places by six pillows, for about 30 minutes, dozing on and off.  She also brushed her teeth which made her "feel like a new woman."  The picture here is of her new comfy house shoes (the leg cuffs are for circulation while she's in the bed most of the day).

She's still very tired but we've been reading her cards and emails and she likes hearing from everyone.

Night Owl

We had quite the exciting night last night.  Mom woke up around midnight, decided she was very hot, and that the only thing that would fix her being uncomfortable was to stand up (this from the woman who, six hours earlier, was extremely smug that the nurse had forgotten to make her get up and walk again). So, she did, in about half the time it has been taking her, stood there for a minute until she felt better, and then went back to bed.  We repeated the exercise around 6 a.m.  Definitely forward progress to have Mom wanting to stand instead of having to talk her into it.

She ended up watching the Biggest Loser instead of Glee, but due to the "fuzzy maker," doesn't quite remember doing so--thank goodness for the DVR. 

She also had a flu shot, Dad brought her new house slippers (she was very excited about those), and she's had her morning visit from the two surgeons.  Both said everything looked good; she has not been nauseous and all and so will be taken off of IV fluids today and just depend on drinking enough Diet Sprite (her new favorite). She has not been in a lot of pain but is very diligent about asking for pain medication before things get bad.

She feels good but we were up most of the night and early morning so she will probably be verrrrry sleepy today. 

Happy Mom

Mom has just received her dose of IV pain medication for the night, which she refers to as "the fuzzy maker."  It is doing its duty quite well so far and she is feeling good.  Here's where we stand after our first full day of wakefulness:

Dislikes: coughing; sitting; walking.

Likes: the cute socks with sticky bottoms she wears to walk in; Sprite Zero; Chapstick; messages from friends; opiates; our nurses and aides.

Dinner Time

Had a short visit from the plastic surgeon who was pleased and said everything was healing well so far.

Then, about an hour later, Anna walked in the door--she was going to wait until next week but decided to come on up, and her coworkers very graciously shifted their schedules around to accommodate her.  FYI, Anna's baby is the size of an apple this week.  A very hungry apple.

Speaking of hungry, Mom ate a little lunch today (her first solid food) and then was actually hungry for dinner.  Anna may or may not have helped her eat her roll. 

After some lung exercises, she is taking a nap in anticipation of the Glee premiere.  She has told us she needs to be ready to watch the whole show and so is preparing accordingly.

Big adventure

Mom just sat down in the rocking chair after finishing a speedy lap around the nurse's desk! Quite a victory, and she even started going discernibly faster once she spied her room (she was very ready for the 3-minute vertical interlude to be over and to be back in bed).  I took pictures that I am unfortunately not authorized by the subject to post, but it was a very impressive performance.
 
The nurse's aide is changing her sheets and then she'll move from the chair back to bed and probably back to sleep.  Her room is already starting to fill with beautiful flowers (and one really funny, extra-large tiger balloon), which have made her very happy.

Busy morning

We've had a lot of activity this morning!

Both surgeons checked Mom out and said everything looked good, and the respiratory therapists came to check her lung function and give her exercises.

Then the nurse decreed that Mom needed to try to sit up, which she did very slowly--she just laid down again after about twenty-five minutes of (forced) sitting up.  She was going for thirty but got tired and rebelled and is back taking a nap now. 

Tuesday Morning

Good morning!

We passed an uneventful night last night, with nurse checks at midnight, 3am and 6am. I (MC) took the night shift and slept on the surprisingly comfortable fold-out couch in the room.  Mom woke up every time the nurse came in and would chat for a little while, but slept very well the rest of the night.  She asked for pain meds around midnight and felt a lot better once they took hold.  She said she feels very alert when she talks to us, but is not very good at remembering what you tell her.

The biggest excitement so far has been a showdown between Mom and her very capable nurse who said she needed to cough because she had some "stuff" in her lungs from being on the anesthesia.  They would stare each other down until Mom fell asleep, and then the nurse would wake her up again and try to make her cough.  Mom eventually won this particular standoff but the nurse won the war about six hours later.  

She has really gotten a lift out of and been excited to look at presents, cards and flowers that people have sent.  I've attached a picture of her enjoying the gift she opened this morning--thank you Betty, she likes it very much.

Mom enjoys her soft new wrap

She is still wanting to hold off on visitors until she has more energy, but keep the good thoughts coming!

Day One

Hi everyone!

We're coming to you from the lovely Washington Regional Medical Center, where Mom is passing her first night of patient-hood in relative comfort.  Her surgery went well and was over faster than expected, although she did spend some extra time in recovery because she was just so dang sleepy.  She was moved into her room around 3:30 this afternoon.  Sleepy has continued to be the theme of the day as she'll wake up for a few and say hi, and fairly quickly be fast asleep again.  She did wake up while Dancing with the Stars was on to comment that Florence Henderson was looking pretty good.

Thanks so much to everyone who has checked in on us so far.  Mom's not quite up to visitors yet but will be wanting to see well-wishers once she has a little energy back.  Dad and I are fine and not in need of anything for the time being.  We'll continue to keep y'all updated!