I talked to Betty yesterday morning and her daughter, Carolyn, last night. Betty was being prepped to get a cat scan--I'm not absolutely sure why (help me out here, Pat McH. R.), but I assume so they can see more into the bowel. Betty sounded stronger, but is, of course, very worried. She said the bleeding is still stopped, but she's afraid it will start again. I believe she hasn't eaten anything by mouth since she was admitted, but has an I.V.
Patrick and Mike both e-mailed me their wishes for her recovery and Alison called and talked to her. Haven't yet heard from Ellen, but I'm sure she hasn't
checked her e-mail. She always calls me Sunday night or I'll call her today. I talked to Muckie (whom Betty had called) and Mary H. e-mailed asking for word, so I called her, too.
I'll call Betty again today--the 3-hour time difference is annoying--because I have a proposal for her. I'm going to see if she'd consider recuperating here. Once she's released, she could fly out and stay a few weeks or as long as she needs to get her strength back. This isn't as nutty an idea as it may sound at first. After all, we have the room, I'm an experienced caregiver, and although there's no question her family is as supportive as they can be, Carolyn has two young children and DIL Robyn is pregnant. I'm going to suggest this today and ask her to think about it.
Around here, everything quiet. I didn't feel like going out, so just did a wash, cleaned a bit, and continued my Dionne Quintuplet stuff. Pat went to the bay, as usual. I put chicken thighs in the crockpot with whole cranberry sauce and it was good--of course, everything tastes good to me, being on WW. I go in a few hours today (the meeting's at 8:30) and hope and expect to have lost.
Oh, please, please, please, let her be all right.
TUESDAY
I started off the morning with some annoying problems with Amazon Japan re Christmas gifts, but I don't want to go into detail. Left at...
3 comments:
This is so scary until we know exactly what is going on...and what the plan is. Betty mentioned on her blog that she has a rare form of colitis. Not sure of course, but this may be a reason they are doing the Cat Scan....they want to get a look at all of her intestinal tract...the colonoscopy only looked at the large intestine. This will help them plan an approach for the surgery. She said the polyp was "high up" so that would mean closer to the small intestine. Hope that makes sense.
I wouldn't expect her to go home today...they're still letting the bowel rest so the bleeding won't recur. Then the next step will be some food and make sure it passes thru without stimulating bleeding.
I think it would be great for her to be with you for recovery. It will probably depend on how comfortable she is with her docs out there...she may be afraid to change...then again it's not like she's been going to them for years and change may not be a big concern to her.
You sound just like a good Discharge Planning Nurse. That's their job to start planning for discharge on the day of admission.
/pat
Thanks for the info and straight talk, Pat. Incidentally, I didn't realize there was such a thing as a "discharge nurse"--thought the regular nurses just did that, too. I'll call Betty when it's about 9:00 there and if there's anything new, will let you know.
It's one of the roles of an RN. In some places a nurse may be assigned as the Discharge Planner.
Post a Comment