Angie & Jim

Roller Coasterby Jim

The rest of today was kind of a roller coaster.  Angie would be doing great, but then after getting up she would start experiencing terrible pain and have difficulty breathing.  We went back and forth with the chest tube in suction, then off, then on, etc.  They want her to drain, but I think it drained too much too quickly.  After the second episode, they called in the doctor and got some morphine ordered (she was at 8 — yes, we cracked Brian Regan jokes later) and did a chest x-ray.  A couple hours later, after the pain was more under control, the doctor returned to tell us that the fluid was almost entirely gone from the lung (for now), but that the lung has collapsed a little bit on the right side.  This is probably due to the amount of fluid she’s lost.  Her drainage tube is currently clamped, so she should be good until tomorrow.  She was able to get up and walk a bit with it clamped and she didn’t have as much pain as before, so we’re hoping that was the cause and now it is under control.
Now that she is comfortable, I finally feel like I can go get some sleep.  The very kind nurses have let me stay WAY past visiting hours without saying a word.  They have been very good to us.
Tomorrow the plan is for a liver CT scan, though I’m not sure when.