Angie & Jim

Many Thanksby Jim

I just wanted to say, “thank you!” to everyone who has been following along and showing such love and support over the past (rather difficult) two weeks.  I am really grateful for each of you and all you’ve done for us.  The thoughts, prayers, phone calls, instant messages, flowers, treats, smiles, etc. have all been so much appreciated.  Despite the grim outlook from last week, Angie’s prognosis looks good and I think she should be back to “normal” within a week or two.  I’ve been overwhelmed by the generosity of those at work that have offered to donate vacation time so I can take care of Angie.  I can’t tell you how much that means to me.  I will forever be grateful to all of you for your kindness in every shape and form.  It has given me strength over the last two weeks when I needed it most.  Thank you all.

We’re Coming Home!by Jim

The doctors have just give us the final approval for going home!  Hurrah!  After the paperwork & discharge orders, we should be on our way.

Favorite quote from this hospital visit?  Angie saying that having her chest tube on suction made her feel like a Capri Sun drink when someone is trying to get the last drop out of it.  She told one of the staff here at the hospital and she really got a kick out of that analogy.

Our Halloween Scare/Laughby Jim

Angie had a little scare this morning just before breakfast.  Because it is Halloween, some of the employees here are in costume, and the kind woman who brought Angie her breakfast was dressed as a police officer.  Angie hadn’t put on her glasses yet, so she didn’t notice anything strange at first.  The people who bring the food usually wear black, so she couldn’t tell there was anything different, except for the hat this woman was wearing.  Angie thought, “That’s funny, it kind of looks like a police officer’s cap.”  When the woman leaned over to put the food on the tray and Angie could see more clearly, she realized it was a police officer’s cap.  This startled her and she looked alarmed.  The poor woman saw Angie’s distress and after everything was explained, she kept apologizing for scaring her.  Our nurse was in at the time and he, too, was a bit confused.  He got a good laugh at it.  He said his first thought was, “Wait, is this patient a criminal?”  He said they get people here in the hospital sometimes that have to have a security detail stationed outside the room.

It made us all smile.

Going Home (Maybe)by Jim

Dr. Lui, Angie’s primary cardiologist, just stopped by to see Angie and make sure she’s ready to go home.  Dr. Rogers gets to make the final call, but having Dr. Lui saying she’s ready is a good sign.  We think that we’ll probably get discharged this afternoon or evening.  Angie is thrilled.

Dr. Rogers et al. came by about an hour after Dr. Lui and checked in.  He said that they would come back in a couple of hours and go on a walk with her while monitoring her O2 levels.  If they like what they see, they’ll let her go home today.  That is very encouraging.  Already, I’ve been on two practice walks with Angie 🙂

Once we get home, we’ll still have lots of work to do.  Angie will need supervision for at least a week or two.  Thanks to the very generous people who have offered to donate some vacation time to me to help take care of Angie, I should be able to stay with her.  I should be able to work from home and get in half days so I don’t burn through other people’s vacation any more than I have to.  Occasionally, I may need to go in for a few hours, so if anyone would like to come play nurse and visit Angie for a bit, that would be very helpful.

We’ve both been overwhelmed by the love and support from everyone during this whole ordeal.  Thank you so very much!  I wanted to especially thank Brandon and Mary, who opened their home for me (less than 2 miles from the hospital).  I can’t imagine having to have had to commute on top of spending very long (and worrisome) days here at the hospital.  I will be forever grateful for your incredible kindness.

Hopefully my next post will be the news that we’re packing up to go.

Almost doneby Jim

Just got a visit from the doctors today (finally), and they seemed to be okay with the idea of Angie going home tomorrow or Friday!  Obviously, we’re hoping for the former.

Ray of Hopeby Jim

The last 24 hours have been very encouraging.  Now that Angie is on an unrestricted diet and she’s had some fluids, she’s feeling much better.  She still isn’t walking yet, but I don’t think it will be much longer before she is.  She’s stood for a few minutes at a time by the bed (and plugged in for monitoring) and hasn’t had any problems yet.  This morning I finally had enough appetite to eat a regular breakfast.  I think the plan is to still do the hepatopulmonary syndrome test today, just to make sure, but I think the general consensus is that it will come back negative.

Angie had some x-rays this morning and they wheeled her away in a wheelchair and she sat the whole time without difficulty.  She was on oxygen, of course, but she’s been trying to sit up a lot over the last day or so.  Angie is very goal oriented when she wants something.  Ever since the doctors gave her some objectives, she’s been working hard.  She’s anxious to get home, so she’s going to press the doctors this morning to give her a list of things she has to do before she can go.

On Monday, when things were looking pretty glum and Angie wasn’t getting better (and slowly getting worse), I was starting to get a bit discouraged.  When they took her away to do the catheterization for the second time to look for shunts or other problems, I was sitting in the hospital room looking out the window.  We have a magnificent view of the construction just across the way.  We’ve watched over the course of a week as they made slow progress on the new building.  The workers had gone home for the day and the site was deserted.  The sky was starting to look gray with dark clouds across the sky.  The gloom reminded me of the despair I was feeling inside.  As I looked out, I saw a beam of light peeking through.  I thought about the desperate bit of hope I felt and how similar it was to that little beam of light against the dark sky.  I admired it and then went back to my laptop.  A couple of minutes later, the clouds broke is such a way that the sun shone directly into the window and light streamed into our room.  I looked up at the sun through the window and the light was so bright that I could hardly see the dark clouds that filled the sky.  It was a beautiful moment.  I knew there were still things we would have to get through, and questions we still needed answered, but somehow I felt a little better about it.  Several more beams of light shone through the clouds over the 30 minutes or so and so I snapped a picture with my camera to remind me of the experience.

Thank you all for your kindness and support during this difficult time for us.

Regearingby Jim

Well, Dr. Rogers stopped by to see how Angie was doing.  Sounds like the plan is to get her body healthy again with some good and supplements.  Her chocolate Ensure arrived and she tried that.  Oh, boy.  Anyway, she ordered some pizza and is in the best spirits I’ve seen get in for a few days.  So, I’m going to take the opportunity to run home and take care of a few things and go into work for a few hours.  I’ll also go home and get some things to keep her entertained for the next couple days.  We’ve exhausted the small supply I brought with me with the short notice we had.

Things are looking up, but we still have a ways to go.