May 6, 2011 - An all day event

Last night I was told that Jason was to go in to the O.R. early, and that they would be coming to take him at about 5:30 this morning. That's okay, as that is the regular time, and I guess I could have used the extra rest anyway. I got over to the hospital, and Jason's room at about 8:00, to get something (David had left his camera and I went to pick it up to send it back to him) and the person in the room told me they came and got him at 7:30, so I could have come and visited with him in the morning, but it wasn't to be. He spent the rest of the day away from his room, and I took care of a couple of errands. I would have gotten more things done if I had known that he was going to be gone all day, but again, it wasn't to be.

We went to the Dutch Embassy to have dinner tonight, and while there I received a call from Jason's doctor, and she informed me that all went well, and in fact some of the areas were even better than anticipated, and therefore weren't going to be needing to use as much Integra as they previously thought. Also, more of his wounds would be covered with his own natural skin, and this would be much better, and more comfortable for him, in the long run. The down side of this is that they do need to do a couple of things a little different, and this is going to take an extra week to get done. Otherwise it was a very good day in the O.R. for Jason, despite the late start. He didn't get in to the O.R. until almost 1:15pm, and during this time he is not allowed to eat or drink.

We got back from dinner, and I went up to Jason's room, and he wasn't there! It is almost 9:30pm and he hasn't returned from the PACU (where the patient goes after surgery, before coming back to his (or her) room - that is unless you're in the I.C.U.). I decided to wait around and Jason was finally brought in to his room at just after 10:00pm, almost 15 hours after they took him. He hadn't eaten all day and he was hungry. Fortunately I had bought him some Campbell's soups, so while they were still getting him set up in the room, I went to heat some up for him. I brought it back to the room and set it on the tray, next to the bed (it was hot). The nurse was working on getting some things finished up on Jason, when all of a sudden the pump motors stopped and the bed began to deflate. This is not a good thing, and in fact, it is a very bad thing. We started looking around trying to figure out what happened, and why did the motors just stop, and Jason started to indicate he was becoming very uncomfortable. More people came into the room. The mattress was now fully deflated and Jason was simply laying on metal cross bars with just nylon sheets between him and the bars. He was in pain! The people in the room were showing signs of panic because the bed wouldn't work and I finally yelled at them, "Get him another bed! I don't care what kind, just get something so we can get him off this one!" A senior nurse came in and said there were no other specialty beds available and I said I didn't care, he needs to be on something else. In a matter of about 30 seconds we had the other bed in the room readied for him, and moved it next to his bed. I started giving commands about what I wanted them to do, to move him (I have now been through a move about 8 times). We got him over to the other bed and the pain points were now stopped, but his residual pain and discomfort didn't go away for another 15 minutes. Total time it took to move him from one bed to the other, once the specialty bed failed, about 10 - 12 minutes, but it must have felt like an eternity to Jason. I have spoken about he pain level in previous posts, and using that same scale, it was at a 10+. They offered him some meds to help with the pain, but he said that once he was on the new bed, and calmed down a bit it was manageable without the additional meds.

I stayed with him for a short while after he was a little more comfortable, and we situated him on his bed. He still wanted to eat his soup, but just not right now. We talked about the need for me to get some rest - more him telling me to go get some sleep, as I think he is wanting to look out for me as much as I am wanting to look out for him. Please forgive type-o's and wrong words in this post as I am doing it after midnight here, and it has been a long day for all of us. Please keep us in your prayers, and please, PLEASE pray for the staff, so they don't act like the Keystone Cops in the future. Thank you, for your continued support, it is very much appreciated.