Tuesday, January 27

Sou's Breathing Toy-->

Leaving ICU

The nurse woke me up at 7am. I sat up and saw 4 nurses and the female surgeon. It was time for the dressing change. They were going to let me sleep, but Sou wanted me awake and at his side. It wasn't my favorite part of the day. I saw Sou reach over and press the button which activated his shot of morphine. They also gave him more pain meds through his central line. I saw the surgeon pile a bunch of supplies, including the fluff roll, onto Sou's bed. Two of the nurses stood on each side of the bed. They bent his knees to prop his leg up. I wasn't paying much attention to the activities but I noticed they began pulling out the packing from Sou's wound. He began to moan and his respirations increased. One of the nurses was holding a flashlight for the surgeon to see in the wound. I knew that they were just pulling out the packing and that it would get worse once they started putting new ones in. Once the old stuff was out, they let Sou have a breather. They also gave him another syringe of pain medication because he was obviously uncomfortable. A minute went by and then they continued. His moans were louder and his breathing became rapid. Sou squeezed my hand hard. Once it was all over, the surgeon said that there was some dead fat tissue. One more trip to the operating room was needed. They scheduled him for tomorrow morning. He was worried that he would wake up intubated again. Jaime, the doc that visited Sou the most, stopped by. 

"Hey, haven't seen you in forever," said Sou. She looked at me and smiled.

"Sou, she was here yesterday and the day before," I told him. He had this puzzled look on his face. Jaime said that he was doing well and he was on day 13 for his chemo. Eight more days to go. Jaime also said that Sou was ready to go back to the 7th floor, out of ICU. I went to sleep for a couple of hours. I think the lack of sleep from two days ago was starting to catch up with me. 

When I woke up a few hours later. Sou had this blue looking toy with a nozzle on it. He was supposed to exercise his breathing every hour since he wasn't getting out of bed. At around 4pm, the nurses came back in to do another dressing change. This time, no surgeon. One of the nurses who had watched a previous dressing change was going to do it. They upped his medications. Even though it took longer than when the surgeon did it, Sou said it didn't hurt as bad. He still moaned and pressed his morphine a couple of times. Afterwards, he was really drowsy. He took a bunch of mini naps. By 6pm, they had him transferred back to the 7th floor. They told me it was room 7242. I walked around and found out that it was an isolation room. I went through the door and there was a sink and a huge drawer full of medical supplies. I went through another door and it looked like his old room. It had a similar view to his previous rooms. I unpacked our things and ordered his dinner. He wanted spaghetti, fruit cup, cheese cake, and the usual gatorade fruit punch. After I placed the order, I went downstairs to get my dinner. In the elevator, this lady saw my UAA hoodie. 

"I used to live in Alaska," she told me.

"Oh really?" I said. I actually didn't feel like talking to strangers at the moment. I was kinda relieved to see her step out on the 3rd floor. But then she turned around and came back in. 

"Wrong floor, I need to go to the dinning area," she said. Crap. It is such a long walk over there. So for the next few minutes, we talked about how she finally felt like Seattle was her home after years of moving. It took her a bajillion years for her to get over Alaska. Blah. Once we were in the cafeteria, I ditched her. I was hoping to get a salad from the salad bar, but they were out of lettuce. What the heck. I turn around and they were serving some Ethiopian stew. Yes it did say "Ethiopian". So I turned to the burgers. I ended up getting a chicken burger. I rushed back upstairs hoping that I wouldn't bump into that lady from Alaska. When I got back to Sou's room, he was knocked out. He stayed that way for another hour until they came in and took his vital signs. Sou went back to sleep while I did online stuff for the rest of the night.