The Roller coaster continues

The last few weeks have been anything but smooth.

Jen finished her whole brain radiation on Friday the 21^st.  That allowed us to head up-north to see her family and mine for the holidays.  We enjoyed a great weekend and Christmas eve with everyone.

Unfortunately, Jen began getting short of breath on Christmas day.  By the morning of the 26^th, she was Very short of breath and had trouble speaking.  We immediately drove back to Milwaukee and headed directly for the Froedtert ER.  They did a chest X-ray and CT and determined that the plural effusion of the Left lung was collapsing it.  In addition, blood clots were forming, further compromising her ability to process oxygen.  They performed a thoracentesis and drew off approximately 950cc of fluid.  That’s a lot.  After the procedure, she was %1000 better.  Over the course of the day (Weds) her lungs got steadily better.  On Thursday afternoon, she was released and we went home with an Oxygen condenser, and twice a day injections of blood thinners to combat the clots. 

Whew.  OK, we’re home.  Relax. ... Right?

Friday the 29^th was a relatively unremarkable day.  Jen camped out on the couch with her oxygen, books and the remote.

Saturday morning was a completely different story.  At 6am she work me up, and she was in obvious respiratory distress.  Her breathing was shallow, labored and fast.  We called 911 and the Franklin paramedics came out.  Both ambulances.  Good to know we’ve got that kind of response to our neighborhood.

They confirmed her shortness of breath, loaded her up and took her back to the Froedtert ER.  Again chest x-rays and CTs.  Again, a remarkable plural effusion of the left lung. Again, a thoracentesis, and  almost 1500ccs of fluid were drained.  But this procedure didn’t produce the dramatic recovery of last time.  Her blood oxygen saturation level did not recover like it did previously.  She was not talkative and laughing.

Based on the very short amount of time she accumulated fluid, it was determined that a “permanent” catheter would be placed in Jen’s left plura.  Unfortunately, that can’t be done until Monday the 31^st.  So, with all immediate treatment options exhausted, the ER gave us the option of going home.  Jen and I believed she was not ready to go home, so we elected to have her admitted, in the hopes that she might get better over the afternoon/evening, and could THEN go home.  It’s a good thing we stayed in the hospital.

Jen was completely and utterly exhausted.  To the point of being unable to stay awake during a conversation.  This is most likely due to the effort required to breathe, the heavy medication, the procedures performed on her, the sleep deprivation, and the cancer.   It has me rattled.  Over the course of Saturday Jens’s blood oxygen level did not increase.  Increasing the volume of oxygen she was getting didn’t have much effect either.  So late in the evening, they prescribed a pressurized oxygen mask to help blow air into the lungs, in the hopes of forcing them open, decreasing the effort required on her part while increasing her blood oxygen.   That helped, and her oxygen levels increased to the mid 90s during her sleep.

On Sunday morning, they took her off of the RPAP mask and back on the regular cannula.  While she’s on a pretty high volume of oxygen delivered, her blood oxygen is increasing, but very slowly.

So now it’s Sunday afternoon, and I’m sitting here bedside.  She’s still VERY tired, and sleeps constantly.  But that’s good.  I sit here and watch her blood oxygen level like a hawk, and every once and a while glance at the Bears Lions game on the TV. 

We’re here through Monday afternoon, certainly.  When Jen goes home will be determined by how well she recovers after Monday’s procedure.  The hope is that by that time she’s recovered from all that’s happened this weekend and can be cared for at home.

There isn’t anything more I can do.  We're both pretty sleep deprived. All I can do is sit here and hope that things get better.