Day 4 Post Op

Sorry for the fractured all over the place post last night. It was a fractured all over the place day yesterday, which was definitely reflected in my post! I'll try to be more to the point tonight. =-)

Creatinine level is down to 2.9 today! Yee-haw! They want Eric to be below 2 before he leaves. They expect him to hit that tomorrow. [Kidney function.]

Ka-ka: The "movement" has occurred that needs to occur in order for Eric to leave the hospital. I was worried we were going to be stuck here because no kaka had joined the party. Glad we can mark that off the list!

Weight: Eric was 4 kg heavier today than he was yesterday, which isn't exactly what everybody was hoping for, but also doesn't seem to be anything they are worried about. I hope that he weighs less tomorrow rather than holding all this extra water weight!

Water: He didn't meet his water goal today. They want him to drink 120 ounces of water every day. He got 4 down today. Poor guy. I could NEVER drink that much water! Sometimes I will go until dinner time before I even get a glass of anything to drink.

Activity: Eric is rocking this part of recovery. He is getting around great. "Great" means that he can walk the whole floor 3 times a day, sits in a chair a lot, and stands a lot. It doesn't mean he's ready to play touch football in the front yard! ;-)

Cough: Thank the Lord, this has improved greatly since they added the allergy medicine into his regimen. He's still coughing, but it's much improved. Through this whole experience, the pain associated with the coughing attacks has been the only thing to bring him to tears. Well, that, and a prayer he prayed for the family that lost their loved one.

Catheter: The Foley catheter will come out tomorrow, we expect/hope. He is VERY ready to have that tube out of him. He desperately wants to be able to really pee. Plus, it's pretty darn painful.

Blood Sugar: PRAISE GOD! As bad as the 3 days previous had been, that's as good as today was! He has been between 130 and 184 all day long! These are dream numbers for him even on a pre-transplant or pre-dialysis day! Thank you for your prayers. I honestly think they made all the difference, as we have no medical answer for why they are so in control all of the sudden.

Steroid Aggression: No major grumpiness or aggression today. Maybe he won't have that symptom at all. I really pray not. He's on 40 mg of Prednisone right now, but we hope that eventually that will go down to 5-10 mg. I won't worry much about it if he's only on 5 or 10 mgs. [Interesting fact: We knew Samren was on very high doses of Pred. when he was little, but I don't think we ever realized how massive the dose was. Samren was taking 60 mgs of pred daily, at 1.5 years old!]

Release: The feeling of pretty much everybody is that we will be out of here on Friday morning, if not tomorrow evening. We are ready to be home. We've started thinking about the practicalities of Eric being at home with the kids and dogs (both love to jump up on the daddy). We'll be talking about pretending there is a bubble around daddy, and not going into his bubble! We'll also be putting the daddy in a reclined recliner so that nobody (including the pups) can actually pounce on him. He will be able to see them coming if he's in the recliner. In addition, he'll put pillows over him. Clothing (Eric has realized) is going to be very uncomfortable. My step-dad bought him some XL sweat pants today. ;-)

Kiddos: The younger 3 kiddos are doing great at Grandma's house, but I just got a call from Taevy and she is struggling. She holds so much stuff in. She wants to be with her mommy and daddy and in her own house. She just called my bawling. =-( Please pray for her hurting heart.

That's the basics of the day. =-)

Anita