Blogging comes into perspective as life experiences happen - falling somewhere between tragedy and family drama - factoring in the whether it is a planned event of something that lands right in the middle of other
About 4:30 p.m. on November 14 my husband was getting hay to feed the cows. When he returned and came in the back door I started chatting about a phone call I had received. When he staggered in before me and waved me 'off' and practically crawled into his chair, I knew we had no ordinary event - my husband is not dramatic when it comes to physical pain.
It took me a moment to gain my composure. When he had his hip replacement surgery on the left hip in July, they had told us to make sure and call them if he had any sign of blood clots in his legs which would be accompanied by sharp pain. "Should we call 911?", I asked. He said, "No" - just to get him an icepack for his right leg.
I got the ice pack. I looked up our clinic's Urgent Care hours and let him know they were open until 7 p.m. As he wavered as to what to do, I suggested it might be better to go to the Urgent Care while it was still open rather than wait until later when we would have to go to the hospital emergency room.
He finally decided that it need to be looked at and it was all I could do to not speed to get there. When we parked at Urgent Care, the pain had subsided somewhat and he wasn't sure he really wanted to go in. I began seriously praying - I knew this was no ordinary pain - he knew it was not a muscle cramp - and I could not believe we were going to return home for what I knew would be a very long nervewracking night.
We finally went in - they were busy (when aren't they). After waiting about an hour and a quarter (about 7 p.m.) we saw the doctor. He could not rule out a blood clot so he sent us to Salem Hospital with an order for an ultrasound.
At 11:30 p.m. the ultrasound specialist finally became available to check Chuck. She did a thorough job, taking her an hour and a half. After she went to report her findings to the emergency room doctor, they told Chuck he was not to get our of bed again - not even swing his legs over the side of the bed! The source of his pain was clots being thrown down his calf from an aneurysm in an artery behind his right knee. But not only did they find clots there, they found clots in his left leg, the largest being in his femoral vein in his left groin.
Salem did not have a vascular surgeon available to work on him, so Chuck was transported to OHSU in Portland.
This was just the first few hours of a #2: Unexpected medical emergency.
What I learned:
The roundtrip from Salem to Portland and back can be done every day..
It is possible to get lost every evening trying to find the way to the freeway from the hospital.
It is possible to stay awake for 36 hours.
Getting the basic daily care a patient needs at OHSU requires an advocate - at least where we were.
Surgery in the nerve areas near the surface heal faster but the pain can last much longer than more invasive surgeries.
There is a whole 'nother world out there where everyone (it seems) takes coumadine.
Vitamin K is very high in green leafy vegetables.
Slippers was just fine all by herself for 6 days (I came home late evenings).
I can drop off to sleep at a moments notice, sitting straight up - something I've never been able to do - even on long airplane trips.
Our cell phone plan definitely needs to be upgraded.
My hiatus from blogging has been a steady trot from pillow plumping to personal hygiene for my husband, from learning how to feed cows to keeping the wood stove fed, from remembering when to get the recycle can out to finding the right wrench to replace the washer in a leaking bathroom faucet.
Today, nearly 4 weeks later, Chuck is doing better, somewhat limited, but much better. We started a Physical Therapy regimen. It still hurts too much for him to drive so I'm still doing a lot of chauffering.
But at least now we are in the predictable somewhat plannable future stage and I feel that I can blog again.
Thank you for reading.
About 4:30 p.m. on November 14 my husband was getting hay to feed the cows. When he returned and came in the back door I started chatting about a phone call I had received. When he staggered in before me and waved me 'off' and practically crawled into his chair, I knew we had no ordinary event - my husband is not dramatic when it comes to physical pain.
It took me a moment to gain my composure. When he had his hip replacement surgery on the left hip in July, they had told us to make sure and call them if he had any sign of blood clots in his legs which would be accompanied by sharp pain. "Should we call 911?", I asked. He said, "No" - just to get him an icepack for his right leg.
I got the ice pack. I looked up our clinic's Urgent Care hours and let him know they were open until 7 p.m. As he wavered as to what to do, I suggested it might be better to go to the Urgent Care while it was still open rather than wait until later when we would have to go to the hospital emergency room.
He finally decided that it need to be looked at and it was all I could do to not speed to get there. When we parked at Urgent Care, the pain had subsided somewhat and he wasn't sure he really wanted to go in. I began seriously praying - I knew this was no ordinary pain - he knew it was not a muscle cramp - and I could not believe we were going to return home for what I knew would be a very long nervewracking night.
We finally went in - they were busy (when aren't they). After waiting about an hour and a quarter (about 7 p.m.) we saw the doctor. He could not rule out a blood clot so he sent us to Salem Hospital with an order for an ultrasound.
At 11:30 p.m. the ultrasound specialist finally became available to check Chuck. She did a thorough job, taking her an hour and a half. After she went to report her findings to the emergency room doctor, they told Chuck he was not to get our of bed again - not even swing his legs over the side of the bed! The source of his pain was clots being thrown down his calf from an aneurysm in an artery behind his right knee. But not only did they find clots there, they found clots in his left leg, the largest being in his femoral vein in his left groin.
Salem did not have a vascular surgeon available to work on him, so Chuck was transported to OHSU in Portland.
This was just the first few hours of a #2: Unexpected medical emergency.
What I learned:
The roundtrip from Salem to Portland and back can be done every day..
It is possible to get lost every evening trying to find the way to the freeway from the hospital.
It is possible to stay awake for 36 hours.
Getting the basic daily care a patient needs at OHSU requires an advocate - at least where we were.
Surgery in the nerve areas near the surface heal faster but the pain can last much longer than more invasive surgeries.
There is a whole 'nother world out there where everyone (it seems) takes coumadine.
Vitamin K is very high in green leafy vegetables.
Slippers was just fine all by herself for 6 days (I came home late evenings).
I can drop off to sleep at a moments notice, sitting straight up - something I've never been able to do - even on long airplane trips.
Our cell phone plan definitely needs to be upgraded.
My hiatus from blogging has been a steady trot from pillow plumping to personal hygiene for my husband, from learning how to feed cows to keeping the wood stove fed, from remembering when to get the recycle can out to finding the right wrench to replace the washer in a leaking bathroom faucet.
Today, nearly 4 weeks later, Chuck is doing better, somewhat limited, but much better. We started a Physical Therapy regimen. It still hurts too much for him to drive so I'm still doing a lot of chauffering.
But at least now we are in the predictable somewhat plannable future stage and I feel that I can blog again.
Thank you for reading.
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