As with many people last night, I was woken by a thunderstorm. I tried to sleep through it, but I couldn’t and got up for a little while. I needed to get some sleep, as I had a potentially testing day ahead of me so after it silenced a bit, I went back to sleep.
I got up about 7:25am, got dressed and made my way to the hospital.
I found that Shaly was on duty again today. She told me that Heather had been OK overnight and the tracheostomy abandoned yesterday was going to take place again at 9:30am. With that news, I went to the restaurant to have a hearty breakfast. Following my stress levels yesterday, I felt that I needed it.
I returned to the ITU waiting room ten minutes before the procedure started, but decided to stay there rather than go back in. I sat in one of the brown leather chairs and prayed that it would be successful today. I have to admit, I was very tense and my tiredness didn’t help matters. Heather’s mum arrived during the wait and we sat together until the news came (whichever way it went).
At 10:35am, we got the word. It was done!!! No problems, no complications. With relief, we went in to see Heather. She looked so much better without the breathing tube down her throat. This has been replaced by a breathing tube that comes from the neck. I know she won’t like it (she hates having anything tight around her neck), but it’s better for her than gagging on the throat tube.
Shortly after, Mum arrived with my brother Martin, so I left Heather’s Mum to sit with her daughter, while I filled them in on the morning’s progress over a welcome cup of coffee. After coffee, Mum went and sat with Heather’s Mum while I went to find the car park attendant to organise a weekly parking ticket (as my last one expired today). He remembered me and asked how my relative was. I then went back to the waiting area and read today’s paper. After reading it, I went back into Heather’s room and handed the paper over to Mum, while we alternated keeping an eye on Heather to make sure she was OK.
At 12:25pm, her stats were as follows
Heart Rate: 72
Blood Pressure: 137/78
Respiration: 18 breaths/min
Oxygen saturation: 99%
Oxygen supplied: 45%
Temperature: 37.8 degrees
PEEP 12
At this point, the ventilator was doing most of the breathing for her (and still was as I left this evening). Shaly told us that her sedation would be removed this afternoon, having given her the morning to recover from her mini-op. She had been given a hefty dose during the tracheostomy, so we were expecting quick results.
We then took it in turns to take lunch, so someone could be with here at all times. She had started to move, so we needed someone around in case she pulled at her new addition.
When I came back from lunch, I found that her sedation had already been removed, so we continued to keep a close eye on her. She occasionally opened her eyes and moved her arm, but she was so full of sedative that these movements were short lived and she fell back to sleep again. Still, positive moves anyway.
At 3:45pm after taking a quick loo break, I returned to Heather and found that she had received some physio from Preethy. Heather’s mum left at 4pm, leaving me alone to sit monitoring my dear wife. I read a book for a while and nodded off a few times. Well, it’s tiring watching someone else sleep!
I watched the ventilator display for a while and managed to figure out that Heather is taking about 15% of her own breaths, with the ventilator making the rest. Perhaps later or tomorrow, they’ll be able to put the machine into “spontaneous” mode, where Heather will be doing most of the work with ventilator support.
I left at 6pm after leaving instructions for them to call me at any hour if Heather should become lucid enough to talk and starts asking for me. Somehow, I’m not expecting anything this evening. She’s been so heavily sedated recently; it’s going to take time to get out of her system.
It’s been a positive day. Here’s hoping for another one tomorrow.
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