The surgeon, who used to be the head of BYU orthopedics, said that he could repair it with surgery. They scheduled us for same day surgery on Tuesday, so we headed to the hospital, thinking we would come home that night. Here is Thunder getting prepped around 1 PM....
... and here he is after the surgery, about 6 PM. I was in the waiting room for several hours. I finally called the nurses in the recovery room and they said that they couldn't move him yet because his pain was not under control. Yikes. They gave him a spinal block and then he was moved to a hospital room. He was pretty unaware of what was going on. He kept asking over and over and over to please straighten his arm. He looked so miserable, but was definitely altered from all the pain medication. He got a blessing and he begged them to straighten his arm. It was so sad to hear him ask over and over.
As he started to wake up more, he complained that it was very painful to swallow. The nurses assured him that it was minor irritation due to a breathing tube, but it was hard for him to even drink water. Since we had a babysitter at home with our kids, I finally left him at 11 PM that night to go home. I should have figured out a way to stay. When I came back at 7:30 the next morning, I found out he had not had any pain medication since I left the night before. It still hurt to swallow and they had given him lemon juice for hiccups. He was throwing up a little blood and wheezing. He was so exhausted. He couldn't eat and could barely drink water.
But we hoped it would get better, so we checked out that afternoon on Wednesday. I was so uneasy but was hoping that being at home would be more comforting.
The next morning, Thunder was throwing up significant amounts of blood and had a fever. We called the surgeon, who said to go to the ER. Thunder was complaining of excruciating pain with swallowing. They checked for blood clots and recommended an appointment with a GI doctor to scope his throat. For this, he had to go without food, drink and medication for 12 hours. It ended up being 13 hours of nothing by the time they got us in. He was shaking with pain and weakness.
When they finally did the endoscope procedure, the doctor showed me the results. He could see dozens of open lesions up and down his esophagus. He said that a particular virus can rarely cause this infection of the esophagus and somehow Thunder had gotten it in this rare form. He pointed out multiple white spots and said that they would all swell and burst over the next 48 hours. Some had already burst and were bleeding into his stomach, causing nausea and vomiting. But the doc said that it would get worse until they all burst and started to heal. Thunder barely ate a few bites a day for a week. He just slept and tried to swallow his pain pills.
Now, this whole time, my foot had been hurting. I had run 12 miles the Saturday before the surgery and it started hurting the next day. I was hobbling around Thunder's hospital bed, but I couldn't very well go off to the doctor with him in his condition. So I called in reinforcements! Nana had called a few times and offered to come out, so I finally accepted her offer. And boy was I glad. One by one my kids were coming down with Strep throat too.
With her here, I went into a foot doctor and discovered I have a stress fracture in my left foot. Part of me was kind of glad I wasn't just being a big baby about it, that it was something real. But mostly I was just so deflated. I had been training for a marathon and had been doing my runs, getting up at 5:30 AM and really doing my best to stick with the training. All that was going to be lost in the 4-6 weeks of recovery, and there was no way I could jump back into the training. So I withdrew from the marathon. It was probably good, since I came down with Strep the day after Nana left.
Here are all of Thunder's pills he was taking after surgery. I had to make a spreadsheet to keep track of it all!
So here is Thunder now. He has to wear this arm brace for 6 weeks and will then start physical therapy. He is still recovering. We all came down with the stomach flu this past week and the poor guy got it. He was been working a lot from home, since it's been so hard for him to have energy for long periods of time.
It's been quite the ordeal! But once again we feel so loved. So many neighbors and friends helped with kids and food and I never had to worry about them for a minute. And of course for Thunder's mom to drop everything and come out here and help us, it was so incredibly nice and needed. We feel so lucky to live in our neighborhood and have such great family. And dang, I'm grateful for texting on cell phones. I've never sent/received so many texts in my life, and it was so nice to update people that way. As you can see below, the kids didn't miss a beat. Here they are racing down the stairs in their footie pajamas.
And here we are, broken foot, kevlar-stiched chest, Strep infections, random viral esophagitis, stomach flu and all. Here's to no more doctor's visits!!! Man, maybe it's time for a vacation in the tropics...
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1 comment:
That is so horrible. I've thought I've had it bad in the past but you beat me by a long shot with that week! I hope things get better for all of you! Love ya!
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