Been a while...

...what can I say??? It's hard to keep reporting the same things over and over.

First off, one year ago today Ron had another emergency surgery. I remember so clearly being in Ron's room as they were preparing to rush him back down to ICU (still at HEB at this point) because he was having another crash. The tube feed was causing stool to leak into his abdominal cavity which once again caused sepsis. And on top of this, his blood sugar had gotten dangerously low so they were injecting glucose as he was being wheeled to ICU. Pastor Tommy and Danny had just arrived and we asked everyone to stop long enough for us to pray over Ron. Afterwards, one of the nurses' said "we are born again believers, too"! What a sweet encouragement, to have his caregiver's join us in this way.

Dr. E had to clean out his abdominal cavity and in the process also found a very large hematoma in his chest cavity. This chain of events confirmed it would be in Ron's best interest to transfer to Presbyterian, which took place 4 days later.

Now, to catch you up on the last 10 days:

For those of you who talk to my husband, let me tell you (and I say this with the utmost love and respect)...he's trying to be politically correct! (My politically correct way of saying he's a liar!) If you ask him how he's feeling, he'll tell you what you want to hear: "I'm good" "doing well" "getting better", etc. If you want to know the real scoop, ask me!

Reality:

Ron continues to experience extreme fatigue and has been having difficulty sleeping again which doesn't help matters--makes his muscles feel like rubber bands, and keeps his brain in a fog, along with a multitude of other side effects. Last week, sleeping problems were caused by belly being very tight, therefore, he couldn't get comfortable so waking sporadically and then took a while to go back to sleep. Belly tightness had gotten better, but last week he had a very hard sneeze that "felt like it pulled something". Had excruciating pain for about 24 hours, even back to taking hydrocodone for a couple of days (obviously, we had to discontinue PT.)

To me, he seems to have gone backwards. He had been V-E-R-Y S-L-O-W-L-Y progressing but since his last hospital stay in October, he's just never seemed to get back to where he was...then, of course, the wedding was hard on him, as well as Thanksgiving festivities.

Reflux had been somewhat better, but in the last week has gotten really bad again; bringing with it, more regurgitation. And even though his appetite has increased , his weight has not; he has actually lost 4 more pounds, Honestly, I've been a little concerned.

We had an appointment with Dr. A today and he is very concerned with the weight issue in particular; and other issues as well. Therefore, we are adjusting some of his meds. Dr. A wants to once again start the process of slowly decreasing steroid, so I'm on the alert for increased weakness & puny-ness these next few days.

AND, if things don't improve and he doesn't start gaining weight, he'll have to be put back on TPN. Not something any of us (including Dr. A) wants but he cannot continue to go backwards.

Dr. A also thinks he may have thrush in his esophagus, which could be causing the increased reflux, so he's back on the Nystatin (that lovely swish and swallow) for the next 3 days...if it is Thrush, we should see a difference in this amount of time. He also said it's a good thing Ron wasn't still on Lovenox (blood thinner) or the hard sneeze would have caused another huge hematoma. And, now that the pain has gotten better, he wants Ron to start back on physical therapy. He is also increasing antidepressant and wants him sipping on nutritional drinks throughout the day so that he's getting a trickle of protein and other nutrients between regular meals.

Please pray that the combination of all of these changes will help him regain strength, stamina, energy, weight, etc.

And pray that we will stand firm....I must confess this last week has been hard, physically & emotionally--we're at a difficult place; seemingly stagnant and at times even feels we're regressing. It makes me so sad...I just want my husband back! I miss his interaction (with me and others), his enthusiasm for life and mostly his joyful spirit. Some days we are so weary of this battle.

This is our prayer:

"We try to live in such a way that no one will be hindered from finding the Lord by the way we act...In everything we do we try to show that we are true ministers of God. We (try to) patiently endure troubles and hardships and calamaties of every kind...Our hearts ache, but we (strive to) always have joy. We are poor, but we give spiritual riches to others. We own nothing and yet we have everything." 2 Corinthians 6:3, 4 & 10 NLT (emphasis mine)

Much love to you and yours!