Below are pictures of my room Wednesday morning:
This was a decent morning but still have pain control issues. My Doctors PA had told me the procedure went well which echo'd my doctors comments on Tuesday afternoon in recovery
Below is shot of my incision:
It is fairly large incision but had no weeping or additional bleeding at the site which is good.
About this time, I started having some additional challenges that my doctors did not expect. This made my stay in the hospital go from 3 days to 6 days.
I started having a fever of 101 consistently, growing nausea which caused me to throw up twice. Turns out my blood counts were dropping specifically my hemocrits. They were unable to rebound on there own so they decided to give me a blood transfusion. The next day my color started coming back and my counts had leveled out somewhat. They took a blood test before I left on Sunday but they did not bounce back like they had hoped. However, I do feel better and less dizzy.
My PT says I have good muscle control of my leg and I have been able move fairly well with a walker. It is very hard to move around putting no weight on my left leg but I am getting better at it. I still need help to move my leg off the couch so I can roll over to get up but I think in a few days it will get even easier.
The biggest concern right now is swelling and making sure my fever goes away. To control my swelling, I have two bags of ice on my leg all day. I am taking ibuprofen for the fever. So far my temp today is normal.
I took my shirt off last night and I have the largest and nastiest bruise on my side I ever seen. It is a tad bit frightening. My doctor was surprised how bad the bruise is and the amount of swelling. It took them about 4 days but they figured out that I had a small vein still bleeding somewhere. That bleeder accounts for the crashing blood counts, the bruising, the swelling and the fever.
He said he has only seen this happen once several years ago and it was a male patient about my age. Just my luck right!!
I go back to see my doctor early next week for my first followup. They expect my recovery to still be about 6 weeks with a walker and then several weeks adding more weight each week.
I have more to tell but I am getting a bit tired. I knew this was going to be rough but this past week has been very very difficult and bit scary for me. I know everyone has been on edge as well waiting for me to finally get out the hospital.
When I got home it was great to see everyone. Cam was very very helpful. He made me dinner, got me water helped get up and down. He also told me to call him from upstairs if I need anything. He was awesome!
I will touch base later today.
1 comment:
You ain't joking that's a bruise! Wow!
I was pretty bruised up afterwards too, just not in that location.
I, too, needed a blood transfusion...during surgery though, not afterwards.
Had to love the bed trapeze...don't ya wish ya had one at home, too? Do you have a leg lasso to help lift your leg? They help A LOT.
I'll keep this short...thanks for the updates and glad to know you are home...it's all uphill from here!
SHC
Post a Comment