Happy days !\u00a0\u00a0 Loads of quiet sleep last night.\u00a0 I even slept through the coyotes yelling.\u00a0 Was awakened twice by Brittanys wanting to go outside, but John let them out.\u00a0 Breakfast (non-leather fried lightly egg and a sausage link), tomato\/V8 juice, and then pills.\u00a0 We had bought a pill container allowing spaces for Morning, Noon and night for all meds for the week.\u00a0 It took us awhile to fill the box. Today for lunch we went to our neighbors, who ordered in Chinese as their oven\/stove quit working.\u00a0 Yummy and a nice visit.\u00a0 I was so happy to be able to join their family again. Came home and slept hard for 2 hours !<\/p>\n
Okay… after being on-line on my laptop again today, and calling some people by phone, I realized that many of you had not heard the entire story.\u00a0 Even those reading the blog would have missed on the beginning of this because John didn\u2019t get it started till Dec. 4th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n So, here is a list of events starting in June that culminated in what happened.\u00a0 John will have to add and make corrections, but here you\u2019ll have the whole story and not have to sort it out.<\/p>\n In June 2009 I went to the ER when my doctor in Cle Elum could not see me because the clinic was closed to participate in a funeral for one of their own.\u00a0 \u00a0My Doc listened to my symptoms and told me to go in immediately and ask for all the doctors in ER to take my case.\u00a0\u00a0 I was very run down and had red spots on my lower legs, indicating internal bleeding.\u00a0 They examined me, took an X-ray, and so on and the lead doctor decided to take blood for a culture.\u00a0 The lungs appeared to show \u201ca bit of pneumonia\u201d but nothing jumped out at them as to what was wrong.\u00a0 He admitted me to the hospital for further testing.<\/p>\n Two days later, the culture results indicated my bloodstream was full of bacteria \u2013 introduced, we suspect, in a late April dental cleaning. \u00a0The\u00a0 \u201ca bit of pneumonia\u201d was fluid leaking into my lung from damaged cells.\u00a0 When infecting the heart this is called endocarditis. The bacteria grew on the valves of my heart — the mitral valve was the worst, and I had known for years I had a heart murmur and was advised early to take a high dose of antibiotics before any teeth cleaning or anything that opened my blood to potential infection. I had done that in April, but apparently I was run down and the antibiotic did not protect me.<\/p>\n I was very ill and had much fluid build-up which, along with my heart issues, made me have difficulty breathing.\u00a0 These symptoms were treated. I received a non-targeted or general antibiotic while cultures were done to determine the exact nature of the bacteria.\u00a0 There were four \u2013 all treatable with Rocephin \u2013 and as by then I was no longer in imminent danger of dying I could leave the hospital. I had to go in as an outpatient for 28 days for infusions of Rocephin that lasted \u00bd hr.\u00a0 This was done via a tube or PICC line from my elbow to just above my heart.\u00a0 That solved the bacterial infection.<\/p>\n Afterwards, I visited both an internal infection specialist and a cardiologist in Yakima.\u00a0 Visits continued till it was determined I had made enough progress to teach in the fall.\u00a0 Our classes begin in late September.\u00a0\u00a0 I managed until the morning of the day following Thanksgiving \u2013 I woke at 3 A.M. with chest pains.\u00a0 First time, so I told John I was having a heart attack.\u00a0 We dressed fast and he drove me to ER in Ellensburg.\u00a0 They took me in and called an ambulance, sending me off to Yakima Regional Hospital.\u00a0 Once there I had my first operation (for which I was awake), to watch them search for a blood clot that lodged in an artery across and leading to the front of my heart.\u00a0 This was accomplished in the cardiac catheterization room where a long thin tube, called a catheter, was threaded into a blood vessel and then guided to and dislodged the blockage.<\/p>\n That was Friday about 6 A.M.\u00a0 I seemed to be fine on Friday but by noon on Saturday all my systems were shutting down.\u00a0 By late afternoon I was taken to the intensive care unit and I was put on life support.\u00a0 Tubes and wires and things I didn\u2019t know about.\u00a0 It looked like I was dying.\u00a0 6 days completely sedated.\u00a0 Two more of partial sedation –\u00a0 still with breathing and feeding tubes\u2014but I was aware of my surroundings. \u00a0The exact reason for my cardiopulmonary collapse remains a mystery.<\/p>\n At some point they found I was deathly \u201callergic\u201d to Heparin, the major blood thinner used for all operations and even to flush PICC lines. An initial test for this came back negative \u2013 it was suspected in the shutdown \u2013 then later, a second test showed the very serious reaction.\u00a0 [This reaction is called Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) and I discussed it earlier.\u00a0 JFH]<\/p>\n I started to improve and was moved to a different floor.\u00a0 Then my heart missed a few beats and I was back in the ICU, picking up a temporary pacemaker on the way.\u00a0 There were a couple of days of watchful waiting and plans to insert a regular pacemaker but my blood clotting ability wasn\u2019t cooperating.\u00a0 While the wait went on I wasn\u2019t eating well and started to deteriorate again (or more).<\/p>\n The death spiral was halted by inserting an\u00a0intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP) to assist my heart pumping functions. [This too, I covered earlier.\u00a0 JFH]\u00a0 The IABP resulted, just a few hours later, in my general improvement. \u00a0This was the expected result and it also indicated a good result from a mitral valve replacement.\u00a0 First I would have to live through an open heart operation \u2013 that probability was not real high. I was in intensive care with 24 hr supervision as they worked to improve my health.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t happening.<\/p>\n John and I and the doctors talked.\u00a0 This is the definition of between a rock and a hard place.\u00a0 I would die without the operation.\u00a0 I might die during it. Take your pick!\u00a0 John sat at home with the dogs and they took me from the ICU at 9 A.M. on Tuesday, 12\/29\/2009.\u00a0 The heart surgeon\u2019s nurse called John at 3:30 to say she left the operation as they were closing my chest back up, that I was alive, and doing well.<\/p>\n The actual procedures \u2013 two by-passes and one valve replacement \u2013 normally take this team about 3 \u00bd hours.\u00a0 Because of being on a non-standard blood thinner the operation was extended another 4 hours \u2013 3 hours with an open chest to visually monitor how I was doing, another after initial closing to watch the equipment that was watching me.\u00a0 I spent 2 \u00bd days sedated and intubated and closely watched.\u00a0 John spent one day away as I was aware and wanted to communicate and the nurse wanted me as quiet and still as I could be.<\/p>\n I was in intensive care until I left Jan 20th<\/sup> for a rehabilitation facility in Ellensburg.\u00a0 Had there been a room available in the care unit called \u201cadvanced care\u201d I could have been moved.\u00a0 That floor remained full and none were sicker than me so I stayed put. That changed on January 18th<\/sup> and I was booted upstairs with little warning.\u00a0 I stayed for two days in that room. \u00a0Then I came to Ellensburg.<\/p>\n I had to be in a skilled care facility.\u00a0 I lost much muscle mass and could not get up from bed on my own, nor walk once up. \u00a0So, my leaving the facility hinged on my being able to get out of bed on my own, get to the potty on my own, and walking with the aid of a walker.\u00a0 I had physical therapy 3 hours each day.\u00a0 Even my tongue had lost muscle and I had trouble swallowing, food and pills. Some say that for each day of being down a 2 to 3 day recovery is required.\u00a0 I\u2019m not there yet but I progressed enough to make it home. \u00a0The great day arrived for my departure (as you heard in Saturday\u2019s blog), and now I\u2019m home and getting better each day.\u00a0 I will go back to outpatient physical therapy 3 times\/week at the rehab center.<\/p>\n Thanks for caring and asking.<\/p>\n Nancy<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Happy days !\u00a0\u00a0 Loads of quiet sleep last night.\u00a0 I even slept through the coyotes yelling.\u00a0 Was awakened twice by Brittanys wanting to go outside, but John let them out.\u00a0 Breakfast (non-leather fried lightly egg and a sausage link), tomato\/V8 juice, and then pills.\u00a0 We had bought a pill container allowing spaces for Morning, Noon … Continue reading “SUNDAY — a RECAP, mostly by Nancy”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-random-issues"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p72iNf-6b","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=383"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":386,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383\/revisions\/386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}