| Wow! So much has happened since I last wrote. Little Karsyn, my granddaughter, turned 1 year old June 17. I changed jobs in August. I'm now working as a staff RN at Mt. Joseph Sr. Village in Concordia. It's under new management and direction, and has been remodeled to create a "user-friendly" atmosphere. It's much more strenuous than working at the hospitals, but not as much of the life or death stress involved. There is plenty of stress, but it is usually just finding the time to complete all of my duties in the allotted time.
Dennis and I took a vacation the last of September til Oct. 6. We traveled to Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Utah, Nebraska...just driving around and exploring the beautiful canyons and small towns in the mountains. We love the mountains and hope eventually to have our own 5th wheel trailer and travel full time. We'd like to spend the summers and fall in the mountains, and travel south for the winters. The only drawback, other than money, of course, is not having the grandkids nearby. We miss them so much when we don't see them almost daily. We have 3 in Concordia that we see infrequently...not because they are far away, but because it is so hard to catch them at home with everyone's work schedules.
After we returned Oct. 6 to home from the mountains, we babysat with Karsyn while Rusty and Becky took the older two kids to a football game at the local high school. She was so sweet and fun to take care of. She keeps us in stitches with her chicken dancing, bobble-head imitations, and the always loved "O" face.
After Becky and Rusty picked up Karsyn and took her home, Dennis went to bed and I watched TV for a couple of hours. I was starting to feel a little crampy, but thought it was from the snack crackers that I had gorged myself on while watching TV. Finally, I went to bed.
Unfortunately, I couldn't stay there long. No position was comfortable. The cramps I was suffering from felt like transitional labor pains with no break between them. I tossed and turned, walked, nothing would ease the pain.
About 4 a.m., I had taken as much pain as I could stand and woke Dennis up. We called the ER at Clay Co. Hospital where I had worked recently, and Dennis drove me to the hospital. They examined me and admitted me after taking chest xrays and a CT scan of my abdomen. The chest xrays showed pneumonia in my right lung, and the CT scan was inconclusive. They started me on treatments for the pneumonia, started IVs and fluids, which was difficult, because I had become severely dehydrated. The surgeon examined me and said he still believed I had appendicitis, even though the CT scan didn't show it. He reordered another CT scan with contrasts for the next morning. I spent the day and night on Demerol for pain and antibiotics.
The second CT scan showed the appendicitis, so I went to surgery at 2 p.m. on my 54th birthday, Oct. 9. Everyone tells me that I was white as a ghost after I returned from surgery. I felt like I was exhausted and just wanted to sleep, but finding a comfortable position was still difficult, due to the incision. I was also having headaches. Finally, the doctor let me have my Demerol by IV instead of having IM injections every couple of hours.
My blood labs became abnormal and I had to take potassium supplements. The IV fluids continued. They were watching my hemoglobin levels. I was running a fever almost continuously, and the doctor was reluctant to treat it, but the nurses tried to find other ways to cool me down. They encouraged me to walk in the halls, but I had little energy, so wasn't able to walk far. The doctor decided to discontinue my pain pills and antibiotics, saying it might be causing my fever. Once my fever went down to a fairly normal level, he discharged me to home.
I lounged around the house on my recliner for a couple of days, watching TV and sleeping mostly. Walking from the recliner to the bathroom exhausted me. I didn't go to church on Sunday, but rested at home. That morning, I felt pressure in my incision. I went to the bathroom and as I sat down, reddish pink drainage squirted from my incision clear across the bathroom floor. If I coughed, it squirted again. There were little chunks of tissue in the drainage. I thought, "this is weird". I cleaned myself up and returned to my recliner.
About 2:30 p.m. the drainage changed color and consistency. It now was yellowish brown and black and had a foul odor, like BM. I called the ER and back to the hospital we went. My surgeon saw me in the ER. He said, That's why I only put one stitch in your incision. So all the nasty drainage could come out. He didn't explain why it looked and smelled the way it did. He gave me a dose of antibiotics IV and cleansed the wound, then sent me home.
The next day I was scheduled to return to the surgical clinic for a followup appointment. The incision still was draining the same nasty stuff and it was increasing in volume. The surgeon said "It's possible you may have a fecal fistula, his fancy way of saying a hole in my colon. He said the infection from the appendix may have eroded the tissue of my bowel, creating a pinpoint size hole. But, he said, it will heal by itself. Go home and rest. You'll be ok. Then he rigged up what he called "The Davis Special" dressing, which consisted of a huge transparent sticky dressing over a Jackson-Pratt drain. He called my daughter, Becky, in to demonstrate what he wanted done with the drain. He wanted it irrigated with normal saline 2 or 3 times a day. Then he sent me home.
The Davis special dressing didn't stick to my skin long enough to even get to the pickup outside the clinic. I had to blot the drainage with a towel to keep it from soiling the pickup. When Becky got off work, she stopped by to irrigate the wound. What should have taken 5 or 10 minutes took almost 1 1/2 hours, because the transparent dressing wouldn't stay sealed, therefore the drain could not maintain suction. It was terribly frustrating for both of us. She finally said, Mom, this is ridiculous. I'm taking you to Manhattan to the ER. By this time I was getting very ill, with a temperature of 102.8, and very lethargic. I couldn't argue. She drove me to Manhattan and I was promptly admitted on Monday, Oct. 17.
The doctor in Manhattan told me up front that I would require more surgery. I had already figured that out before we arrived, but just nodded. Several doctors came in to check out the "Davis Special". One of the doctors asked "Now what was t he name of the doctor who did this to you?"
They rigged up a colostomy bag over my incision to collect the drainage, because it was becoming very caustic to my skin and tissues. They had a hard time finding one to fit, because the incision was longer than the diameter of any of their collection bags. While they were changing the bag on the evening of the 18th, I looked up to see Dr. Davis standing at the foot of my bed. He said "I just wanted you to know that you did the right thing in coming down here." He then said something about how working with my daughter had "colored" his judgment in my care. I wasn't sure what he meant by that, but the nurses asked me a question and I looked at them to answer. When I looked back toward him, he was gone.
My surgery was scheduled for the 19th, because the doctor was already fully booked for the 18th, and they wanted me to have antibiotics on board and IV fluids. I don't remember much about my surgery day, except riding the cart to surgery, and waking up in ICU with several lines running antibiotics, IV fluids, and enteral nutrition through a triple lumen central line in my left chest. I drifted in and out of consciousness. The dr. came in and told me he had taken the right side of my colon and part of my ileum due to massive necrosis. He had reattached my small intestine to what was left of my good colon. He said I had received 2 units of blood because my hemoglobin level had dropped to below 8.
I spent 4 days in ICU. I remember a couple of the nurses there, one being a RN that I had worked with at Clay Co. Hospital last year. She was very busy and I didn't feel much like chatting, so conversation was minimal.
Finally, I returned to the med/surg floor. There I saw a couple more staff that I knew from working at Clay Co. Hosp. Dennis visited faithfully every day. I wasn't very good company most of the time as I slept through most of his visits. I think he prayed a lot that month. Once I got to the floor, I grew steadily stronger and started walking once more. Just taking a shower exhausted me. After being on ice chips for almost 3 weeks, I had no appetite, which made regulating my blood sugar levels difficult for the nurses. They were checking my blood sugar every hour while in ICU and gradually lessened the frequency once I was on the floor. My fingers all grew quite sore, but I was so lethargic that I just extended my arms and let them do their thing, often not even opening my eyes.
I left the hospital in Manhattan on Oct. 28. The drive home was tiring, but I enjoyed being out in the fresh air and sunshine after being confined to a hospital room for almost a month.
Everything tasted extremely salty to me. It wasn't until I had been home from the hospital for a week that foods started to taste good again. My appetite still is not back to normal, but I'm not sure I want it to be. I'm hoping to keep some of the weight off that I lost while I was sick.
I am anxious to return to work, but am not sure when I will be able to do so. Light housework is very tiring and I require frequent rest periods. My bowels are now shorter than before, so digestion takes less time. I have frequent cramping and diarrhea, especially after meals. I have two incisions, the one Dr. Davis made with the appendectomy, which is almost healed, but leaves a deep dimple in my apron fold on the right side. The other incision is down the middle of my belly and is about 8 inches long. It is healing fast too, but has left a cleft down the center of my abdomen, almost like buttocks in front. LOL. I certainly could never wear clothing that revealed my abs again.
Everyone wants me to sue Dr. Davis for his inaction after finding my "fecal fistula". The delay in getting the second surgery cost me much of my colon, changing my bowel habits to the point that I am afraid to get far from the bathroom. We have been reduced to 1 income for the past 2 months, and it may be longer before I can get back to work. I'm not sure I can ever go back to what I was doing at work. I have been fighting depression, and worrying about our finances is taking a toll on both Dennis and myself. Our dream of owning a 5th wheel seems very distant right now. We have looked into finding a lawyer, but 5 out of 6 lawyers wouldn't even talk to me because I'm not dead or permanently and totally disabled. We finally found one that will at least look into our case. We are currently waiting on my medical records from Manhattan so we can set up an initial appointment with her.
So far, the insurance from Clay Co. Hospital has been paying 100% of my medical bills, but that will end on Dec. 31. Then I will either have to keep paying the Cobra premiums and still pay 100% of the $3000 deductible, or switch insurance. If I am working at Mt. JOseph, I can get on their insurance. If I'm not working...I don't know.
Please pray for us. |
