The day is coming to a close; the hospital is quieter and the pace has slowed down considerably. Today, as often happens when we're in the hospital, plans changed. Adam did not get his PICC line. The infectious disease specialists haven't decided how long Adam will need to be treated for the infection, which we now know is klebsiella, a bacteria that can be found on the skin. It isn't usually a problem there, but is definitely a problem when it gets introduced into the fluid in the brain. This could have happened when his incision began to leak. Anyway, since the specialists aren't sure how long they want to treat this infection until they see another sample of Adam's cerebral-spinal fluid, the neurosurgery team doesn't want a PICC line placed in case he doesn't really need it. So we wait for the next turn of events.
We did, however, go downstairs for a Doppler study. It was a precautionary measure as Adam has been in bed so much this past month. The Doppler was to check his legs to be sure he isn't developing any blood clots. Good news; he isn't. He also got a new i.v. placed, because the other one was four days old, and that's the limit.
It's almost 10:00 p.m. It's dark outside when I look straight out the window, and I can see the lights od the surrounding neighborhoods and streets. When I look down, it's very bright in the parking lots and roadways of the hospital. I can see the helipad for the emergency airlift transports. It's right near the emergency room entrance. Sometimes I can hear and see the helicopters land, but not tonight.
Tonight, as things quiet down, and Adam goes to sleep, I'll be alone with my thoughts and my hopes and my prayers, just like when I'm home and everyone else is sleeping. I'll be waiting to hear about what comes next. It always strikes me, when we're in the hospital for these extended times, how everything in our life centers on the crisis we're attending to, but how everything else in the world just goes on, without even a notice of the dramas taking place in these towers. And I know it will be exactly the same for us when we go home again; we'll go about our lives, almost as if this time never happened. We'll just kind of shed this experience like a butterfly sheds it's cocoon and flies free. And I'm thankful that we can.
We did, however, go downstairs for a Doppler study. It was a precautionary measure as Adam has been in bed so much this past month. The Doppler was to check his legs to be sure he isn't developing any blood clots. Good news; he isn't. He also got a new i.v. placed, because the other one was four days old, and that's the limit.
It's almost 10:00 p.m. It's dark outside when I look straight out the window, and I can see the lights od the surrounding neighborhoods and streets. When I look down, it's very bright in the parking lots and roadways of the hospital. I can see the helipad for the emergency airlift transports. It's right near the emergency room entrance. Sometimes I can hear and see the helicopters land, but not tonight.
Tonight, as things quiet down, and Adam goes to sleep, I'll be alone with my thoughts and my hopes and my prayers, just like when I'm home and everyone else is sleeping. I'll be waiting to hear about what comes next. It always strikes me, when we're in the hospital for these extended times, how everything in our life centers on the crisis we're attending to, but how everything else in the world just goes on, without even a notice of the dramas taking place in these towers. And I know it will be exactly the same for us when we go home again; we'll go about our lives, almost as if this time never happened. We'll just kind of shed this experience like a butterfly sheds it's cocoon and flies free. And I'm thankful that we can.
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