My Little Pumpkin!

So today Danny and I went to Target to get a few things and while I was there I just couldn't resist getting Brodie a Halloween costume.....Danny thinks I am crazy but I think he is adorable!


Nothing else has really been going on. My little brother turned 21 while I was in the hospital so he came over and spent the weekend with us and we went out Saturday night....we had a lot of fun but boy was I tired....didn't go to bed till 3:30am!! It's ok, as long as he had a good time....Happy Birthday Josh! :)

WE GOT A PUPPY!!!!

His name is Brodie and he is a Teacup Yorkie. He is 8 months old and he weighs 4 pounds! My mom and dad got him for me and I love him.

I got him last night and I was a little worried about him because he didn't eat or drink anything all day, so finally at like 8:00pm I gated him in the kitchen so he couldn't follow me in the living room and sit on me and when he thought I wasn't looking he ate his food! I was SO happy.

Last night, when we put him in the crate he cried for like an hour but when he realized we weren't letting him out he went to sleep. I am sure he will cry tonight too but he will eventually get used to it.

Here he is.....

Im home!

I got home Tuesday. I am still getting acclimated to being home, I get tired real easy and my legs have been kind of sore. The last couple of days I have had to run a lot of errands and since I have been in the hospital for 3 weeks I am still a little weak....even with the physical therapy that I did while I was there.

I also have a surprise but I don't want to tell you yet until tonight when I can post some pictures.....so look for a post later on!!!

HOORAY FOR MIAMI!!

The Miami Dolphins beat the New England Patriots 38-13!!! It was a great game and I am SO happy they won.

As for me...I am still in the hospital. I am scheduled to go home Tuesday which I am totally ready for. I am going to be done with IV abx but will continue to be on Cipro (a pill) for another week.

I have had a super boring weekend with not much to do. My mom visited yesterday for awhile and Danny came today but once they leave and I am here alone time seems to stand still!

Luckily, tomorrow is Monday and I have daytime tv to look forward to!

So far, So good...

Its only 10:30 and already I am having a GREAT day!

I am OFF oxygen (YEAH!) and I got weighed this morning and since I have been here I have gained 8.14 pounds!!

Hopefully my day continues to go well and I stay off oxygen....

Looks like im not going anywhere!

Well to day is day 13 and I thought I would be able to go home today since I had a transplant appointment tomorrow, but I had to call and cancel it because I am still in the hospital.

My steroids are being continued from 5 days to 7 and while I feel like I am opening up and I am definitely breathing easier...I am STILL on one liter of oxygen.

My doc has stopped the mucomyst for now because it was making me feel more constricted and not doing any good.

The last couple of weeks I was causing myself A LOT of extra stress and anxiety due to a couple different situations (plus with the steroids my anxiety was like double!!) and that was also causing me to not get good sleep and when my anxiety kicks in my chest tightens up even more. SO a few days ago I was prescribed Ambien for sleep and Klonopin for the anxiety just while I am on the steroids and let me tell you....it has helped tremendously! I feel a lot calmer and its the first time in 2 weeks I have slept through the night.

My doctor has also added cipro to the abx that I am taking. Its just a pill so its not that big of a deal. Did I also mention that I have been doing physical therapy while I am here?? Since I was working out at home I didn't want to be in the hospital and loose any of the strength that I have worked up so I asked my doc to set it up. I now have a little exercise bike and work out bands in my room that I do. I really enjoy the bike and have also thought of possibly getting on for home!

So all in all I feel like I am on the mend...I am just ready to go home!

Quick Update

Yesterday, because my chest has been feeling tight and my doctor could hear wheezing he started me on 6omg of Solu-Medrol for 5 days to try and help open me up.

I already feel a little better so hopefully I can get off the oxygen. I am at one liter and haven't been able to go any lower.

My doctor isn't on call this weekend so I am having to deal with the guy I don't like. Oh well. He wasn't to bad today and my doctors back on Monday so it isn't horrible.

I am hoping to go home Tuesday. I have a transplant check up in Gainesville Wednesday, September 17th so I kind of have to be out. I just need to get off the oxygen!!!

Bored....

I haven't felt that great today.

I had an issue last night when I was having my medi-port accessed. It made a weird popping noise and the one nurse who was in here made the comment that I probably needed to have surgery and get a new one....now me being the anxiety queen that I am immediately got upset which then through me into a bronco spasm and I felt like I couldn't breath. My doctor luckily was here and he told me that my port was fine (it flushes and draws back blood great) and that it was probably just scar tissue and that I needed to calm down. I get upset very easily and sometimes I cause more problems for myself because of that!

I just think that the nurse shouldn't have just jump to that conclusion so fast without thinking of any other possibility....I mean she jumped right to my port was crap and I need a new one. Of course I would get upset...GEEZ!

So this morning when I woke up I was feeling ok...but all day today my sats have been on the low side and my chest has felt tight and of course because I was wanting to see my doc tonight to see what he thought he didn't make a second round so I have to wait until the morning.

Good news for Sara...she finished her physical therapy and has been released to go home!! Her and Mike will start there road trip home tomorrow. My thoughts are with you guys as you start your journey home...drive safe!

More hospital problems!

So, last night I think I had the biggest OOPS ever in the history of coming to this hospital!

I have CF related diabetes that started last year and when I am home and not sick in the hospital it is very well controlled. When I am home the only insulin I usually get is 10 units of a 24 hour insulin called lantus. I check my sugars at meal time and if they are over 120 I use more insulin to cover for the food I eat (luckily when at home I usually don't need to do this because they are never over.) When I am sick and in the hospital my blood sugars usually get crazy and I require more insulin through out the day than normal.

Last night, my nurse came in to give me all my pm meds, check my blood sugar, give me my 10 units of lantus, and hook up my lipids that I told you I get. Around 10:45pm she comes back in apologizing up and down that she is so sorry but she looked at the med sheet wrong and she had accidentally given me 20 units of lantus! She said that she had already called the doctor and he said to stop the lipids and begin running fluids (basically sugar water) so that my blood sugar wouldn't bottom out during the night while I am sleeping and oh yeah....she is going to have to check my blood sugar every hour through out the night! Needless to say I didn't sleep at all!! He also stopped ALL insulin today and the lantus I am supposed to get tonight because my sugars have been low all day. He also said as long as my sugars are above 80 before I go to bed tonight they only need to be checked every 4 hours tonight and then tomorrow we can go back to my normal schedule.

Now, I partly blame myself for this happening I usually pay good attention to everything the nurses do and the ONE time I just have faith that I don't have to hold there hand...look what happens! And I know they are supposed to get a "second" pair of eyes to check they have the right amount in the syringe so what happened? Did she just skip that step or did the second person just look without actually knowing what she was looking at?? Who knows...

I don't want you to think that I am in a hospital full of idiots cause thats not the case there are SEVERAL nurses here that I am personally friends with and they are great nurses! (and I am sure they are reading this and they know who they are!!) :)

There are just a few that you would swear got there nursing license like yesterday and you wonder how they ever graduated.....and I am not kidding! Oh well, I guess this just means I am gonna have to be a pain in everyones you know what to make sure I get the right meds.

Hopefully tonight I can get some rest and I won't be a zombie tomorrow...I need to get some work done!!

Just a little rant...

The last couple of days I have been getting annoyed and today it finally came to a head!

Usually while I am in the hospital my doctor has me hooked up to lipids at night so I can gain some extra weight. It's supposed to run for 10 hours at night while I am sleeping.

Seems simple....but not only do I have the lipids that need to run but I also have 2 abx, one running every 8 and the other running every 6 hours. The first night the lipids were hung the nurse said she had talked to the pharmacists and they told her the abx and lipids were compatible so they could be run at the same time. Great.

Then, the next night the nurse (a different one) came in and said she talked to another pharmacists and they said absolutely no way are they compatible and when my abx need to be run the lipids need to be stopped.

Well between the lipids the abx and nurses being slow I was hooked up from 10:30pm LAST night until 3:30 this afternoon with no break in between.

Finally, I said to my doctor that they needed to figure out if the abx are compatible or not because it is ridiculous that the same pharmacy gives a different answer everyday. I mean if its not compatible then what does that mean for the days they did run together...did I not get the all the med? Will my port be affected? I mean WTF people??!! This happens all the time and I am tired of it!!

It turns out that it hasn't been "tested" yet so they don't know if its compatible so my doc just said to run them separate to be safe. So now all I need to do is hope the nurses pay attention to there schedule so I am not hooked up to the wall the WHOLE time. The girl tonight came in and went over a "schedule" with me (cause she knew I was unhappy about being hooked up all day) to hopefully have me unhooked by like 9:00am so we will see how that goes.

To answer a question about the mucomyst....it doesn't really taste bad but the smell isn't great. It kind of reminds me of well water which if you don't know what that smells like its kind of like rotten eggs. My doctor and the RT were making me think I was going to hate it and honestly it isn't to bad. I absolutely HATE 7% saline so I welcome any alternative and so far its working fine.

Also, today was the first game of the season for my Miami Dolphins and unfortunately Brett Favre and the NY Jets won the game. Its ok though we can only go up from where we were last season so lets just keep thinking good thoughts!

No Fevers!!

Well, yesterday was all day with no fevers...Yeah!!

My cough is already getting better even after only 3 full days of abx. Without going into to much detail so I don't gross people out...a lot of the stuff that I have been brining up has contained hard pieces in it which is most likely part of a mucous plug which was probably causing the pain/discomfort I was having in my chest for a few days earlier this week. So its definitely good news that I am getting all the junk up and out.

My doctor just started me on a new med yesterday and I think it is really helping. Its called mucomyst and it is an aerosol med that is added to the duoneb nebulizer that I do twice a day (4 times in the hospital.) Its to replace the 7% hypertonic saline (that I HATE) that usually comes after my duoneb.

I have hated the 7% for years because when I do the breathing treatment I cough my brains out and get horrible bronchospasms to where I can't breath.....and I could be wrong (not likely) but I don't think that is the point of the medicine! I think its supposed to help you feel better and that isn't what it does for me.

I have my friend Felicia as my nurse today so I know I won't get forgotten about like yesterdays intern nurse. Yesterday I would get hooked up to an abx that only runs for 30 minutes and like 3 hours later the lady would come and unhook me! Now I know I don't have a hot date or anything and its not like I leave my room but it nice to be able to get up and use the rest room without carrying an IV pole there EVERY time!! Its to bad they can't just leave the stuff in here and I would do it myself!!

OK I am done now.... :)

I am in the hospital!!

I got here Tuesday night....but I just got my laptop brought to me today so that's why I haven't been able to post anything!!

So yesterday , I had an ultrasound of my stomach and the good news is I don't have gall stones....but I do have gall bladder sludge! How horrible does that sound? The good news is I don't have to have surgery and the IV abx that I am on right now should do the trick.

Of course, since I have been here I had my normal 2 days of fevers. Yesterday it got up to 103 and today it only got to 101.9. Hopefully tomorrow I won't have any at all!

I was feeling really congested today but its just because of all the breathing treatments I have been getting so all the crap in my chest is moving up and out. I usually feel worse before I feel better, again hopefully tomorrow I have a better day!

Anyway..im just happy I have the internet!! I have my work laptop that I was able to use to have work keep me occupied but I can't cruise the internet on that one so now I have my personal one that I can use when I am up all night not being able to sleep! :)