Week 8 of Hospitals

Sorry it has been a while since I last blogged, but the first part of the week was a slow tough week.

We had seen steady improvements in Tracy for the last couple of weeks and last weekend we didn’t see any improvements, but we didn’t see any regression either!

As I left Sunday night to go to bed the nurses told me that Tracy’s treatment was scheduled for 8:30AM not the usual 7:30.  Ah, I could sleep some more. 

I woke up at the 6:15, called Drew to make sure he was up and then called to see how Trace’s night was and both were good.  I went back to sleep and got up at 7:30.  When I arrived at 8AM her room was empty, they had picked her up at 7AM!  I rushed down to the 1^st floor to find her in the treatment room.  The nurses told me that she was just getting ready to come out of the treatment room.  She did, I told her I was sorry I was late and one of the nurses told me they were sorry they took her early because of cancellations.  While waiting for her to recover I talked with the Jennifer (she has attended to Tracy on every treatment so far) and she informed me that Friday’s and todays (Monday) had not been very good.  This explained what Drew and I had seen over the weekend.  Tracy got back to her room and slept most of the day.   I found out that afternoon that there had been some miss communication between the nurses and I.  Tracy’s Ativan dosage had not been changed the way I thought the previous week.  I had been told they lowered from 15mg per day to 10mg, (2.5mg four times a day).   But the dosage actually went up, 3mg four times a day, for a total of 12mg per day.  This fit with what Dr. Taylor had told me about no lowering the dose no more than 20% each time.

Tuesday was not much better; in fact it was my worst day since Christmas.  Tracy was not responsive all day and slept all of it.  I think the fact that I knew the previous treatment was not a good one weighted on me, kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy thing.  Tuesday evening Trace was scheduled for another MRI of the brain.  The nurses kept asking me if I thought Tracy would need anesthesia for it.  I was like, I’m not a doctor, let’s talk with the doctors about it.  Well as fate would have Tracy’s new lead doctor, Dr. Houtchins, suggested that we increase the Ativan for the dose just prior to the MRI and see if we could go without the anesthesia.  Drew had said that he thought we should try without also and if didn’t work then try again with anesthesia.  So we went without.  She went down at 6:30PM for the MRI and I went with her.  She went in around 7PM and was done by 8 without any anesthesia!  It had been a long day.

Wednesday was a new day!  We left Trace’s room for treatment at the usual 7AM time.  I didn’t sleep well again, so I went back to the room and slept for another hour.  Got back up again and dressed headed to Ypsilanti to pick up donuts for the ECT team that has been treating Tracy. 

I returned to the hospital to deliver the donuts and was welcomed with huge smiles.  First of all, they said that Tracy had had a very good treatment and secondly the big box of donuts.  I had arrived just before their department meeting and later I found out from Dr. Rosinski that Tracy and I were the talk of the meeting.   She also told me that the MRI from the previous night still showed nothing.  I then left to meet Dante Burchi for lunch in Belleville. 

I rushed back to see Tracy as I knew that she should be very lucid after hearing earlier how well the treatment was.  I got there and she was very talkative.  Dr. Rosinski came by and told me that they were lowering the Ativan to 10mg a day (now, 2.5mg four times a day).  I later began to worry about how Thursday would be, as Tracy’s mother Kay and sister Sarah were due to show up on Thursday and the last time they came up, Tracy had a good day the day before they got here and a really bad day the day they arrived. 

Well Thursday came and it was a good day.  Tracy was having a good day and Kay and Sarah showed up around 4PM.  They were very happy with the progress they saw in Tracy, as they were able to converse some with her.

Drew came out that same evening around 9:00 just as the snow started to fly.  I was glad he came out before the weather got too bad.  We stayed in Trace’s room until around 10PM and then headed for our beds.

The week had turned, God is Good.

God Bless and “Never Give Up… Never Ever Give Up!”

Rob