I Spoke too soon . . .

So I am sad to say that I may have spoken too soon earlier when I said that today seemed to be going well. Jennie has been out of it most of the day just generally not feeling good. She will be freezing cold one minute, then burning up the next, or her arms will be hot and her legs freezing, etc., etc.

She only managed to get out of the bed for one walk early this morning and to sit in the chair for a short while this evening, which was much less activity than we were hoping for, but she has been very tired and in pain all afternoon and evening.

Even though she has been able to have clear liquids all day, she has only felt like drinking small amounts of water, and in fact was unable to keep that down. The nurse gave her some compazine shortly afterwards, and her nausea has been better since. Jennie also has been in more pain all day, and is in fact moaning in her sleep now which she hasn't done since the first night or two.

The doctors and nurses had warned us that there would be some bad days mixed in with the good, so hopefully today was the worst of it. I know as sore as Jennie's abdomen is vomiting must have been very painful, and I hope that this was the last time for a while.

Please pray that tomorrow will be a new day fresh with progress and less pain.

Day 8 of Recovery

Again today Jennie is doing pretty well. The doctors came in this morning and told us they are pleased with her progress. While some have recovered quicker, she also has had no real complications aside from the mystery infection that she is on antibiotics for.

The doctors have also ok'ed her to try a clear liquid diet, which is the first step towards getting her back on regular food, and one of the biggest hurdles left. She continues to walk several times a day and is spending a good portion of the day out of the bed and in the chair. She is very tired today, but we wore her out pretty good yesterday and the doctors said energy will very greatly until we get her insulin shots more stable.

That is probably the other difficulty we have had, is that her blood sugar has been high much of the last day and a half since we started the long-acting shot instead of the IV. Again though the doctors say that it will take several days to get it regulated, and when she starts on solid food it will begin to vary again, all of which is normal.

Keep Jennie in your prayers, hopefully recovery will continue to go well and we can get her onto solid food in the next few days.

She's doing well

This morning the Doctors came in and removed Jennie's NG tube from her nose as well as the drain from her abdomen, which I know will make her much more comfortable.

Her blood sugar levels are still fluctuating quite a bit, but they said that is to be expected now that she is off the insulin drip and only taking shots to regulate it. They also said that they will be increasing the dose of the long acting insulin some to try and reduce the variances some.

Other than that, they started her on an extra antibiotic for pneumonia, they saw some fluid in an ultrasound they did yesterday and want to stop it before she gets full pneumonia. Her liver function has come back to the normal range, so they aren't as worried about infection but they will still be monitoring it.

Yesterday was the first day that Jennie has actually been awake most of the day, and we got her out of bed several times, including a walk with Physical Therapy around the entire floor of the hospital. Other than that we watched a lot of TV and movies, which she really seemed to enjoy. If fact when we got here this morning, Jennie was already up and watching Finding Nemo with Stitch at her side :-)

Recovery Day 6

We made it in today early enough to see the doctors, which was a relief since we haven't had much contact the last few days. The plan for today is to get Jennie off of the Heparin IV and her Insulin IV and try to switch her to a subcutaneous shot daily. It will be somewhat of an experiment the first few days trying to get the levels right, but it has to happen at some point.

They also said they plan on raising her pain med a little since she is doing more movement and her pain has increased as a result. Our only concern with that is she is having a difficult time staying wake for any period of time that the increased meds will only make her grogginess worse.

She is supposed to be getting up at least 3 times a day, and they will be removing her catheter to try and motivate her more. They also mentioned that the X-ray showed nothing besides some fluid in her left abdominal cavity where they removed the pancreas from, which is normal.

It seems that things are still pretty well on course, although we feel like her progress is somewhat slower than some talking to the doctors and nurses who see these transplants regularly. We would like for her recovery to be very quick, but any progress is still progress and so far we haven't had any big setbacks, which is a blessing.

Recovery Day 5

Today Jennie again appears to be doing better. The swelling is down more than it has been in months, although she is still running a slight fever and the blood work indicates she still has an infection somewhere. The doctors that came in before we arrived said that they weren't too concerned about the infection and would be watching it for the next few days until they were able to get the cultures back to determine exactly where it is.

The only other real issue is that they have decreased her pain medicine quite a bit, which is causing her to hurt more than she has the last few days but they feel she isn't coming down quickly enough on her own.

Other than that there isn't much to report today, but hopefully Dr. Sutherland will be around lunchtime to give us some more information and to answer a few questions we have.

I thought I would post this drawing that we had done last Thursday at the Mall of America, we both thought it was very good.

Address to send Cards

Sorry, I just realized that I never posted the address you can send cards to for Jennie.

Fairview Medical Center
420 Delaware Street SE
Minneapolis, MN 55455
Floor 6B - Room 239

IMPORTANT - Due to the floor we are on, they won't accept flowers real or silk, and we ask only for cards due to the limited space.

Thanks, I know Jennie would really appreciate hearing from everyone!

Recovery Day 4

Again today Jennie seems to be doing well. Unfortunatley we got here after the doctors had already come by this morning, for some reason they seem to keep coming earlier and earlier everyday. Jennie says her pain is about the same as yesterday but there is a noticible reduction in her grogyness, so we can tell her medication has been lowered significantly.

On the agenda today is to try and get Jennie to walk a little, maybe even out into the hall. I don't know if this is a bit much, yesterday just getting to the chair really exahausted her.

The only other issue is that Jennie still has some swelling, although it appears to be mostly in her legs and feet. They don't want to give any more lasix because her fluid output has been fairly high, but getting up and moving some more should help it.

Her blood sugar levels remain stable, which means that they have finally stopped checking it every hour (her poor fingers were getting butchered). The nurse is going to try and get the doctors to return, so hopefully we will know more later.