Day 248

Day 248

Sunday, January 26 2014

Physical:

For the 3^rd day in a row, DH was content to spend the majority of the day in bed.  He didn’t even want the TV on.  He told me he’d been at a flea market all night and was tired.  I got him up after getting home from shopping, and he watched TV for awhile.  He started watching a movie, and really wanted to see it all.  But by close to 10:00 he couldn’t hold out any more and was ready to go to bed.

He was wakeful, but not restless, in the early morning hours.  He didn’t know where he was or how he got there; I’m pretty sure he also didn’t know who I was then either.  Once again he wouldn’t eat much.  He took his pills with his nutrition drink, but went back to sleep and refused any lunch.  He ate one pot pie for supper, and didn’t even want another (usually he does). 

Eople:

DSS stayed with DH as usual.  He never got him out of bed, but did take him a glass of water.  TGF and I got grocery shopping done.  She fixed pot pies for everyone (they all love them too, and they were on sale.  I’m the “odd man out” who doesn’t care for them, but I had plenty of other options). 

The boys got all the trash out – didn’t forget anything this time.  In fact, I haven’t found anything at all left behind.  That is very strange!

Emotions:

Wow.  I’ve been through a lot (of emotions) this week.  It is easier on me physically when DH stays in bed .. but I worry a lot more.  I don’t know why .. is he just cold?  He keeps saying he has a cold, does he feel bad?  Is he really just “slowing down” that much?  He’s clearly getting weaker; but so much inactivity would make anyone weaker.  The nurse keeps saying his lungs sound clear .. but actually, no one is testing his lung function any more.  He sounds like he’s struggling to breathe a lot of the time, especially at night.

Yesterday I discovered a MAJOR mistake on my part.  I paniced .. this is completely unacceptable.  I know I’m over tired, and get distracted way too easily.  Still.  Apparently Saturday night I didn’t hit the “start” button on the dialysis machine.  On Sunday, I didn’t hurry to disconnect (other than close clamps) so I wouldn’t disturb DH since he was sleeping so much.  At noon I decided I had to wrap it up so I could finish bagging trash. 

Note: I cannot really “read” the writing on the screen on the machine.  But I can tell the different color bar across the top.  At the beginning of the process it’s blue, and I press “next” and it starts.  At the end there’s a blue bar, and I press “next” and get a beep and another blue bar screen.  I have to press “next” again, and get another beep, and then it begins a summary.  So, there was a blue bar, so I hit “next” expecting a beep.  Instead it went directly to a green bar .. and began the process!!!  So, he had no dialysis over night. 

Way back last spring a dialysis nurse told me tht if we stopped doing the dialysis he would probably only survive about 3 days.  That makes me panic over missing one night.  However, the current nurse indicated he thought that was a “low” estimate, that it would be longer (but not by more than a few days).  Nevertheless, missing a night is BAD.  I went on and let it start, thinking I’d just let it go until I got back from shopping, stop the process (he’d get about half the usual treatment, better than nothing).  But, on the 2^nd drain cyce (out of 6), the alarm went off.  And absolutely nothing I could do would make it continue the drain process.  I finally just turned it off.  Last night DSS did the heparin injections; but there wasn’t enough for but half the bags.  (I have requested more, but it hasn’t come yet).  In any case, it ran all night with no problem at all.   It’s probably got 3 to 3 ½ hours left to go; hopefully with no problems.

Last night I managed to stay awake for a large part of the gramy awards.  I watched the remaining Beatles perform, and felt nostalgically sad.  When did I get so old?  I did not enjoy the program for the most part; and parts of it I found extremely distasteful.  But I just *had* to see Ringo and Sir Paul.  They got old too and that made me sad.

I am having a hard time getting motivated to get this day going.  I had to push myself to go on and get up and dressed, because I have no idea what time the landlord will be here to fix the water heater.  Not at all likely this early – but who knows.  And I never know what time the CAN will come (and wonder if she’ll even be able to get here later in the week).  I haven’t head from the volunteer lady, from my SIL, or even from the social worker.   I really hate when people say they’re going to do something .. call, come over, whatever .. and then just don’t do what they say. 

I’ve been up about 3 hours.  DH is sleeping soundly and doesn’t get more pills for another hour and a half.  I think I need to try to take a quick nap!