Update

[Guest guest]

Well, greetings everyone, Thought I'd take a few minutes to update you on

this past month. I am finally home after two of the longest weeks of my

life in the hospital. Leave it to me to never do anything the easy way.

Total knee replacement surgery was performed on Monday, November 18th. Which

everyone tells me went well. At 4:00 AM on Tuesday I was rushed into ICU.

Apparently my blood pressure (80/40) was dropping thru the floor while my

heartbeat was going thru the roof - who knows why? It took two days and two

units of blood to get things under control (fortunately, all this was pretty

much a blur). On Friday I was sent up to the orthopedic rehab ward

(finally! or so I thought!) I actually had two PT sessions before the docs

started worrying about the pain in the calf of the surgical leg and the

shortness of breath. Back down to the ortho floor, where I was confined to

bed and little or no movement, since they discovered I had clots in my leg.

During the next five days I had more tests (blood, Xray, nuclear (kind of

cool actually), you name it and I had it, sometimes more than once. This

was the toughtest part of the whole thing, the pain from the surgery was

horrendous and add all the other junk in and my depression took off big

time! My poor honey, if he wasn't at work, he was at the hospital, and

while I was wallowing in my depression all I did was cry...he did not have a

good time of it! But then, I wasn't exactly having fun either. During all

this time I was getting cumodin and heparin via IV (along with the blood

transfusions....oh, the fun! Finally, on Thursday of week two, I was

allowed to take a real, honest-to-God shower! I think I went to Heaven on

that one. THEN the PT's came in and said they could start my therapy, which

I thought meant I'd be going back upstairs to rehab, but they did it there.

Fortunately, all the PT I had in April, May, and June had left my leg pretty

strong so the PT went well and pretty quickly. So far as the PT's were

concerned, I was ready to go HOME, not back up to rehab, but home! Now, if

only the doctors would concur, which of course they didn't. According to

the endless parade of doctors, altho' they thought the clots in my leg were

improving, they still had to get the cumodin up to a therapeutic level so

that if another clot did form, it would be dissolved. That took another

three days, until finally, FINALLY on Sunday, December 1st, I went HOME. If

you are ever faced with a choice of doing this surgery or not, DON " T! I

realize eventually, it will be worth it and all this will be just a bad

memory, but, and that is a big but! I have never had so much pain in my

life...ever - and God knows, I've had pain before, but this..... Another

suggestion IF you ever have to do it, have PT first before the surgery to

build up the strength in the muscles because it will help tremendously.

So, anyway, I got home and figured finally it was over...wrong! Got a call

from my PCP and he said I had to see a cardiologist. ASAP apparently I have

a leaking ventricular valve (RP related?? could be), so as soon as I am

strong enough, they have to start testing to see how bad that is...

You know, if I hadn't had so much support (everyone has been so incredible),

I don't know if I could have made it thru all this. It seemed for every

baby step forward, I had three giant steps back. I am so grateful it is

pretty much over, I can't tell you! Trust me, you really don't truly

appreciate your friends until you go thru something like this...and I don't

suggest you find out who your true friends are by doing this, but the cream

does rise to the top. And you guys are the cream of the crop!

I have had home health care for the past two weeks, one more to go, and home

PT, hopefully in a couple of weeks I will be able to go to regular out

patient PT, The docs still are monitoring my cumodin levels - for another

couple of months I think before I can get off it and back to my normal meds.

Did you know you can't eat spinach when you are on cumodin? And I love

spinach,so I am really looking forward to getting off this junk. My PIC

line is out and the only new body part I took home with me is my metal knee

joint (which I have to carry a card to fly so I don't set off all the

alarms, weird, huh?) I'd love to tell you the pain level has decreased

dramatically, but it hasn't. I'm still living on pain pills, but I have

come down from morphine to vicodin, so that's progress at least. Lovely

scar is abut 8 " long, starts about 2 -3 inches above the knee and goes over

and down (and it's crooked! - not that I care), it;'s just another scar.

I can't stay out here any longer, sitting at this height is very painful for

both my knee and my back, so this is the end of it. I just want to tell you

all how much I love and appreciate you. (BTW, RP group - you should see the

gorgeous Teddy Bear I got from the group...he's gorgeous! But please don't

do this just to get a Teddy Bear! That was a real pick-me-up that I truly

needed. Thanks to all of you for your thoughtfulness.) I don't know how

often I'll be able to come in here to check messages, so please leave me on

" No Mail " until I can sit here for more that 10 minutes at a time, OK?

Love to each and every one of you, I am so glad you are my friends! Love,

Judy