Home on the horizon???

[Guest guest]

Hi Friends,

Another sleepless night followed by another day of tests and too

many people wanted to poke and prod. Bob and I have been

secretly laughing all day at all the medical professionals who

come in to examine my pseudocyst and poke around at the

wrong part of my abdomen. We've gotten now so we bet each

other as they walk in the door. Each and every one has poked

me in the right mid section, down below my right ribs, poked and

then kept poking deeper again, watching my face for a grimace.

When I don't grimace in pain and explain to them that the head

and tail of my pancreas aren't positioned in my abdomen in the

usual places, they get all doubtful and huffy, until I physically

place their hands on the two swollen areas, and then grimace or

scream my head off as they poke harder than necessary. Bob

wants me to paint " X " marks the spot with magic marker and see

if that will help these characters find the prize.

The doctor had announced that he planned for me to go on TPN

and stay in the hospital for another week last night and I wasn't

too excited about that. Although drainage isn't an option, and the

surgeon here feels that surgery would be unsafe also, due to the

location of the cyst and the way my pancreas is aligned, I wish

there was something more they could do. My doctor is too

worried about TPN and its possibilities of causing an infection

with an already terrifically inflamed pseudocyst, even with me

staying in the hospital. So I know that if I am allowed to go home

tomorrow, I'm going to be on strict bed rest and no activity until

this thing settles down. But four days is enough, and NPO is no

fun.

The nurses keep asking me to rate my pain on the 1-10 scale. I

finally told them today that with a continuous dilaudid drip and a

bolus I could inject every 8 minutes, any interpretation I gave

them wasn't really valid, as far as rating it for how it's going to be

when I go home, unless they send me home on the IV drip. They

said no, they didn't plan to send me home with the drip. So I told

them they needed to take me off the dilaudid PCA and see how I

rated the pain when I was going without it. Leave me the bolus

to use if I have to, but take away the continuous IV drip.

I mean, the drip is great and pretty well covers most of the pain,

but I want to get out of here, and they're not about to let me with

this PCA pump going all the time. Well, I've done okay without it

since 9:00 am, and have managed to get by with 9.4 mg of

Dilaudid since that time. I think that will be good enough to

convince the doctor I'm able to go home, so wish me luck that I

get to go home tomorrow.

Thanks again, everyone, for your prayers and well wishes. They

really mean a lot to me and I hope to be able to thank everyone

personally, or exchange the special thoughts sometime when I

am feeling better.

With hope and prayers,

Heidi

Heidi H. Griffeth

South Carolina

SC & SE Regional Rep.

PAI, Intl.

Note: All comments or advice are personal opinion only, and

should not be substituted for professional medical consultation.

[Guest guest]

Heidi,

I hope you'll be able to go home soon. Just don't put yourself in to

much pain to do it. Keep us informed on how you continue to do, we

worry about you. You'll definitiely be in my prayers that the pain and

such clears up rapidly and that the inflamed psuedocyst goes down as

soon as possible. Do the doctors have any idea on why the psuedocyst

refilled and became inflamed, when it had been resolving the last time

you looked at it before this happened?

Kimber

--

Kimber

Vallejo, CA

hominid2@...

Note: All advice given is personal opinion, not equal to that of a licensed

physician or health care professional.