I can't believe it is noon already. This morning has been a whirlwind. I woke to find Clem literally dazed and confused talking nonsense to the nurse about his dreams and struggling to keep both eyes going in the same direction. The breakfast tray had already come and gotten cold and she was urging him to eat. I had not heard any of this. I am a night person and I laid awake last night for hours after Clem crashed so I was sleeping really deep this morning.
Jumping from my little cot I felt guilty that he had been in this state alone. It didn't take long for me to realize that he was pretty much bonkers. I took a deep breath and tried to slow myself down and slowly fluffed him and washed his face until he agreed to attempting the cream of wheat. About two hours later he had consumed almost all of it along with intermittent sips of tea. The Doctor came and went, the nurses came and went, the lab people came and went, and eventually the cream of wheat came and went.
Clem seems to be going through a big adjustment phase inside. His ileostomy put out 2400cc of fluid yesterday despite the Imodium that was prescribed to slow this down. Today the medication will be doubled. He vomited at least that much and took in nothing. His IV fluids saved him yesterday and today the Doctor has increased those again. The plan is to take him off the dilaudid, keep a back up iv morphine if needed, and use valium and zophran. Zophran is an awesome anti nausea drug and he has used it throughout his chemo and any other time that he has experienced nausea. It is very effective and does not have all the nasty side effects of phenergan.
The Doctor thinks that Clem is reacting to the complex cocktail of drugs and that what he really needs is something to stop the muscle spasms that he is having in his gut. Everytime he has a spasm it causes terrible pain in his incision area, every time he has this pain he starts having nausea, he stops eating and drinking with the nausea and this causes dehydration which perpetuates the nausea etc.... So he is going off the drugs and onto valium. He will at least be a happier camper. This morning in the middle of his phenergan stupor he warned me that he was pissed off about everything. The phenergan was making him have crazy thoughts and the air around him was irritating him. It is probably fortunate that he was exhausted because he may have ripped the curtains down otherwise. I just tried not to stimulate him any more than necessary and encouraged him to sleep until all the symptoms passed.
Unfortunately barfing up all his breakfast has calmed him down alot. He seems to be resting comfortably right now and I am hoping for a turn around soon. I actually had a moment yesterday where I wanted to sit in the corner and cry but fortunately the craziness of the day didn't allow this option and soon it passed and I was back to the regime therapy. I hope that Clem will trust me after this episode. Everything that I have coaxed into his body in the last 24 hours has come back up on him. Wearing the Nazi hat has really sucked.
Despite everything that has been going on Clem has been walking the halls constantly and sitting up in his chair. He really wants to be better. Yesterday we went back out to the little balcony over the garden and watched the rain. Clem spotted a huge hawk sitting on a railing right beside a fake blow up owl that had been duct tapped there to deter creatures. (Note to self...that doesn't work!!!) We were amazed at the beautiful creature and spent a good ten minutes just watching it hoping that it would fly. Turning to come inside I could see that this had renewed him and given him the extra energy he needed to do a few more laps down the long claustrophobic corridors.
The bright spot has been a little hard to search out over the last few days and fortunately we sense when the other one needs a positive thought and one of us jokes or plants a new thought for focus. This morning I told the nurse about Clem's trip to the North Pole. She asked him lots of questions about it and of course marveled at his adventurous spirit. For just a few minutes you could see him reliving a bit of that time and it took him away from the black hole he has found himself in lately. "I love you sweetheart thank you for taking care of me" is all that it takes for me. Fortunately he tells me this everyday and it fuels me to keep the Nazi hat firmly on my head.
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