Kicked Out... with options :)

Danny is doing much better. He has been able to eat small amounts of bland food and keep it on his stomach. Grits, chicken broth, & chicken soup have been the foods of choice so far this week at the hospital. He has been getting up and walking the hall a couple of times each day. So we are making progress.

Monday morning the doctor began weaning Danny off of one of his IV meds and changed it so he will be taking it by mouth. I think they wanted to be able to slowly wean him off of the IV meds and make the change a little at a time so that we would not be sure he is going to do well at home BUT we have friends in Alabama that had different plans.

We came home yesterday! Of course, we are excited to be home for obvious reasons. We really had no choice. The insurance company gave us a couple of options. Since he was still in need of nursing care & IV medications we could go home and I could continue to give Danny his meds through his IV along with the TPN or he could go to a skilled facility. Well, as you can imagine a nursing home was out of the question. Not only for personal reasons but also we didn’t feel the environment would be very conducive for a healthy recovery. We naturally took the option of coming home. I have to admit I have mixed feelings. Even though I am thankful to be home with the children and in the comfort of our own home, I am a little nervous about all of my nursing responsibilities. Let us not forget I am an accountant turned real estate agent…. Yeah that is pretty far from nursing so I am a very unskilled, quickly trained, stand in nurse.

My sister made me laugh yesterday. She reminded me of the statistics they share about women and all the roles they manage at home. You know the reports that show the monetary value of each role as if they were paid on a professional level. She said “Wow your portfolio just fattened… with the jobs you already have of accountant, social planner, domestic engineer, counselor, fashion consultant, transportation, lawn maintenance, chef, not to mention mother & wife and now nurse… too bad you can’t collect the pay!”. I think the fact the insurance company was “OK” with me handling this responsibility was a shock. They even offered to teach my 15 year old if I thought I would be overwhelmed. Pretty soon we will be performing surgery at home with training manuals printed from the internet! Hey, you never know!

So far I have done okay in administering the medications and the TPN was already familiar territory from before. It has not been too bad… maybe I missed my calling…. I could still go back to school. Funny huh, 38 years old and I am still considering what I want to be when I grow up. Just kidding! I am trusting the Lord… I know He has given me peace & equipped me to handle this situation. Danny is handling it pretty good too… he only asks me “what is that you are giving me?” and “what is that, is it time, are you sure?” every single time I have to do something. But in fairness to him, he did that to the hospital nurses too. I am sure we will have some fun stories to share when this is all over.

Danny has done really well since we come home. He has not vomited… YEAH! He has only eaten some potato soup but that is a great start. He was outside a lot yesterday once we came home. He sat on the back porch and slept a while in the warm sunshine. Later in the evening, he took a walk across the street to the lake (I guess he was hoping he would “see” some fish) and sat for a while on the front porch and watched Summer play with my nieces. He is definitely getting better & we are so thankful. The Lord has been so merciful & gracious to us during this time.

Danny did have a good night. He slept well after we were hooked up to the TPN and finished his last meds for the day. However, He was feeling pretty bad this morning but we have IV Phenergan we can use for times when the nausea is really strong or he vomits. Fortunately, we were able to get everything under control & he didn’t get sick. Maybe everything will all work out and the timing of our hospital eviction will be perfect so we can stay home permanently. I think we will be okay even if he gets sick. Last time at home we didn’t have a medication strong enough or that worked fast enough to get everything under control and it didn’t take long for Danny to get dehydrated. Hopefully, we are well equipped to stay ahead of the sickness so it no longer gets away from us.

We are very thankful the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter and brighter. We are on the home stretch of the race and the excitement continues to build. I am so looking forward to Danny feeling much better and being able to enjoy each & every day.

Thank you everyone for your continued prayers & encouragement!