Obstructed

Writing this Saturday morning:
Here I am in the hospital again, French Hospital. I’ve been here since Monday night, and now it’s Saturday morning. I have a bowel obstruction that won’t resolve. This is amazing to me, but I brought it on myself, I think.

After receiving methotrexate on June 4, I was to follow with dexamethasone for a week. I realized on Monday the 14th, as I was getting ready for my next dose of methotrexate, that I had continued the dexamethasone all along. I had been constipated since Friday, and when I mentioned this to the doctor he said I had constipated myself with the decamethasone and the vincristine.

So he sent me home to treat first the top down, with Miralax. One dose should do but use up to 4. If that does nothing, then start working from the bottom up. The Miralax did nothing, so I went and bought Fleet enemas. My body absorbed the first one no problem, nothing ever came out. The second met with similar results, very little action.

Meanwhile, mind you, I had stopped eating anything around Sunday afternoon, and was getting pretty hungry and swollen. Dana wanted to know what trips I would like to go on over summer vacation, and all I could think of was Old Faithful or maybe a gas extrusion lab. I called doc and he suggested stool softener, Colace, and that said if it didn’t would in a couple of hours, I needed to get to the ER for Xrays.

So Monday night I went into ER, very quiet there, and they took some pictures and sure enough I am obstructed. They inserted this horrible tube thing down my nose to drain anything they could, and put me in the middle bed in a room. On my left was a dementia patient, and he was screaming in pain, at times coherently. He had a 24 hour caregiver, big guy. He would then calm down and ask crazy questions, and try to leave his bed. His caregiver spoke in a loud and firm voice, and their TV blared. On my right was a man sleeping and snoring like no other. He was a hurricane, a vortex, sucking all the air in the room and expelling it with huge force. He did this for 23 hours straight, only waking to incoherently answer some question.

I had reached insanity. In the middle of the night I called the nurse and asked to be discharged, and told her the pain I was having was better resolved at home. I demanded the head nurse, and when she came she was angry, telling me I could not drain this obstruction if I left. I decided to tough it out with the promise of better digs the next day.

So the sleeper left and I took his spot, where there was a TV and I could watch the fix known as NBA complete its debacle. Right across from this room is the nurse’s station, so they put all the trouble patients in this room for easy access. I’d like to think I was there only because it was the last room. The demented man was still there, being demented, so I asked for a quiet room at the end, and that’s where I am now.

It’ 6:00 in the morning, and I had a great night sleep. There is a man in the other bed, sleeping quietly. I will be going in for another x-ray soon, to see if this obstruction is moving. I get broth, jello, juice, more juice and tea and sherbet at meals. I drink it all, bloat for a while, then that all absorbs. The last food I had was Sunday night I think. I am hungry.

Sunday afternoon, I am home. The obstruction is gone, and I feel much better, but I weigh about 152. Very weak, so I have to get back to a walking regimen, and some small weights, just like Bill says. I really feel like it has been taken out of me this time, it was just so unexpected to have to stay in the hospital another week. Oh well, life goes on.