Monday Morning, 8/27/07

I forgot to mention that a couple of really good things happened Saturday night / Sunday morning while I was at the hospital. First, Nathan's ostomy bag filled with gas a couple times. This suggests his small intestine is starting to work, and if so, is really good news. Second, he actually had a poop in his diaper. This does not mean he's digesting food, because, well, he isn't eating anything. In reality, it just means he's passed something that was already in there, pre-surgery. Nevertheless, it's still good to see that his bowel seems to be kicking into gear.

Christa spent most of Sunday with him at the hospital. He's still in the main ICU area (with the nurse's station), but they think he'll be moving into his own room sometime on Monday (maybe). He's doing well but still suffering withdrawals from the sedatives. This will last for quite some time, as we're expecting to take home medication in pill form to continue weaning him off his addiction.

One of the more difficult things to manage lately has been a diversity of information provided to us from the doctors and surgeons. Even among different physicians of the same team, we receive wildly varying recovery schedules and planned courses of treatment. One surgeon has told us that Nathan would be going home with an ostomy bag; an attending has said he would go back into surgery and be "whole" when he checks out; another attending said he'll be eating a couple weeks after he leaves; one surgeon said he'd be eating by Thanksgiving. We expect a range of opinions from the different staff members, but some of these predictions seem worlds apart.

They wheeled him down to Interventional Radiation this morning to insert a new tube near his arm. This will replace one he already has, making it easier to control his nutritional input. He should be getting back soon.