March 3, 2022

Here are some words

Photographs and memories
Christmas cards you sent to me
All that I have are these
To remember you

Memories that come at night
Take me to another time
Back to a happier day
When I called you mine

I left at about 3 yesterday, and they still hadn’t started his dialysis, but Nurse Meredith (I think this might be the first time here we’ve had the same nurse two days in a row? Oh, no, wait, I think we had Nate two days in a row, but I barely saw him, so I’m not counting him). ANYWAY, they started about 4, but Meredith says that he threw up about halfway into his dialysis yesterday – they had JUST started the tube feeds again after a day or two off of them, from the last time he threw up. This barfing is getting super old!

So today’s Doctor (I can’t remember her last name but they’ve been really good about updating MyChart so I’ll figure it out) came in to talk with me just a few minutes after I got here. She wants to get an x-ray of his belly to make sure he doesn’t have another ileus, she wants to reread over his history about anything GI has said (they’ve done ultrasounds, x-rays, and CTs), especially in regards to the clot he threw in his duodenum. She said there’s a medicine they can give him for about two days, and it stimulates the muscles of the small intestines. There are some side effects that are pretty common, uncontrolled muscle movements being the most common one. I’m fine with that if it gets his small intestine working again, becasue the more tube feeds he can have, the more nutrition he’s getting, and the more nutrition he gets the stronger he’ll get, so the faster we can get back to PT/OT, including swallowing and moving onto actual real food.

Oop, they just kicked me out for a few minutes to do that x-ray — nice. She just told me about 15 minutes ago she was going to order it. I like a doctor who moves fast!

But we sure had a good time
When we started way back when
Morning walks and bedroom talks
Oh how I loved you then

Summer skies and lullabies
Nights we couldn’t say good-bye
And of all of the things that we knew
Not a dream survived

Where was I? Nutrition and GI seem to be the plan for the day. And a four-hour dialysis, sometime today, I’m guessing late afternoon (then tomorrow, no dialysis, and they’ll evaluate the day after tomorrow when they need to start up again – I think the goal is three times a week for a while). Other than that, not much going on for him. He’s pretty sleepy. He’s opened his eyes once since I got here but I don’t think he really knew he was looking at me. So, that’s about it for today!

In other news….? I cleaned up my mailbox yesterday. Not a huge chore, but it had been bugging me for a while. Right on the corner there, we get a lot of dirt flying. And I didn’t sleep well last night… for the first time since moving the Catio, Tulip woke me up, howling about defending her territory. I thought maybe she was fighting with Newt so I ran out into the living room, and… there was a stray cat on top of the Catio! A black cat, just sitting there like… “hey, yeah, not sure how I got here, so let’s all just pretend you don’t see me, and maybe this lady cat will stop yelling at me?”. After he finally jumped off, Tulip came inside and twined around my feet, purring, making sure I knew to tell her she was a very good Guard Cat.

In retrospect, now, I wonder if that was Mama Cat who gave birth underneath my house…

I went over to Denise and Tarrant’s that night… for dinner, maybe? Do y’all remember? I have a couple of pictures of your chickens, and this sunset. Thanks for having me over, even if I can’t remember why I was there! I love you both so much!

Photographs and memories
All the love you gave to me
Somehow it just can’t be true
That’s all I’ve left of you

But we sure had a good time
When we started way back when
Morning walks and bedroom talks
Oh how I loved you then

Lyrics by Jim Croce
Photographs and Memories