I'm only sharing one picture today. Joe's had several visitors over the last 3 days, but this picture is very telling. Joe is using the bi-pap device more and more, and interacting less. The last 2 days, he's been very nauseous. We went from 1 nausea med to another. The latter helped more, but still not feeling well. Joe's voice now is mostly a whisper. He does have a voice that comes and goes and he gets frustrated when he tries to talk and not much comes out. His anxiety is pretty high, so he's asking for more meds.
Monday:
Our day shifter today was Becca! Joe hasn't slept well in the last few days due to nausea. When he does eat breakfast, it's either 1 soft boiled egg or very small cup of Life cereal, some jello or tapioca. Then, its more meds and back to sleep. He's coughing more often. His lungs are completely clear, it's only attaching to his voice box and rattles. He doesn't have the strength to cough it up. And, it's not up high enough to have it sunctioned out. We've been trying Robitussin, and it calms the cough. The nebulizer (with albuterol) treatments works very well. It seems to stop his cough completely. But, it does wear him out.
Our friend, Laura R. (from church) texted and offered to bring a few grocery items over in the morning. When she came by, Joe was sleeping so she didn't stay. The rest of the morning and afternoon was pretty quiet.
Later in the day, our friend Regina (from work) brought Joe some fresh squeezed OJ and "heavenly hash". Unfortunately, Joe couldn't enjoy any of it....nauseous again. UGH! Joe's sister, Jane, came by to visit and stopped up the street to bring back a 2-liter of room temperature 7-Up for the sour stomach. Thank you!
Tuesday: Our day shifter today was Vicki Y. (our hair stylist). She helped me quite a bit with laundry, and general cleaning. I appreciate it very much! It was a very quiet day and night. It's the first time that Joe had absolutely no visitors.
Wednesday:
Our day shifter today was Cathy M. (from church). It was a much busier day all the way around. Joe had another coughing episode that required a breathing treatment. Then, he slept much of the day.
Later in the afternoon, our friends Pat (Elder Class of '79) and his wife, Lynn, stopped by to visit Joe and brought us a dinner. Thank you! Several other friends made return visits to see Joe including, Dave B. (Elder Class of '79), Mike C. (Elder Class of '76), Steve C. (Elder Class of '78) who also brought a few 12 packs of soft drinks, my sister Jenny and her son, Erik, who brought 2 boxes of Life cereal.
Jane, Jeff and Stephanie all stopped by. Jeff tried to rig something for Joe to allow him to get our friend, Pat's attention when he awakens during the night. With the oxygen concentrator on, and the noise it makes, its hard for Joe to make enough sound, while wearing the bi-pap, to awaken Pat who sleeps on the couch next to him. Joe has minimal use of his hands/fingers, but we tried to use a wireless door bell under his hand. He doesn't have the strength to depress the button. We also tried putting the same control on his bi-pap mask strap so he could push his head against the button, but that wasn't comfortable. Jeff ended up using a sleigh bell strap with a string coming from Joe's bi-pap mask and draped over the pillow behind him and balanced on the edge of the bed. When he wakes up, Joe pulls his chin forward, which pulls the bell strap forward. It falls over the edge of the bed to make a loud jingle sound. Success!
This is the last time that I will allow myself to get 3 days behind on the blog updates. It's too tough trying to remember everything. My apologies, if I did forget. As always, thank you for your continued support of our family.
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