Fine tuning

We continue to fine tune Roger's pain meds.  I am pretty sure I am on the most wanted (hated) posters of the nurses and doctors here.  I continue to challenge what they are doing.  Today they wanted to increase both the base line continuous drip dosage and the on-demand dosage of Roger's pain meds.  And, they wanted to jump the dosage a large amount.  I am pretty sure Roger would have been totally zonked all day from it.  He verbalized he did NOT want that and vocalized his preference.  Additionally I made the request that the doctor and nurse practitioner explore Roger's viability (right word?) for this epidural kinda thing.  Again, I got the long eye like "who are you to make these requests?"  The doctor in particular seemed to have a little bit of a snit.  Oh well.  Too bad.  I finally started saying, "look, maybe with some patients around here being comatose is ok but Roger wants to be active and cognizant and aware of what is going on.  Yes, he wants the pain controlled as do I but we think we can get there without his eyes being rolled in the back of his head has he is passed out from drugs".  You can probably tell I was in a little bit of a snit myself. 

We had a parade of medical workers coming in and out.  Nurses, nurse practitioner, doctor, floor nurse supervisor, social worker, home discharge liaison, etc etc etc.  Literally, a parade.  Had lots of good visitors too but the combination of visitors and parade of medical people has left Roger pooped.  He is now snoring away merrily across the room from me. 

Tomorrow holds more medicine tweaking. We thought maybe we might be going home.  Now it sounds like Monday.  I'm itching to "break" him out of here.  Pretty as the facility may be....I want to get him home.  Having said that I know we need to make sure he is comfortable going home both with pain management and his ability to move around.  Fortunately he and I are working together to get him out of bed to go to the bathroom, straighten his bed, etc.  Kinda acts as a reassurance we can do this ourselves without the need of additional assistance at this point.  

I'm hoping his pain is under control enough that we can get him into their hydrotherapy tub here.  I think a bath would genuinely help with his achy muscles and bones.  A bath has always historically helped make him feel better.  So, we'll see. 

As usual, I'm signing off.  Gotta grab sleep when I can.  Last night he slept from 11:00-ish through 4:00 and then fell back asleep until the nurse came in around 5:00 then fell back asleep until 8:00.  wow, almost normal sleep. 

Take care, a & r