Day 163 - Nov 10, 2008

We had another great day. Kevin was actually in the chair about 11 hours today and we went to the house for a good 6 hours. We played cards again outside and then we had a nice dinner and followed it again by some tv.

I love when I come to the hospital and we have a nurse that really cares and we get him showered, lubed up, compressed and dressed by 10:30. This enables us to have a more normal day. Unfortunately, we have been having a LOT of nursing problems and to be honest, I am getting a little frustrated.

To hit a few of the points - Kev is not supposed to ever be alone, yet for the past two weeks he has been alone when I have arrived nearly every day. Some of those times he has even been given food or drink and he is absolutely not allowed to eat/drink without supervision. One time his bed was the absolute highest it could go and one of our issues is his trying to get out of bed and falling. Then we have had other people's eye meds in his room and I have to wonder how often he has been given the wrong ones. We have also had meds not even dispensed. There are just so many frustrating things going on here. And I do understand that it's probably the norm everywhere, but I have to ask - how can anyone feel comfortable leaving their loved one in this type of situation?

It's actually made my days even longer. I used to leave when he fell asleep and sometimes that was like 9:00. Those were the 12 hour days. Now I have to wait until close to midnight even if he falls asleep early because they did remove the sitter from 4-12 and I was actually ok with this when they did it. But since then, it was proven to me that Kevin knows HOW to ring the call bell - but he doesn't understand WHEN to.

Case in point - while in the middle of writing this post, Kevin threw up. I was in the hallway talking to his nurse because he was trying to go to sleep. I was out there maybe 3 minutes. So Kevin was getting ready to vomit and didn't understand to call the nurse. Luckily - I heard him moaning and rushed in. If I hadn't - where would we be? He could have choked to death on his own vomit as he is usually laying down when it happens and can't hold his head in the right position.

Grrr...I really hate to bitch about these things, but I am just so frustrated and tired of having to deal with it all.

Now see how my moods are just swinging? I started out with this nice happy post about having a great day and ended up with Kevin being severely sick and venting about nursing issues.

Calgon, take me away...

BUT - I am going to revert back to something good (can't end on a bad note, now can I?). The Steelers were kind enough to send Kevin a huge box of goodies! He received a football signed by each and every one one of the team players. He got an autographed framed photo of Troy Polamalu. A personal framed message from the owner of the team. A really nice shirt. A team photo that is framed as well and a whole bunch of other things. Here is a photo of Kev with some of it:



Pretty cool, huh? Kevin was really excited and Breezy was really jealous, lol. I wish I would have caught a pic of the guy on the left side in blue. He is actually the one responsible for all of these items arriving. He called the Steelers home office weeks ago and talked to them. He works in Prosthetics and is in charge of Kevin's helmet. Once it's made - he is planning to have it painted with the Steelers logo on it. Great guy. And the nurse in the pic is a wonderful woman too. Never had a problem with her. I keep telling her she is coming home with us when we go...