Time warp

     

What Ruth gets to look at from her bed.

  You can glimpse her sleeping in the TV reflection.

  

  I know a few days have gone by since my last post.  Ruth remains out of the intensive care and is no longer needing oxygen.  That's the good news.  The bad is that her kidney failed and dialysis was started yesterday.  For the last 3-4 days, she has been sleeping, and when not sleeping, she has been confused and mostly staring blankly - there's that expression, "The lights are on but nobody is home."  We use the term "encephalopathic" in medicine, and I've been on the doctor side of it.  It's definitely hard being on the family member side of it.  No one has had meaningful conversation with Ruth in a few days.  She hasn't been awake enough to eat/drink and just throws it up anyways.  I apologize if Ruth has not answered any texts.  She is incapable of looking at or reading her phone.  She doesn't know what month or year it is or why she's here currently.  The team is hoping this is all from the kidney failing to clear toxins, and the nephrologists says it will take a week before her mind clears.  They did do an MRI last night to help rule out other causes, and it looked normal, so I feel a little more assured nothing else is going on.  She gets dialysis session #2 in an hour.  I hope to see her perk up a little afterwards.  

    Doctors are also watching her liver number closely.  They're off but have stabilized, and to do a liver biopsy at this point would probably more risk than benefit.  So they're just trending the labs and holding on some medications that have hepatic side effects.  

    Through all this, the hardest part for me is patience.  I come in everyday and Ruth is the same.  I keep hoping I'll walk in and she'll say "Hi, Roy."  So pray for patience on my end and for her family's patience.  I think Naomi is picking up on the fact Mom is not Mom.  I joke with her that you can probably ask her anything you want and she might just say yes to it.  

    The silver lining is this:  Ruth did tell me before coming in for stem cell transplant, that she'd almost choose to be sick and have time pass quickly than be healthy and bored silly.  I'll tell you that I'm pretty sure she won't remember the past 4 or 5 days, and that she'll be really surprised next week when she's more lucid that it will already be late September.  She'll just be that much closer to engraftment (the median day, by the way for bone marrow transplants, is Day +21 - that is, tomorrow). I'm ready to be done seeing her get bags of platelets and blood every day to keep her supported through this.  Pray for engraftment soon.

    In an hour, I'm outta here.  Naomi has soccer, and afterwards I'm getting together with my church small group to watch the Chapman Swifts.  If you've never done it, it's definitely a treat worth checking out.

Roy