what kind of pneumonia is it?

Hi journal friends.  Good friends!  If you are worried about me being up so late, don't be.  I took a six hour nap today, LOL.  Actually, it didn't start out too funny.  I was over at the hospital with John.  All the sudden I noticed i was feeling, well, impatient, trapped, like I had cabin fever.  Oh, my eyes are tearing up as I read this.  I feel like such a bad wife.  I usually stay with John till late at night.  But I was feeling stir-crazy.  That is the word that I wanted to use.  That doesn't usually happen until I have been at the hospital for two weeks or maybe a month.  So here I am, sitting next to John, feeling I need to take a break, and it is day two!  It was kind of like having cabin fever.  And I am no good for John like that either.  I get anxious and grouchy.

I told John that I didn't feel well.  Actually I was tired.  It was only two o'clock and I was exhausted.  I guess a lot of it was emotional exhaustion.  "Go back to Hope Lodge and go to bed," John said.  "But you won't have anybody here with you," I replied."  "That's OK,"  John said.  "You will be back in the morning.  What time does the next van leave?  You better hurry so you can catch it."  So I told him I loved him and ran out the door and caught the shuttle back to Hope Lodge.  Then I took a six hour nap, LOL.  Now I feel like a human.  Slightly guilty, but like a human.  But not too guilty, because I will be better for John tomorrow.

Which is a good thing.  He is going to have a bronchioscopy around noon.  By the way, his oncologist (Dr. E., the one he has right now - they rotate every two weeks) said any blood clots have been reabsorbed by the heparin.  Now they are dealing with pneumonia.  So Dr. E. called in a pulmonary specialist.  The pulmonary specialist explained the bronchoscopy.  She said that they would probably take a few snippets of John's lungs, and do a wash of them, to try to determine what type of pneumoniaJohn has.  A nurse told John that he should "pray for bacterial pneumonia.  Bacterial pneumonia we can do something about.  Fungal pneumonia is much harder." 

You know, if you read stories about stem cell transplant patients, you sometimes read about those who die from fungal pneumonia.  Usually it is from a fungal pneumonia called Aspergillosis.  Read more about it here.  One gets it from mold, such as from mold outside, or in an air conditioning vent.  At any rate, I have to try not to panic here...  Maybe it is not even the type of pneumonia he has...

Be right back, going to get something to eat, LOL.  Wow, another night person like me, somebody else has gotten up to study their schoolwork and have coffee!  BRB. 

Now I am good to go!  I have some chicken, two chocolate cookies, and a diet coke, LOL.  I'm laughing at the cookies-diet coke combo! 

So that's about it.  I was going to tell you about something else but I am going to wait till tomorrow.  I am going to see if the issue resolves itself.  I can't find something, and I think somebody here stole it.  But I want to wait to see if it turns up before I assume that.  We work as such a family here at Hope Lodge.  Everybody pitches in and helps one another.  I don't understand why somebody would do this to me.  More about this tomorrow.

Gee, I am thinking about the VIVIs now that the voting is over.  Because I think they are special, they are truly peer awards.  I am sad that I won't be able to be in the chat room this year when the VIVIs are announced.  It was so much fun last year.  The pulmonary specialist said John would be in the hospital for awhile.  This saddens me that John is so sick.  And yes, it saddens me a little that I will miss out on the VIVI announcements.  But of course I would rather John have the care he needs.  I am also saddened that I won't get to vote in the political elections tomorrow (Tuesday).  I didn't even get to research everybody who was running before John was taken to the hospital.  I should have known enough to get us absentee ballots.  It is just that John was out of the hospital three weeks and I got complacent, thinking it would be longer.  Silly me.  I hope we will be home the month of December.  I want to spend Christmas at home... 

Ok, enough rambling, I hope all is well with you all.  I am not going to be able to visit too many journals while I am here, just a hit and miss here and there.  I know you all will understand.

Love you all, hang on, Krissy :)

I forgot to mention...

I forgot to mention something last night.  To play the Monday Morning Question while I am gone, go to Val's journal, There is a Season.  Also go to her journal to play the Photo Scavenger Hunt.  Val will be hosting the games while I am here in Hershey.  Thanks for agreeing to do them again, Sissy.  You are the best!

I believe Val posts on Monday mornings, so hop on over there some time this morning, and they should be posted.

Krissy :)

PS  I am here at the hospital with John.  They are going to be doing the test soon to see if he has any clots anywhere.  I will let you all know.

blood clot or pneumonia?

It all started last night when John was telling me how much pain he was in.  And his fever was climbing.  At first I didn't realize how bad it was.  I thought his side was only hurting because he was shivering so bad (his fever was about 100 at the time, but he usually runs 97 degrees).  So I told John if we could do something about his fever his side would stop hurting.  Maybe if we got some Tylenol down or something.  It didn't work, within one hour he was 101.3.  That's when I told him I was calling Hershey.  Hershey Medical Center is a fine hospital, but they ask stem cell transplant patients to wait till their fever reaches 100.4 degrees before they call and ask if they should be admitted.  And some of the doctors there make you wait till 101 degrees.  So I waited for John to reach 101 degrees, called, and was told "bring him in".

This was pretty early in the morning.  I don't drive much because of narcolepsy ( I am guessing that is what it is, I haven't been able to have it checked yet) so I began calling around to see who might take John and me to the hospital.  At this point John is screaming in pain every few seconds.  He may kill me for telling you all that because he is a pretty tough guy.  Finally he tells me he can't take it any longer and to call an ambulance.

So I called an ambulance.  They loaded him into the back and I got in the front passenger's seat .  It was horrible.  He kept repeating over and over, "I don't know how much more of this I can take."  I didn't know what they were doing to him back there, but he told me later that they were just checking his blood pressure, etc.  And that the more he couldn't take was the pain in his side.

The ambulance took us to the nearest hospital.  They wouldn't take John to Hershey because they have to take you to a local hospital, which stablizes you, and a doctor from there writes the orders to take you to the next hospital.  So at our local hospital they took some X-Rays.  And on John's right side where his lungs are thedoctor saw a "haze".  They told John he either has pneumonia or a blood clot in his lungs.  At this point orders were signed and he was wisked away to the hospital in Hershey, where he is right now.

Oh, wow, I am pretty nervous about everything.  The doctors at Hershey Medical Center talked with me today (yes, I am up here with John.  I am staying with John at the hospital during the daytime, and at Hope Lodge nights).  They said his condition is serious, and they are not letting him eat or drink anything.  I can't imagine not even being allowed to have a sip of water!  They told me they are leaning towards believing it is a blood clot.  Right now John is on saline for fluids, heparin in case it is a blood clot (this can help clots reabsorb), and zithromax (an antibiotic).  They also told me they were going to give him blood tonight.  This really scared me because his Hgb and his HCT are soooo low and he just got blood on Wednesday.  Wow that was only four days ago.  I am glad he is not back local, because it would take them days to try to find a match for his blood.  Last two times it took two or three days.  But that is another story.

Okay, so I am rambling as usual.  I left the hospital tonight feeling horrible.  I didn't want to leave him but he said "go".  I had to take my medicine so I came back here to Hope Lodge.  My car is not here so I can't go back to the hospital and spend the night with him (I have no ride).  Believe or not there are no taxis in Hershey, LOLOLOLOL.  It is just a tourist town mostly, so people don't do taxis.  So I told him that if I went to the Lodge, and he died on me tonight, after all of this, I would be VERY upset with him.  I told him I didn't want to leave, and asked him if he was sure, and he said, "I have a good feeling about this, I won't die tonight, so go, get a good night's rest."  So I left.  And that brings me till now.  I hope this last paragraph wasn't a little to real for you.  And it may seem to have levity in it, but I was very upset when I left the hospital.  But when I came back here to the Lodge I had others who did their best to cheer me up.  Some I knew and some I didn't.  It is so good when you have others who are there for you.  They helped pull me through my fear and funk.  So tomorrow I will be back at the hospital spending time with John again.  

Okay, enough rambling.  I hope some time soon I will have something boring to right about.  And please, if you are the praying type, pray for John.  I am having a feeling this could be a rough one this time.

All my love,  Krissy