4/28 B-Day events

Happpy Birthday got diluted with confused and grumpy.....seems quite reasonable really, when you consider spending your 59th birthday in the cardiac ward with 25 staples across your stomach and still attached with tubes to constant beepers. Birthday meals started with the nurses bringing him a birthday cupcake....which his family was instrusted to eat and not share with him. His first liquid meal- appropriately .. Italian lemon ice, broth, jello, juice and popcicles. It is amazing to think of his body receiving anything one week after being replumbed. Modern medicine at work. Still, it took me all afternoon to figure out what was off. Jim's irritability became more understandable when I realized the morphine drip had been stopped @ 10am and when asked by the nurse if he had pain he shrugged it off (his pain tolerence is very high). As the day progressed he was waring thin from discomfort. He did'nt realizing he needed to ask for meds. He got drugs and is resting much more comfortably.......now I am envious thinking I could use the same of the same.

Goodnight,
Kaye

Pre Birthday

The mood of the day is 'real food'....followed by real results. With the flow of 'all bodily fuctions' comes the reward of jello and juice to do a test run of the system. So the B-Day cake will still be in his dreams but there are hints of discharge Sunday or Monday if all works (flows) well. :) :)
He is not ready to take over these posting but wants me to extend to everyone his appreciation for your support, prayers and attention. I gave his a big kiss from all of you tonight....this was a good one....tube free and shaved...WOW !

Wednesday - "Movin on Down"

It has been the best day of 6..... Jim has been moved from ICU down one floor to 'cardiac care'..... this IS an improvement...huge. He is alert....a little grouchy...... to be expected now that he is aware of all that is happening to him. He had big smiles for Owen and Matthew's visit later this afternoon, Owen and Matt were guarded at first.....he doesn't quite look the same....maybe it is the goatee :). So when asked what he would like for his birthday on Friday.....he paused, seriously thinking....looking at me (the health food troll) and said "chocolate cake with bananas and whip cream filling". Well we all know that this will not be his first food after a week...but nice idea. Amy asked if a picture of a cake would do......he disguestedly agreed. So I am looking for a large paper chocolate cake (that will hold 59 candles) for his wall.

I hope to sign off and pass the torch tomorrow to Jim for his first post.

Keep up the good thoughts and prayers.....they have made a difference...look at the results.
Again, I must express my/our appreciation for support, prayers, and advice we can now move forward to the next phase.
Love Kaye

American Idol

"Mr. Dal Bon has requested to watch American Idol tonight at 8:00pm on Fox". This was on the dry erase board when I visited this evening. Very funny. Thanks to Ali for mentioning to Jim that AI was going to be on tonight. Jim is going on his 5th night in the ICU, but happy to report that there were no major incidents today. At ~7:30am, Kaye received a nice surprise phone call from the patient himself. He was wondering when she was coming to visit. Given the "sleepy" state he is in currently, being able to ask to make a call was a great feat. The rest of the day he continued to sleep and sleep some more. He does have one less tube than yesterday. Dr. Fitzpatrick stopped by around 5:00pm to give us the latest. Another tube may be removed tonight (he has many) and his stomach drainage tube may come out tomorrow when his bowel functions become active again...sorry had to explain. When this tube comes out, he may be able to eat some food...yeah!! Tomorrow may be the last full day in the ICU. Will continue to update tomorrow.

Seacrest out...

Jeff

Monday 4/24

Another eventful day. No fever! Great news. All was looking much better until pains started in his left arm radiating to his chest. More test and blood work resulted in a trip to the 'cath lab' to insert two new stynts in his heart to open blockages. One replaced a 1996 stynt that had scare tissue creating a blockage (typical of older stynts). It was also discovered he needs another stynt on the left side of his heart but they will hold until he recovers further from this surgery.
His color is great, and I am quite sure he is content being 'out of it'......maybe not so when he awakes to find that we shaved him... leaving him with a goatee. We all had a good laugh but must wait for his reaction.
More later,
Kaye

Sunday's Update

There is not much change today. His pain is controled but the fever is persistant so he will remain in ICU. We are hoping for more improvement tomorrow. He has minutes of altertness and fades in and out of sleep. I will remind him later of his many comments...today's made me really laugh. He asked me to bring a bar of soap in for him because the nurses soap is too oiley. Of course I agreed.
Kaye

Saturday Update

Late yes, but here with a favorable update. It was a long day for Jim, ups & downs with a fever, jaundice and signs of infection. ICU Nurse Ann is incredible... providing Jim all day, minute by minute with meticuleous care. Tonight he is resting comfortably, fever is lower and with a good night there is talk of release tomorrow to a regular room. Through it all he as provided humor and grit.... and an occassional request for "juice"... which use to mean wine but has been reduced to a water swab.

Thank you all for your love, good thoughts and prayers.

Love Kaye

Quick Visit

Around 8:15pm, Kaye and I were allowed to briefly visit the Commish in the recovery room. He was slightly awake when we arrived, and we were able to talk to him for a little while. He mentioned that he felt cold and wanted to have his back scratched. He then asked to see his nurse because of some pains on his right side. Before we could get the nurse, he went to sleep for a few minutes. I told Kaye that the doctor forgot to fix one thing...his snoring! :) I think the pain was because the Sharks lost their opening playoff game and the Giants lost in the 9th inning again making for a great sports night for his home teams.

To cap off the evening, his nurse said he would be moving to the ICU within the hour which was good to hear.

We will update everyone again tomorrow afternoon or evening.

Jeff (temporary blogger for the commish)

Out of Surgery

Good Evening,

Around 7:15pm, Dr. Bold came by the waiting area to inform us that Jim (Dad/Commish/Overall great guy) was out of surgery. It lasted almost 10 hours, 2-3 hours longer than planned (see below).

The first part of the surgery was spent removing his gall bladder. It was revealed that the GB was "very inflammed and infected" so getting it out took longer that expected. The doctor said this was the source for ALL of Jim's abdominal discomforts.

Once the unhealthy gall bladder was removed, the doctor was able to check the progression of the cancer first hand vs. the MRI and gave the OK to proceed with the rest of the surgery. The mass was removed. This included several suspect lymph nodes around the pancreas that were was not detectable on the MRI. This was a little alarming to us since the MRI showed one suspect lymph node. Dr. Bold was confident that he removed all areas of concern around the pancreas.

Jim is now in the recovery room and the doctor said family could see him briefly in the next hour or two.

Thanks for all your continued thoughts and prayers.

Until the next update...

Jeff (with Kaye and Amy nearby)

My First Blog

This is very new to me. Yeah, right...the guy who has worked with computers for the last 35 years. Well, as I've always said, mainframes and minis are not PCs. Enough about that.

The blog is really a way to keep all interested partiies aware of the latest medical news about me. This Friday (April 21), I will be operated on for cancer. In additional to removing the tumor, I will lose my gall bladder, a piece of my stomach, all things related to bile ducts, a piece of my pancreas, a piece of my small intestine (including my duodenum). I think that's all (that's more than enough).

The oncologist performing the surgery (Dr. Richard Bold) has been fantastic. Kaye and I both think he's top notch. He comes very highly recommended in the UCD system and we would agree.

The hospital stay will be 9-10 days followed by some period of time (4-6 weeks) home. Since I can actually work from home, I'm hoping to make that number even smaller.

All our friends, relatives, and workmates have been tremendous. It humbles one to think how many people are "out there" ready to support.

I want to initially thank my brother-in-law, Gary, for suggesting using a blog to keep everyone posted while beating away cancer (which he is in the process of).