Painful Night .. Better Morning

Karin and I both were so exhaused last night that we were in a mental fog from about 10pm onwards. The night is pretty much a foggy blur to me. I have no idea how often we woke up. I slept next to her in a recliner (as I did the first night). This time I was facing her with my head near her feet. I recall on one occation in the night that after I woke she said that she had been poking me with her foot to wake me up.

Strangely she had more pain last night than the first night. Maybe some of the pain meds from surgery were still in her system that first night. Or maybe she was sleeping for longer stretches of time last night so not getting pain meds as often. I don't know how often we woke and don't really even remember much details of being awake, but I do recall her being in constant pain. I know yesterday I described that she has a local numbing medication via epidural to the incision area (her right side), which are delivered continously via a pump. She also has pain meds available via her IV, but these are on demand only. She has a button to press which will release a dose of the pain meds. It's limited by a machine so she cannot overdose. The first night I was making sure she woke up every hour or two to check on her pain level. Each time she was just in very mild discomfort, and pushed the button once. Since we were both very knocked out last night, I don't know how often we woke up, so her pain might have been increased just by not getting a dose of that general pain medication as often.

I just realized another difference between last night and the first night. The first night the bed was flat. During the day yesterday the head of her bed was adjusted to various angles at different times. She slept with the head of the bed still angled up at about 45 degrees. Maybe that contributed to her pain during the night. At some point during the night she was feeling uncomfortable because she had slid down to a slouched position in bed, and her and I worked together to get her scooted up to a more comfortable position.

At around 6am when Karin woke up hurting again, we both struggled to stay awake long enough to get her pain under control. The way the machine works, she can only release a dose of medication every 8 mintues. During the night we were generally so tired that we'd wake up only for a few minutes and fall asleep again before she was able to get enough medication into her system to get her pain under control. It was a really struggle to stay awake at 6 this morning, but we managed to do it and get her pain under control in about 30 minutes.

When breakfast arrived, Karin was actually starting to feel hungry for the first time since surgery, which is a good sign of improving. :-) Yesterday she only had a few spoonfuls of jello and broth and icees that I fed her. Today she was able to feed herself! :-) She was able to do this because she was able to be confortable with the bed proping her all the way into a sitting possition and her right shoulder (which was somehow injured from surgery) is feeling better today, so I wheeled a table over her legs and she could use a spoon in her right hand. She definitely ate more at breakfast than all 3 meals of yesterday combined, though it still was not a lot. She ate some jello and some beaf broth and drank a cup of apple juice and half an icee. She didn't have any nausea from eating at all.

During breakfast I opened cards that had been brought from the house yesterday and she was able to sit up in bed and right them herself, feeling very good.

Then her dad showed up with a pumpkin latte and muffin for me for breakfast! I didn't have a breakfast plan and was very appreciative of being taken care of myself while taking care of my Sweetie. Dad stayed for a little bit and they are taking the boys to church this morning. I'm staying with Karin.

It's 10 now and Karin is still feeling good and watching a little TV. She's feeling well enough that we've discovered what someone warned us about, that laugher after a surgery like this is not a good thing - it hurts.

We're not sure when she'll be ready for visitors yet. She will be forced out of bed again today at least once (I'm guessing maybe twice), and that could be tramatic.