One step forward, three steps back

I can't even begin to express how disappointing and frustrating today has been.  It's definitely been the most trying day of this little adventure so far.  David was supposed to be moved to rehab today but he woke up with abdominal pain.  Yesterday he had some pain as well and I teased him that he overdid it during physical therapy but the pain was soreness and not sharp pain.  Today it hurt in a band around his whole body across his ribs but more sharp near the left side so the Drs thought it was his stomach and to him that’s what it could have been because everything hurt so much he couldn’t really tell.
Fast forward through a very painful (12 on a scale of 1-10) day, a couple of near anxiety attacks from the intensity of the pain, 3 doses of morphine, nausea meds, valium, advil, ice packs and heating pads and I FINALLY convinced the physical therapist to consider that he pulled a muscle and the sharpness was from when the muscles were spasming.  Apparently he went for that explanation and so did the Docs when he mentioned it to them.  Ahhhh the heavens open up and the light shines down.  I’d been saying it all day and they finally listened.  Apparently they gave him some muscle relaxers and he’s doing much better now.  I felt terrible that I had to leave early to take care of the aforementioned FedEx drama.  At least that’s out of the way.

Needless to say when the rehab doc found out he got morphine he put the kibosh on the move so that was a total let down.  They like them to be not in pain when they get there, go figure.  Better that he not be moved than have him be moved and then moved back but that’s very little consolation right now.  I also realized that the Dr who supervises the rehab place is the step-uncle of a girlfriend I've been friends with since kindergarten.  Small world.

So then we got news that they were going to start treatment tomorrow!  SO EXCITING!  Then they called back and said the dr would rather wait until Monday so he can do 5 days in a row instead of 1 day then wait a weekend then start again.  That makes sense but why get our hopes up?!  GRRRR  Lots of frustration. Then they mentioned that they don't always move people to rehab on fridays or on weekends so he could well still be at the hospital until monday.  More fantastic!  Monday will be 2 weeks.  2 weeks at the hospital is a long long... long... time.  So many disappointments.  Har har... dis... appointments... heh.  Yeah... I need sleep...  sleep helps me not overuse ellipses.

Oh, and to mark the fantastic start to this wonderful day I noticed that the tank on the toilet in the master bath has a craze line and was slowly leaking all over the floor.  Great!  I turned off the water and flushed the toilet and left for the hospital.  I grabbed some marine epoxy that should take care of the problem temporarily until I have a little more mental capacity to deal with replacing it.  Plus if there is a kind that might be better to have for when Dave comes home that would be a good excuse to make that change. 

We’re still trying to look towards rehab where he can get stronger and come home but it’s hard to see past the end of the day.  Especially on days like today.  It’s so hard to see him in that much pain and not be able to do anything but hold his hand or in this case dig my fist into his back which seemed to be the only thing that eased the pressure… hence why I thought it was a muscle problem.  He kept apologizing but I was just relieved that we found something that helped.  He updated me tonight and said the nurses are keeping a good close watch on him and bringing him warm compresses for his muscles and taking good care of him.  That makes it easier for me to leave when I have to, and sometimes I do have to.

Owen spent the afternoon with family but I know he’d like to be at home more.  We’ve been home long enough to eat dinner, visit a bit or watch part of a movie (took 3 days to watch Tron:Legacy, unacceptable!)  and then it’s bed time.  That’s not very conducive to quality time or rest or getting things done.   As a random aside: at school every day they learn about and taste a different food item (fruits and vegis mostly) and yesterday at school they had shitake mushrooms.  Apparently most of the kids didn’t like them so Owen took home a few extras (with permission) and we made stroganoff for dinner.  A quick, easy and cheap skid row stroganoff we used to have occasionally when I was a kid but we tossed the shitakes in there.  High class skid row.