Trip to the Hospital

Well, we are here the hospital.  The last couple days here have been pretty eventful, but we finally have a morning where we feel like we have a break.  Caleb has been reading his Bible (finally able to focus being that he has less pain today) and we just enjoyed our hospital food quality breakfast together.  Caleb is still his optimistic self....right before we ate he made the comment, "Hey its like we are on vacation! We get our own room service, people waiting on us, and even a room with a view!"  Oh Caleb....finding the positive in everything.  He hasn't changed that much, even with pain!  I keep telling the staff that he is this nice all the time, even not on meds. 

So......Monday we ended up getting him admitted being that he daily seemed to be getting worse and worse.  The all time low was when he had 13+ hours of being in level 8-10 pain without relief.  I don't think it is possible to explain what it is like to see your tough husband moaning, hitting his head against his chair, and pulling at his hair due to such intense pain for hours upon hours.  So, all the doctors finally agreed that he needed to be admitted.

The first reason was that they planned to do an angiogram.  But in order to do it, he needed to be in a more controlled place for meds because he was unable ice his feet for 6 hours.  At that point, the most he would go was three hours. 

Well, the first thing the doctor did when we got here was take away Caleb's pain control of ice.  This had been a concern we had discussed with doctors before....if soaking his feet in ice water was setting him back.  But to that point, no doctor knew if he should stop or not.  Well, lets just say that the result was horrific when we took the ice away. They described it as when you are out in snow and then come in and put your hands under hot water...well, his pain was that times a hundred, plus the arthritic flare-up pain.  Poor guy! They gave him Ativan, Hydrocodone, and Morphine for the pain (as well as Vicatin he came in on)...and he was still shaking uncontrollably and at a level 10.  So they gave him the most potent drug diluadid.  Scary thing was 15 minutes later he was in pain again.  So, they hesitantly gave him more.  The concern is it suppresses your respiratory system and you can forget to breathe. 

Luckily, our friends Steph and Greg Williams showed up with Chipotle and extra things we would need for our stay.  They helped me keep Caleb awake for the next couple hours.  It was scary and humorous to see Caleb during this time.  He wouldn't finish thoughts, he would shovel food on his chest instead of mouth, and crack witty jokes.  I think the funniest thing is when he told us he wanted us all to have a sing-a-long! 

Finally we got him controlled, the Williams left, and my night was about to begin.  They put him on a drip that he controlled giving himself the IV dilaudid.  But since the pain wasn't manageable yet, although he finally slept, they had me waking him up every 6 minutes for over an hour to get the drugs built up in his system.   The next hour after that was awful cause the alarm started going off every 10 minutes saying his oxygen levels was in the 80s and so I would wake up him and try to get him to breathe.  He was beyond out of it.  He made no sense.

Once we got the drugs in his system, and oxygen going, I finally got to sleep from 4-6am.  Then our day of tests began.

To make a long story short(er), we are thankful his heart, arteries, and veins are all okay!  The ecocardiogram and angiogram both showed a clean bill of heath.  But that leads us to more questions as to where the vasculitis is coming from.   We have an amazing team of doctors, who we are hearing often are a renown group of people...rheumatologist, neurologists, radiologist, internal medicine, cardiologists, etc....

So for today we run more test, I am not sure what though.  And we continue to try to heal him up so he can hopefully regain some function and mobility soon.  And we definitely need continued pain management...Caleb's feet are in a constant state of being flared-up.  They say we should be here for days to come still.

My friend Crystal is coming later today to pick me up and bring me home to (finally!!) shower! Oh I can't wait!  I finally feel like he is stable enough to leave him here.  I will, of course, head back to be with him tonight. 

We cannot express how much support we are feeling right now!  The amazing amount of love and support is overwhelming! 

I will say that the most touching, encouraging, meaningful moment was on our way to admit Caleb.  He has been mentoring a guy that works for him and  who has been studying Scripture with Caleb over the course of the last few months.  He has been saying he has "commitment issues" with following Jesus, but he said he knew one day he would commit to following Jesus and want Caleb to baptise him after he could walk.  Well, this was the text Caleb got 5 minutes before being admitted...

"I'm at a point where prayer is an active part of my life...I pray for you everyday.  If it wasn't for you I would have forgot about the Lord and His love.  I'm ready to accept Jesus as my lord and savior and I ask everyday  He helps you.  You guys are the reason my hearts now open and feeling.  I can't wait until your better so we can study together and share in the Lord's love.  I needed Him in my heart and you showed me where to find Him again.  Once again thank you and I will be praying for you."

PRAISE JESUS!!!!  At a time when we needed to be reassured that He was working and with us the most, He gave us the most special and amazing gift! We have been praying for Caleb's buddy for months.  And this was so special.  So the moments when Caleb was in the most intolerable pain, I would get out his phone and read this to him. 

So, WOW, what a few days!  Glad they are over.  And we are hopeful we will get further healing and relief and answers in the days ahead.  Please, as you pray for us, thank God for what He has already done.  We are thankful and know that He is being gracious and loving to us.

And....P.S. I love Caleb so much.  It is amazing how times like this bring you so much closer.  He is one amazing man, and I am always in awe of how well he takes this.  He is blessing so many of the staff here, even in the midst of all that is going on.