Sally is finally home from hospital and is most pleased. We ordered pizza for dinner being our anniversary, they do gluten free pizza now.... her legs are much better, only needed a couple of bandage changes which took less than 1/2 hour so am rather pleased about that. Apart from the financial relief it is also vastly reducing my laundry load, not having to constantly wash towels etc. She is currently spending most of her time sleeping, never slept much in the hospital. Also still feeling weak, so still need help getting up and going to the loo.

After some hiccups with Silver Chains Sally is finally scheduled to come home tomorrow (Friday). The problem Silver Chains were having was with the bathing arrangements. Our shower recess is tiny and with those sliding shower doors Sally simply could not get in and out of the shower due to the swellings, and also could not stand long enough to take a shower. So for the past 12 months Silver Chains have been coming to give her a manual bathe in the kitchen area with a basin and towels. And well to put it bluntly but truthfully, Silver Chains were too lazy to accommodate this arrangement so were wanting to drop her. Sally would have been home today but for Silver Chains who at first refused to agree to her care. It was only after some intense lobbying from the hospital that they finally agreed to keep Sally on their books, so will start on Monday with someone inspecting the bathroom facilities at our house.

Anyway I was able to get a good look at her sores as she was coming out of the loo at the hospital this evening and am happy to say that they are all but gone with only a few minor patches. So it seems that our bandages expenditure will be much reduced. Of course there's that wound on her leg to attend to, hence is why the hospital insisted on home nurse care such as Silver Chains so to continue to dress the wound and keep a check on it. The wound is reportedly healing nicely but still has a bit to go yet. The worst of it is over, so just need to keep tabs on it which is what the home nurse is for.

Nevertheless i am still a bit apprehensive even though things seems to be better. I suppose I just have to wait and see how things pans out once she is home. She will try the shower over the weekend. She has lost weight so should be able to get in and out of the shower, the only question remains as to if she can remain standing for long enough. The shower is too small for a chair or stool.

The test results did not find any nasties so Sally is now cleared to come home to continue her recovery. Dependant upon how soon they can arrange for Silver Chains to resume the home care she could be home as soon as tomorrow. I must admit I am rather apprehensive about the prospect of her coming home so soon. The hospital insists on her legs being washed daily but Silver Chains are certainly not noted for their enthusiasm of service, trying to skimp which ever way they can and provide only the bare minimum that they can get away with. As for me there is a reason why I studied Physics rather than Medical Science, the least of all, Nursing. I am simply not cut out to be a nurse or a high level carer. I am like Sheldon from the Big Bang Theory TV show, strictly Physicist and definitely not people person, I cringe at the sight of one's body waste products, not much better when it comes to blood although I quite like the sight of my own blood, just not hers!!! It has what been stressing me out for the past 12 months, and it's stressing me that I am being thrown back into it. The stress most of all are those sores and the prospect of needing to order bandages again. The choice is, order bandages OR pay the electricity bill, I cannot do both, the budget simply does not allow it. The govt as usual trying to shirk their responsibilities due to the budget bottom line and pushing the burden back onto us long suffering citizens - "peasants" being a more accurate term!!

However there are some promising signs. The sores are clearing up and it would seem that I could get away with using significantly less bandages. She has been using the Essential Oils. It is a matter of how far my budget can stretch to accommodate bandages and pay the electricity bill before disconnection. I certainly could not do it on the previous level of bandage expenditure, it will have to be significantly less if to have any chance of meeting the necessary bill payments. Emotionally she feels better, her ward mate went home today but apparently they swapped contact details, it looks like she found a new friend in her, someone else to bitch at aside from me!! LOL!!

I guess we just have to wait and see how it all pans out.....

Sally seemed much happier this evening when i came in to see her, she had befriended one of her ward mate, or she befriended Sally, probably a bit of both, they get on very well together, always chatting to each other, and seem to have a lot in common including the same Silver Chains home nurse!!

They had taken the sample and is now awaiting results, possibly by tomorrow, then will probably know whether she will soon be coming home or needs further tests and treatments. I am somewhat relieved to see that her sores are finally starting to clear, indeed the sores on her sides are about 90% cleared. It's hard to say whether it is the continuing treatments at the hospital or the Essential Oils, I suppose it is a bit of both. However I am hoping they will keep her in until the sores clears completely. I have a huge electricity bill to pay and the only way it can be paid is if i don't have to outlay any more money on bandages etc. If they send her home and I need to  start ordering bandages again, quite simply the electricity bill will not be paid, and in spite of the extension that they granted me, for the first time in my life we will have our electricity cut off. This has never happened before, not even in my childhood at the public housing estate when mother was on a pension, we were in poverty and had to make do without a lot of things other kids took for granted but she always managed to pay her household bills, we never had any utilities cut off. Anyway i suppose we will just have to wait and see how things pans out, and hope they keep her in long enough for the sores to clear completely so won't have to spend any more money on bandages when she comes home.

The test results are in and things not quite so rosy as first thought. Sally is still losing blood "somewhere" and still not quite sure where it is all disappearing to. Maybe a black hole or a vortex where the blood is disappearing into a parallel universe! lol!..... nah but seriously, and potentially very seriously, they needing to figure out where the blood is going to. So next step is a fecal sample, that will be the next time she goes to the loo for a No.2. And well we all know what she is being tested for in the fecal sample. Very few docs dare to say so, but we all know reality, the reality of the situation - the dreaded "C" word and we're not talking about Vitamin C. It is at least a reasonably likely reason for the loss of blood, by no means the only reason, but a betting man would be willing to place money on it. Anyway as it pans out it seems she will be in hospital for a little while yet.

As for me i am back at work tomorrow - Tuesday - can't say i am particularly looking forward to it but the rent and the bills has to be paid, and since I haven't won Lotto yet, then going back to work is the only means available for me for such living expenses to be paid.

Well i did say there will be no more updates on Sally until Monday when they said the test results would be in. This perhaps should have read, the last of the test results will be in Monday but some will be in beforehand. This is what had happened. Some of the results were in today, it seems that her kidneys are all hunky doree, no problems there. The wound on her leg seems to be healing up nicely, its now about 1/3 of the depth. So depending on the rest of the test results, they say Sally could be home by sometimes next week. Her strength is returning, and is able to walk more, they took her off the catheter meaning she has to go to the loo now, they figure she is now strong enough to do so though still needs help getting back into bed.  I was kinda hoping they would be dealing with the sores on her legs and hips before they send her home, but i guess their reasoning could be that once these other issues are dealt with then the sores would soon heal, and that could be just as well accomplished at home. However it will mean more bandage changing each night and more money on bandages for a while yet, however long it will be. I will have to extend my loan hence go deeper into debt as this will be the only way i will be able to meet my bill payments especially the electricity bill if i also have to start spending money on bandages again. I think it is another couple of weeks before the six months of repaying the loan is up, the whole term of the loan being 12 months, and i have a perfect repayment record, so i should be able to extend the loan. The hospital doc have allowed her to continue with the Essential Oils treatments in the hospital, and her sores are slowly clearing but at the current rate it will take well beyond the next week before those sores are gone completely. Anyway we won't know exactly when Sally will be home until Monday when the rest of the results will be in. I'm back at work Tuesday but will have to take a day of work the day she comes home.

Latest update on Sally..... the results of the blood tests from yesterday won't be known until Monday, so this will probably be my last update until Monday unless there are drastic developments over the weekend. Not much else to say really until then.... she is doing reasonably ok at this time........

When i came in this evening to see Sally she was on another blood transfusion, i think this was her 3rd or 4th unit and she was due for another one later that night. She is that anemic, her body it seems is just not producing the blood or proteins it needs, she has also have to had protein drips. They are still trying to figure out why. She have had blood tests today for possibly every known condition! lol! A bit of a worry if the docs can't figure out what is wrong, they are paid to know what is wrong, even if the govt doesn't pay docs enough in the public hospital system! lol! Anyway that is pretty well it for today..... looks like Sally will be in hospital for our anniversary again lol.... just like last year.... that is next Friday on the 19th ;)

Oh what a difference a day makes. Sally is now much happier. The doc must have seen how close to insanity Sally had become and took some action to rectify this. Sally is now in a room with a TV, and in a different bed that is lower to the ground so she doesn't need a hoist. She can now get in and out of bed with the help of just two people mainly to shift her legs. Furthermore she is encouraged to spend part of the day sitting in the recliner chair. She is still quite weak and cannot walk far without help.

The scan results are in and she has a shrinking liver, said to be indication of hepatitis, and stones in the gall bladder. The doc did not seem too concerned with the stones but the liver is a worry. So more tests arranged to try figure out what is going on there. Also she will be tested for signs of cancer in the uterus firstly by a blood test.  Blood in the urine can be a sign of cancer in the uterus hence the tests for it. But i think it is going to be a while before they can figure out what is wrong with Sally!!

Tomorrow our electricity will be off most of the day, the utility company is carrying out maintenance in our street. So pointless staying home, i will be out and about all day, going for drives into the hills and doing things i haven't been able to do for the past 18 months to 2 years.

Today's update.... Sally went in for the ultrasound but is yet to learn of the results. It has been a bad day for her. She was originally shifted to a ward with a TV only to discover there are no facilities for lifting her out of the bed via a hoist so she was shifted back to the original room which has no TV. This happened near to dinner time which really got the catering company in knots and so she ended up with no meal and i needed to head out to the nearest Red Rooster to buy her some dinner. This is no surprise for the catering company, they are utter dimwits. It was always going to be a bad idea to privatise the catering. The tender process involves up to three companies and the rule is the one with the cheapest quote wins the deal regardless of level of service, or if they have minimum level of service then it is about time they raise the standards. This particular company can barely cope with normal dietary requirements, but when it comes to special needs such as needing gluten-free foods this company simply cannot cope. We have lost count the number of times they messed up on Sally's meals, either bringing her unsuitable foods, or foods that she did not order, or some other kind of mixups. They make such basic dimwit mistakes as cooking a salad!! Even I know that you do not cook a salad!! But it is the kind of dimwits this company employs, they don't know that you don't cook a salad!! The last time she was in hospital I was forever bringing her my home cooked foods due to the catering company's poor service, and it looks like i will be doing the same this time around.

Let's hope tomorrow will be a better day for her but i guess it will depend on the scan results if they indeed are available tomorrow. It is rather concerning that she won't be in a room with a TV due to lack of hoisting facilities. The last time she was in hospital she was able to go to a room with a TV and hoisting facilities so not sure what has changed since then. She will go crazy with boredom without a TV especially if she is going to be in there for a while, and she doesn't have ADHD like I do, I simply could not cope without at least a TV. Let's hope the doc will see how crazy she will be without a TV and force the issue a bit to find her a room with a TV. The nursing staff often make decisions to suit their own conveniences rather than patient welfare but the doc can override their decisions, he just have to be convinced that her mental welfare will be at stake if she doesn't have a TV.

This being the first day of the working week the hospital would be now fully staffed since Sally was admitted. The wounds specialist came to see her today, he cleaned up the wound on her leg and it was 1/2 inch deep as well as about 3 inches round. This sounds a very serious wound indeed. The testing is yet to determine whether it is gangrene, but either way, a 1/2 inch deep wound seems very drastic. In hospital is certainly the right place for her!! Tomorrow morning she is scheduled for an ultrasound of her tummy region to try figure out what is going on. She has been bleeding where a woman should not bleed when in menopause or not on a period. But also to see what is going on with the bladder infection, her urine is dark and has blood in it. So it seems something serious is going on there. Also it seems her tummy is not absorbing the nutrients from her food, which perhaps explains why she has lost so much weight in spite of spending most of her time sitting and laying in her recliner chair for the past year, she lost more than my whole body mass in weight over the past year. She is indeed slowly starving to death. She is indeed a very sick little critter, more sick than we realise. The ultrasound tomorrow morning is expected to be a telling point.
 

Oh i was so exhausted after coming home from the hospital last night that i went straight to bed for a nap after i had dinner, i tried to get up a bit later to get online but i was so weak as a kitten myself i couldn't do a thing, so went to bed and slept on and off until now. i guess it is all the stress and torment of the past year catching up with me. This is the first respite I had for close to a year. Since November last year I have been changing bandages for Sally each night for between 2 and 4 hours, night after night without a break at all, and often changing them again during the day, often before I go to work thus making me late for work, and during weekends. Then having to be virtually on 24/7 call in case she needed to go to the bathroom, and especially over the last few months being so weak as a kitten that she couldn't help herself up. The Silver Chains nurses thought she was just being lazy when she calls me in to help her up while they were changing her bandages. Little did they know she was anemic. But yes after close to a year of constant 24/7 care and changing bandages, I get a few days respite, and a year of stress catches up with me and hits my body for a six!! So today I am just resting, not doing a thing, well at least as little as possible anyway. It is a Jewish high holiday today, known as Shemini Atzeret, it's Jewish for "The 8th Day", this being the 8th day of Succot, it is indeed a separate holiday attached at the end of the 7 days of Succot.

Anyway latest on Sally..... well when i came in to see her last night she was hooked up to a fluid drip and also antibiotics drip, feeding antibiotics straight into her blood stream in an effort to deal with those sores. She is so badly dehydrated that they have her on a fluid drip. The test result from the swab from her wound didn't turn up anything particularly nasty, just apparently normal bacterial infection. It seem weird since last year the diagnosis was staph infection. Go figure.... hmmmmm...... but all along she had anemia which was why those sores would not heal in spite of previous antibiotic treatments, though previously the antibiotics were orally taken, just  in pill form. This time it is being fed straight into the blood stream. Her hospital doc did approve for her to continue on with the Essential Oils treatments, which was unexpected. They usually baulk at alternative treatments especially in public hospitals, most pass them off as hocus pocus, but her doc is of Indian descent so probably more open to alternatives. Sally is still in acute care ward but is hoping to be able to find a spot in a normal ward soon so she can watch TV and not been driven batty with boredom, there are no TVs in acute care. The nurse gave her a puzzle book in an effort to stave off boredom. She is confined to bed, not being allowed to get up, she is deemed a falls risk probably due to her weakness of strength.

Sally update - me gotten home a while ago from the hospital and currently having home delivered pizza which i only do when Sally is not here. It would be downright cruel to have home delivered pizza when Sally is here, while she loves pizza she cannot have it due to her gluten intolerance, it would make her sick. However i have noticed that they now make pizza with gluten-free bases which i didn't know about and was certainly not available last year, so perhaps something worth mentioning to Sally when she comes home from hospital. Anyway, it has been a year since i last had pizza, being a year since she was last in hospital. Last year it was Pizza Hut, but in a year they it seemed shut down the shop in my area as when I went online to order it, it rather rudely informed me that my address falls outside the delivery area so i would need to pick it up. Well blow that, I ordered from Dominos instead. Pity really, Pizza hut has better side dishes but Dominos is also delicious!! ;) I always get the garlic bread though there is yet a store that does garlic bread as good as mother used to make them, no one on this planet makes garlic bread as good as mother does, one of many things i miss from mother :( nevertheless the Dominos one is pretty good.

Anyway regarding Sally..... she is in the acute care ward which is where everyone goes after they been through ER and before being assigned a ward, usually when a bed becomes available. There are no TVs in the acute care probably cos people are meant to be in there for only a short time, perhaps a day or two, but last year Sally was there for close to two weeks before finally moved to a ward with a TV. But right now she is driven crazy with boredom and she does not suffer from ADHD like i do! LOL! I could not cope in the acute care wards!!!!

Boredom aside, it seems Sally is a very sick little critter, more sick than we realised. it was indeed a good thing she went into hospital, one of those "cruel to be kind" thingie when it came to having that infection on her leg!! Firstly she is anemic and actually required blood transfusions!! She had one such transfusion already and is due for another tonight or in the morning. Then she has a bladder infection which explained why she was needing to go to the loo every 5 mins or it seemed that way when i need to help her up and help with the cleaning, etc, and getting her back into her chair - thus driving me around the bend!! Well in the hospital the nurses are paid to help her but they were being driven around the bend with her toileting needs, so they put a catheter on her which means it gives the nurses a break and Sally can have some decent sleep!! Then also she was suffering from dehydration, not drinking enough or perhaps she was going to the loo so often. As for the original reason for her admission to hospital, the infection in her leg, well they took samples and are currently having those samples tested to see what nasties are residing therein. So it seems Sally will be in hospital for a little while, until at least they can figure out what is going on with her, in particular why she is so anemic!!! But it seemed she managed to score a pretty good doc of Indian descent, he agreed to allow her to continue on with the Essential Oils treatment while in hospital. Normally alternative remedies and the medical establishment does not get on well together! The Silver Chains nurses does not like alternative or natural remedies, dismissing them as "hocus pocus".

Further updates as it comes to hand......

It's about time i updated this blog. My AWOL is due to my utter depression, utter chaos, and my sanity being sorely tested, but now Sally is in hospital so have a bit of breathing space.

Over the past week Sally had started on the 2nd phase of the Essential Oils treatment, addressing directly the staph infections on her skin - the reason why I spend $200 weekly on bandages and protection sheets to stop the substances from the sores from soiling her recliner chair. And for the first time ever the treatments began to make significant differences on the sores, many of the smaller areas clearing up completely, resulting in about a 20% reduction in bandages used. Keeping this up for a month as designed would have hopefully eliminated at least most of the sores hence hugely reducing my medical bills.

But as always a spanner in the works. Sally had knocked her leg against the chair and sported what at first seemed to be a nasty bruise about 3 inches long and an inch wide. Then the bruise turned into a giant blood blister. The nurse from Silver Chains suggested she go to the hospital to have it drained, but Sally and hospitals does not get on well together, she avoids them like the plague. Well afterall the original staph infections was gotten from Royal Perth Hospital, and was also where I had gotten the flu from last year. So if she had to go into hospital at all, RPH is a no go zone!! She would go to Charlie Gardiners if possible, not much better but at least we didn't get any diseases from that place!! Sally's issue with Charlie Gardiners was that her ward mate died just after Sally was discharged, and she blames the hospital for her death.

So I placed a bandage on the blister, and as soon as she got up to go to the loo, the bandage turned red! The blister had popped. I carefully removed the bandage, and there was indeed a break in the blister, and a reddish white pussy fluid was literally squirting out, at the most squirting six inches into the air. We went through five bath towels before the flow subsided, and it would now be a slow oozing. However Sally figured if she could get the rest of the substance out the sore would heal, so spent the next day of so waiting for nature to take its course with an occasional help of squeezing.

Then two nights ago we peeled off the bandage and what we saw alarmed us, Sally most of all. The skin on the sore disintegrated and it was all pussy underneath going quite deep into her leg and smelled of rotting flesh. It looked like gangrene may have set in. This really freaked her cos if the gangrene spread she would lose her leg. She reluctantly conceded that she needed to go to the hospital.

So we spent the next day Thursday preparing for this, mostly mentally preparing for Sally as she just did not want to go into hospital but did not relish the prospect of losing her leg to gangrene. The night before last we decided that Sally would go into hospital yesterday - Friday.

We cancelled the Silver Chains services and Sally started to pack her belongings. First we decided she would go into hospital after lunch, but by then she was tired and wanted to take a nap. So I ran my usual errands. Then when I gotten back, Sally decided she wanted to seek an opinion of a doc, and we have the Medicare home visit program from 6pm where a doc would pay us a visit for free. Fair enough I suppose as no doc had actually seen the wound, it was only a Silver Chains nurse that gave the opinion of going into hospital. Nurses does not have as many initials after their names as docs. So Sally wanted a professional opinion.

So 6pm came around, but Sally wanted dinner first before calling the doc. Fair enough, in case the doc calls the ambulance. Then I had a shower and she went to the loo. A couple of hours later I called the Medicare service and when I described the situation to the sheila on the phone, she simply said get her arse to the hospital!! She did not bother to arrange for a doc to visit us.

Now we have no choice. I phoned for the ambulance. Being not a priority call they took their time nevertheless still arrived within the hour which is most reasonable under the circumstances - the busy Friday night period!! It was a while before they loaded Sally into the vehicle, and arrived at Charlie Gardiners just before midnight with me following them.

Friday night is the worse time to visit ER of a public hospital, and i waited for over an hour in the  aptly described waiting area before finally being called to the counter where they asked me the obligatory few questions about Sally and getting Medicare details. Then it would be another half an hour before I was allowed in to see Sally.

So it was close to 2am before I was let in to see Sally, now in an ER bay though they are slightly better designed than RPH bays which has only curtains. Charlie Gardiners bays has solid walls except the front bit which has the curtain. The doc still hadn't been able to see her, and the wound had not been looked at yet. She was most uncomfortable as a result. But being Friday night it would be forever before she would see a doc since as dire as the situation seemed for Sally, it was not classed as a life threatening emergency. I was there until 4am and the doc still hadn't seen her.

So this morning I slept in until well after 9am, and well i am yet to call the hospital for the latest update but i won't do so until a bit later, just before my plan to visit her near dinner time. Hopefully she would be in a ward by then and have at least an initial diagnosis and prognosis on possible length of time in hospital. I am betting about a week if it is indeed gangrene, a day or so if it is just a bad infection, she just be sent home with antibiotics. But in my humble unlearned opinion it looked a bit more than just a bad infection. But as i say I am a Physicist not a Medical Practitioner. I may know how physically the universe works but I am a dimwit when it comes to knowing how the human body works.

Watch this space.