Day 2: Post-op Part 1

The first night in the hospital for Charlie was never going to be great, let's be honest. He had just had his spine cut open and was told he had to lie flat - not even a pillow.

So, is it fair to say we'd all struggle to get a good night's sleep?

Oh, and how about if someone came into your room every 2 hours to take your temperature and blood pressure? Relaxing, right?

So, not a very restful night for him. (I slept perfectly in my own dark, quiet bed with my lovely soft pillows, thanks for asking).

The focus of the day is pain management because everything seems to be ok with the surgery site. We had a visit from the surgeon and the fellow. The fellow, we learned, has only 30 days left of her fellowship and she was in Charlie's surgery. She took a lot of time to talk to us and filled in a few blanks that we had about what had happened on Thursday. I think Dr. 30 Days might be my new favorite. We also had a visit from a member of The Pain Team (I think they are part of the Marvel Universe).

All seemed to be going quite well until the middle of the afternoon. Charlie had been showing pain when he was being moved (he was allowed on his side and they want him moving every few hours) but outside of those maneuvers he seemed pretty comfortable. Until he wasn't. 

He couldn't get comfortable and was showing signs of real pain (and fear). There were orders in place for him to be given morphine in this situation so the nurse got that sorted and it worked for a little while but then he started getting upset again. This time, though, the nurse didn't have any arrows in her quiver. The morphine was only to be given in minimum intervals and we weren't even close. Given that all it had seemed we had talked about today was how there was no need for Charlie to be in pain - "there are many ways to manage this" - this was frustrating. He's in pain! Let's do some of that pain management we'd been talking about! Now!

Eventually, one of the younger doctors on the neurosurgery team picked up the phone and agreed to prescribe more of the hard stuff (Oxysomethingorother) and Charlie moved on to his side again, took a pill and he calmed down. 

With the dinner situation sorted and everyone settled down, I headed home.