Now, That's Not Natural

At 5:45pm last night, Jo took some pain medication - 5 days and 6 hours after surgery. At noon today, she called me to let me know she slept through the night, she had forgotten to take her pain killers and she was quitting, cold turkey! I told her that nobody would ever give her a hard time if she wanted to at least use the pain medication through the one-week point tomorrow morning. She says she can tough it out. At first, this speedy recovery thing was really cute, but now she's just showing off.

My Sacrificial Spirit...

Jo had another good day of recovery, but I don't want you to think that this hip has been a complete walk in the park. Well, yesterday, we did go for a walk in the park, but you know what I mean.

In one way, this hip has been 10 times worse than the first hip. Because Jo needs her surgical hip toward the outside of the bed, we have had to switch sides of the bed. If you have ever slept on the wrong side of the bed, you know how tough this has actually been on me. It's hard to believe how sore you can get by morning when you sleep on your "other" side.

I guess if that's the worst thing we are dealing with, we should consider ourselves pretty lucky. By the way, I've only asked Jo three times today if she thinks she is up for switching back.

It's All About Priorities

Jo got a lot of rest today, but there was also time for a Sunday morning drive with a stop by Starbucks. You'll have to go back and read the blog entries from the first hip surgery to really understand how dramatically different this one has been. For all of you out there that have been procrastinating having joint replacements, don't read any of that stuff from November. I probably embellished the entire first experience anyway. This 2nd hip is how your experience will probably be. Trust me.

I did get a call from a home health care nurse today that wanted to speak to me and find out how my mom was doing with her hip replacement. Jo and I got a good laugh out of that one. I told the lady that we don't need her to come by. Jo will be going in to see Dr. Alvarez tomorrow and they will take care of checking everything that needs to be checked.

Anna is 4 1/2 months older than she was in November and she is stronger and faster than she was back then. She is having to learn how to be gentle with mommy. She likes to hold on to the side of Jo's walker and pull to try to get mommy to walk faster. She regularly points to Mommy's "boo boo" which is covered with a huge bandaid that covers Jo's entire hip and half of her backside. By the way, at the hospital they call it a "Texas Bandaid". How appropriate.

Has Anybody Seen My Wife?

I think every new parent secretly worries that their newborn baby will accidentally be switched with another baby in the nursery and they will end up with the wrong kid. I'm not sure how it happened, but I think I brought the wrong wife home from the hospital today.

My wife supposedly had a total hip replacement 3 days ago. The woman I brought home is already walking all over the house, sometimes with her walker and sometimes not. She has unpacked and put away all her things, made herself an evening snack and put her little baby to bed. I was expecting slurred speech, a little drooling and incoherent speech for a couple of weeks.

Percocet appears to be a much better match for Jo as far as controlling her pain. I hate to count any chickens before they are hatched, but so far, so good. We'll see how the night goes.

A Day of Experimentation

If the next 12 hours goes well, Jo will be coming home by noon or so tomorrow. Today was another very good day, although not without some minor hiccups. Jo had a fever for part of the day and she had some redness around her incision. The hospital staff will just need to keep an eye on her over night.

Today was mostly about experimenting with different pain medications. Jo would like to come home with some pain medication that would allow her a little more sleep at night, even if she had to deal with a little more pain during the day. Dilaudid was the pain medication of choice last November and it did it's job, but it also came with some not so desirable side-effects - slurred speech, constant nodding off and a fair bit of nausea.

Jo did quite a bit of walking today. She made at least 2 or maybe even 2 1/2 laps around the hospital floor today. The therapists absolutely love working with her. Their normal patients are between 70 and 80, so of course, the progress is normally much slower.

A Speedy Recovery

So far Jo's progress appears to be moving along much quicker than the first hip. About 24 hours after coming out of the recovery room, Jo walked an entire lap around the hospital floor with her walker. Although the pain medication does make her sleepy, she seems much more coherent than last time.

The only thing we can come up with is that in November, she literally didn't have a leg to stand on. This time around, she has one really good hip and a significant amount of her "referred pain" went away after the first hip replacement. Then too, wouldn't a person just want to recover faster with summer coming up as compared to the first time around as we were heading into winter?

I do have to admit that I may have been a little too detailed in my documentation of the first hip surgery. I feel like there isn't anything new or funny to report...on the Jo front anyway. Now Anna is a different story. She has figured out how to get her pajamas unbuttoned and then off comes her diaper. I can deal with her wanting to take her pajamas off, but little babies need to keep their diapers on when they sleep. Tomorrow, we bring out the duct tape!

A New Right Hip

Jo went into the Operating Room at about 9am this morning and she was finished by 11:30am. She is now in her room resting. According to Dr. Kelly, everything was pretty routine. Jo did get "intrathecal morphine" today. That has something to do with the morphine going directly into her spinal cord, which from the look on Jo's face, seems to be quite effective.

Spring is in the Air...

and by noon or so, Jo will start to get some spring back in her right hip. We are headed down to Presbyterian St. Luke's for hip surgery #2. Jo has received a ton of well wishes over the past couple of days and she wants to make sure you all know how much your thoughts and prayers are appreciated. Thank you!

Happy St. Patrick's Day

3 more days and a wake-up until hip surgery #2. We have pre-game at 6am and kickoff at 8:30am. If all goes as planned, Jo will be back home from the hospital by Saturday. Meema will fly in on Monday to help hold down the fort for that first tough week. Oh, by the way...I do plan on taking a swimsuit or two to the hospital for Jo...just in case.

2 Years, 3 Months and 18 Days Later...

Main Entry: nor·mal
Pronunciation:\ˈnOr-məl\
Function: adjective
Etymology: Latin normalis, from norma
Date: circa 1696

2 a: according with, constituting, or not deviating from a norm, rule, or principle
b: conforming to a type, standard, or regular pattern

synonyms see regular
— nor·mal·i·ty \nOr-ˈma-lə-tē\ noun
— nor·mal·ly \ˈnOr-mə-lē\ adverb

For the first time in over 2 years, Jo's platelet counts today were in the "normal" range. If you look at her CBC report above, you will notice the absence of the "L" next to the Plt count that we have become so accustomed to seeing. This is probably the biggest news we have had in the entire 2+ years!

You can also see the three "L"s next to the RBC (Red Blood Cell), Hgb (Hemoglobin) and Hct (Hematocrit). These are all measurements associated with Jo's red blood cells and all three are still in the low category due to the PNH. However, keep in mind that her Platelets have always been the primary source of source of concern due to the critical level to which they dropped. At Jo's 8 week pregnancy checkup in November, 2004 her body was not producing enough platelets to support everyday life.

We've been waiting a good while now to see that little "L" disappear. There have been a couple of times that Jo's counts got close and then they backed off, dashing our hopes. Today we bask in the sweet thrill of victory!