Saturday Morning

She’s groggy this morning.  Her mouth is very dry so I start with some water first thing.  I look at her catheter bag and decide to do some math-200ml of brown pee in 24 hours is 6.7 ounces of water.  That’s only a bit more than half the liquid contained in a Tall Starbucks coffee (12 ounces).  It closely matches the amount she drinks so I believe it.

Another two ounces of juice, a few spoonfuls of yogurt and apple sauce and that’s it for breakfast.  Her morning meds go well and I include a suppository laxative.  It been a few days and I need to manage the monster.  Let’s see how it goes.

The bandage on her bedsore has come unstuck and is missing.  I’m not sure how it can be missing completely but I’m sure I’ll find it later.  I put a piece of Duoderm over the sore and it seems to stick like mad.  Duoderm looks like the thick skin you have on your feet but is sterile and works as a bandage.  I love this stuff.

I also saw a red spot on her right elbow.  Remember that she had a blister on her left elbow from leaning on the bed rail.  I don’t know why there is one on her right side since there is a big pillow to isolate her.  In any case, more Duoderm!

An hour passes and I give her a few more sips of water; there’s no gagging or barfing.  She starts up with the waving to herself thing again.  She also starts to mumble about random things.  I can’t understand most of it but there was some mention of helping her up to change her clothes.  I think.

All these are signs of agitation so I administer 0.25ml of Ativan.  I wait 20-minutes and no change.  I give her a second 0.25ml and she’s sleeping a few minutes later.

It’s now 1:00pm and I’m sitting here next to her.  I hear her stomach bubbling.  I think the monster is gathering its strength for later.