This afternoon Laetitia went to her first rehab exercise session. It was held at the Queensland Health service centre at Browns Plains, and involved a few alternating cardio and weights resistance exercises, supervised by a couple of nurses. There was one other person doing the program during her session.
I took my phone along, and have made a short (2 minute) video about it.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
They're baack!
Yep, the auras have returned.
2:30 pm Monday, 9:30 am Tuesday, 9:30 am today. Sigh.
I'll try to be grateful for small mercies - they may suck time out of my day, they may make my eyes more photosensitive and tired, they may make me tired, they may make it harder to concentrate, BUT at least I don't normally get a raging headache or need to lie in a darkened room for a day (I'd never be able to leave if that were the case).
2:30 pm Monday, 9:30 am Tuesday, 9:30 am today. Sigh.
I'll try to be grateful for small mercies - they may suck time out of my day, they may make my eyes more photosensitive and tired, they may make me tired, they may make it harder to concentrate, BUT at least I don't normally get a raging headache or need to lie in a darkened room for a day (I'd never be able to leave if that were the case).
Monday, October 17, 2011
Rehabilitation program
This afternoon Laetitia had an initial appointment for a Queensland Health cardiac rehabilitation program, run at Browns Plains.
This is a positive development, as we were not expecting to start the program until early November.
Today's appointment was mainly administrative. The nurse asked many questions about Laetitia's experience and current state of health (mental and emotional as well as physical), and then got Laetitia to do a six minute walking test, during which her blood oxygen level, heart rate and feeling of exertion were monitored every minute. She found that quite easy.
We'll be going back for an exercise session next Monday.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Day 23 post op
Time for another update.
On the vision front:
Praise and news
I had a migraine aura on Tuesday morning, none on Monday, Wednesday or Thursday and a really odd experience on Friday. I had the little blank dot that graduated to a little thin line and then it disappeared.
Now, when I wandered off to the bedroom to lie down to wait it out, Ian asked if I were ok. In a resigned voice I had replied, "Yes, I just have a migraine aura again," and very soon after that was when it disappeared. I decided to enjoy the rest on the bed anyway (and give myself opportunity to see if my brain was playing any other tricks on my vision) so I didn't get up and rejoin Ian straight away.
When I rejoined Ian 20 minutes or so later, I mentioned how weird it was that the aura had disappeared. He said, "Well, that confirms it." He then explained that when I had mentioned that I had another aura, he had prayed against the attack and commanded it to be gone in Jesus' name. So we think that there is a spiritual dimension to the aura attacks (and to a certain extent there is to any illness).
So far today I have not had any auras. :-)
Prayer requested
The downside is that my vision is still not 100%. I can't look at the computer screen for more than about an hour before I have to take a break as my vision blurs. Watching TV also can be tiresome after a while, hence I have a lot of programmes recorded that I haven't yet watched. I have problems with bright points of light (hurts the eyes - I hate the opening credits for all the Catalyst programmes we have recorded), fast moving images (my eyes can't follow them easily) and I see after images / ghost images easily, particularly words or lines on the TV.
Fortunately my vision is stable and fine for the purpose of driving - I did my first driving post surgery today to our church and back for a church 'picnic'. :-) Of course, these were short trips and longer trips will have to be judged on experience.
I also seem to be more sensitive to light generally - it takes my eyes longer to adjust to dimmer light after bright light including light reflecting off a bright white page. Some of all this may be caused by the drugs I'm on - Ian says that he's seen light sensitivity mentioned as side effects for various drugs in the past (though not necessarily my drugs).
I do actually need to be able to do some things on the computer (e.g. writing a few reports to finish my TESOL assessment; creating a digital scrapbook before month's end) so please pray that my vision will improve to allow this.
On the physical stamina front:
Praise and news
I have been doing 20-30 minute walks around my neighbourhood the past several days and can see a definite improvement in stamina and speed. Next Tuesday, I will treat myself to Chinese take-away from the shop down the road if I have done a 20-30 minute walk every day. I'm tossing up whether to give myself a grace pass if the weather turns so nasty that I can't get out of an afternoon but of course I could pace the house for 20 minutes and even over these last few days I have been able to go for a walk after the storms have passed.
Next Monday at 5pm, I will have my first appointment for my rehabilitation over at Browns Plains. We originally thought that this was conducted at the Logan Hospital which is only a few kilometres away but it has moved. My original appointment date was to be in early November so we are very thankful that it has been moved forward. Getting to classes will be interesting as the available times do not work well with Ian's schedule, however Ian's mother (Doris) may be able to provide transport to the class with Ian picking me up later.
Prayer requested
I am very much not a morning person. At the moment I tend to have breakfast after Ian has left for the day (he leaves around 7:15am) and often go back to bed, or at least the couch, after breakfast. However, on Friday I'm hoping to go into town to the quilt show at the convention centre, which means either going with Ian in the morning so he can drop me off at the train or working out which bus will get me to the train or walking there or getting a lift from someone. Although the distance is not much further than the distance I'm walking at the moment, I'm a little concerned that I will be all out of puff by the time I get into town and then want to walk around the show itself (I still need a fair bit of rest). Of course, it's a week away and many people who have had this op are back up to speed by 4 weeks post op.
On the vision front:
Praise and news
I had a migraine aura on Tuesday morning, none on Monday, Wednesday or Thursday and a really odd experience on Friday. I had the little blank dot that graduated to a little thin line and then it disappeared.
Now, when I wandered off to the bedroom to lie down to wait it out, Ian asked if I were ok. In a resigned voice I had replied, "Yes, I just have a migraine aura again," and very soon after that was when it disappeared. I decided to enjoy the rest on the bed anyway (and give myself opportunity to see if my brain was playing any other tricks on my vision) so I didn't get up and rejoin Ian straight away.
When I rejoined Ian 20 minutes or so later, I mentioned how weird it was that the aura had disappeared. He said, "Well, that confirms it." He then explained that when I had mentioned that I had another aura, he had prayed against the attack and commanded it to be gone in Jesus' name. So we think that there is a spiritual dimension to the aura attacks (and to a certain extent there is to any illness).
So far today I have not had any auras. :-)
Prayer requested
The downside is that my vision is still not 100%. I can't look at the computer screen for more than about an hour before I have to take a break as my vision blurs. Watching TV also can be tiresome after a while, hence I have a lot of programmes recorded that I haven't yet watched. I have problems with bright points of light (hurts the eyes - I hate the opening credits for all the Catalyst programmes we have recorded), fast moving images (my eyes can't follow them easily) and I see after images / ghost images easily, particularly words or lines on the TV.
Fortunately my vision is stable and fine for the purpose of driving - I did my first driving post surgery today to our church and back for a church 'picnic'. :-) Of course, these were short trips and longer trips will have to be judged on experience.
I also seem to be more sensitive to light generally - it takes my eyes longer to adjust to dimmer light after bright light including light reflecting off a bright white page. Some of all this may be caused by the drugs I'm on - Ian says that he's seen light sensitivity mentioned as side effects for various drugs in the past (though not necessarily my drugs).
I do actually need to be able to do some things on the computer (e.g. writing a few reports to finish my TESOL assessment; creating a digital scrapbook before month's end) so please pray that my vision will improve to allow this.
On the physical stamina front:
Praise and news
I have been doing 20-30 minute walks around my neighbourhood the past several days and can see a definite improvement in stamina and speed. Next Tuesday, I will treat myself to Chinese take-away from the shop down the road if I have done a 20-30 minute walk every day. I'm tossing up whether to give myself a grace pass if the weather turns so nasty that I can't get out of an afternoon but of course I could pace the house for 20 minutes and even over these last few days I have been able to go for a walk after the storms have passed.
Next Monday at 5pm, I will have my first appointment for my rehabilitation over at Browns Plains. We originally thought that this was conducted at the Logan Hospital which is only a few kilometres away but it has moved. My original appointment date was to be in early November so we are very thankful that it has been moved forward. Getting to classes will be interesting as the available times do not work well with Ian's schedule, however Ian's mother (Doris) may be able to provide transport to the class with Ian picking me up later.
Prayer requested
I am very much not a morning person. At the moment I tend to have breakfast after Ian has left for the day (he leaves around 7:15am) and often go back to bed, or at least the couch, after breakfast. However, on Friday I'm hoping to go into town to the quilt show at the convention centre, which means either going with Ian in the morning so he can drop me off at the train or working out which bus will get me to the train or walking there or getting a lift from someone. Although the distance is not much further than the distance I'm walking at the moment, I'm a little concerned that I will be all out of puff by the time I get into town and then want to walk around the show itself (I still need a fair bit of rest). Of course, it's a week away and many people who have had this op are back up to speed by 4 weeks post op.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Sucky Migraines
As a friend commented, the migraines sound 'suckiest' of all and, to a certain extent they are. I'm now up to 9 in 10 days - I had one at 5pm yesterday and one at about 11am today.
Normally I'd relish the opportunity to laze about on the couch watching TV or surf the net with the excuse that I'm recovering. Unfortunately, due to migraine auras, I'm always second guessing what I see and don't know whether to pick up a needle to do some sewing while watching TV (or even whether to watch TV at all) or work on my digital album-making or...
Boredom is a problem.
Laetitia :-)
Update as at 6:30pm - make that 10 in 10 days.
Normally I'd relish the opportunity to laze about on the couch watching TV or surf the net with the excuse that I'm recovering. Unfortunately, due to migraine auras, I'm always second guessing what I see and don't know whether to pick up a needle to do some sewing while watching TV (or even whether to watch TV at all) or work on my digital album-making or...
Boredom is a problem.
Laetitia :-)
Update as at 6:30pm - make that 10 in 10 days.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Muscle pain
Well after Laetitia's earlier post (see below), her muscle pain increased to the point where she simply could not rest, sit or move comfortably and (perhaps the bigger problem) this was causing her significant stress and anguish. So I put her in the car and took her to the local hospital (Logan Hospital, it's only 3km away). We needed some good advice about pain relief methods that wouldn't interfere with the various medicines she's already taking.
The doctor there was very helpful and gave us plenty of advice and encouragement along with a few prescriptions. We got those filled at a late-night pharmacy before returning home.
Please pray with me that Laetitia will get some relief from her discomfort and that she will be able to continue getting the rest and sleep she needs to finish healing properly. She's normally such a busy-bee with many things on the go all the time, she finds it really difficult to relax, let go, and just enjoy doing nothing much. She is finding the enforced rest and inability to do as much as she's used to quite frustrating.
The Good, the Bad and the Miserable
If I’d written this post a few days ago, it might have been titled “Good day, bad nights”. At about 4am on Wednesday morning I woke with pain in my left ribcage which we assume was due to nerve pinching from sleeping on my left side all the time. After sitting up for about half an hour, it finally eased off and I was able to go back to sleep.
Wednesday was a good day. In the morning I was able to go to my craft group, and in the afternoon (as some of you will have seen from Ian’s post) I was able to walk for twenty minutes around the neighbourhood. I wish that every day in my recovery were as good as Wednesday.
Early on Thursday morning, Ian woke with what we think was an allergic reaction ahead of the coming storm, and that kept me awake for a bit, partly due to the fact that if anything happened to him, I wouldn't be able to care for him. On Thursday I went to a funeral, and then that afternoon had a migraine aura. (For me, this means a disturbance in my vision that takes about half an hour to pass. I don’t usually get much of a headache.)
On Friday I had another migraine aura in the morning and a related headache, before we went to have lunch with Ian’s parents. Late that afternoon I started getting pains in my neck—again we think from sleeping on my left—and then later, pains under the ribcage from wind that took all night to clear.
Today (Saturday) I’ve had yet another migraine aura, which brings it up to seven in nine days. Before my operation, I normally used to get them only sporadically and hadn’t had any for several months. I would dearly love to never have a migraine aura ever again. They are frustrating. They make me miserable because I don’t know when they’re going to strike again, how bad they’re going to be or whether I can trust any of my vision. Unfortunately I don’t know what’s triggering them at the moment.
On a positive note, I have been able to go for 15-20 minute walks in the neighbourhood during the last couple of days.
Laetitia :-)
PS - Ian would love to hear from you if you are (or know someone who is) either a physiotherapist with an understanding of recovery from robotic heart surgery, or a holistic health specialist with an understanding of migraines…
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Walking the streets
Laetitia is slowly working her way up to her target of 30 minutes of walking a day. Today we went for a walk around the local streets and through a park, about 20 minutes. Since we live at the top of a hill, every route we can choose involves an uphill section at the end. Click here for a short video of part of today's walk.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Day 12
That's Day 12 post-op, as people in the hospital count it.
We went to the GP this afternoon [and yes, I had fish & chips for lunch :-) ]. My beta-blocker (to slow my heart rate) is being upped from 1/4 to 1/2 tablet twice a day. I'll be seeing my GP again in a week's time.
Tomorrow morning (Wednesday) I will have some more blood tests to see how low my iron and B12 stores are. I was told in hospital that they were 'low' but my GP has not received the results of the bloodwork done by the pathology lab in Victoria. It's a fasting test so I have to go there first thing in the morning, then back home for breakfast before I can take my Aspirin for the day (must be taken immediately after food). The Aspirin is to thin the blood; I'm on paracetamol for pain (although it's hard to tell how much I need because I don't really have pain but that could be because I've been on paracetamol since leaving the ICU).
Last night my jaw did a funny clicking crack thing unrelated to my surgery. This was on the left hand side. It's done similar things before and Ian said that he's had similar. It's a bit like having one's jaw spontaneously dislocate without actually doing so - maybe one of the tendons shifts or something.
It happened during dinner and, for a while, I had to chew on the right side of my mouth. It eased up during the evening but then it really ached this morning, which tended to give me a headache. It certainly didn't help my migraine aura experience - now at 4 in 5 days. Into the bargain, last night I dreamt that I had an aura; sigh, as if a real one waking me up isn't bad enough, now I have to dream them up?!
Apart from weird jaw movements and migraine auras, I have a groin wound with moving bruising. The groin wound is from an incision just up from where one's leg meets one's torso; it is required to get blood to flow back into the body in the bypass procedure. In and of itself it isn't too bad, however, one can get a lump of soft tissue bruising associated with it. The physiotherapist assured me that this is normal, as is the fact that the bruising can travel between layers of muscle to other areas.
Looking down on myself while standing, I look lop-sided with this lump on the right-hand-side just above the wound. The tenderness has now started to move to the left (possibly because I can only sleep on the left, not the right side, at the moment) but the lump hasn't.
In terms of height, it's right around bench height which makes it difficult to use counters. Ian has been fantastic at getting cups of water or tea and snacks in addition to regular meals for me. I'm just a bit concerned with how I'm going to go next week (on Ian's return to work) if it hasn't reduced much.
On a plus note, the right side of my chest isn't as sensitive today. :-)
Laetitia :-)
We went to the GP this afternoon [and yes, I had fish & chips for lunch :-) ]. My beta-blocker (to slow my heart rate) is being upped from 1/4 to 1/2 tablet twice a day. I'll be seeing my GP again in a week's time.
Tomorrow morning (Wednesday) I will have some more blood tests to see how low my iron and B12 stores are. I was told in hospital that they were 'low' but my GP has not received the results of the bloodwork done by the pathology lab in Victoria. It's a fasting test so I have to go there first thing in the morning, then back home for breakfast before I can take my Aspirin for the day (must be taken immediately after food). The Aspirin is to thin the blood; I'm on paracetamol for pain (although it's hard to tell how much I need because I don't really have pain but that could be because I've been on paracetamol since leaving the ICU).
Last night my jaw did a funny clicking crack thing unrelated to my surgery. This was on the left hand side. It's done similar things before and Ian said that he's had similar. It's a bit like having one's jaw spontaneously dislocate without actually doing so - maybe one of the tendons shifts or something.
It happened during dinner and, for a while, I had to chew on the right side of my mouth. It eased up during the evening but then it really ached this morning, which tended to give me a headache. It certainly didn't help my migraine aura experience - now at 4 in 5 days. Into the bargain, last night I dreamt that I had an aura; sigh, as if a real one waking me up isn't bad enough, now I have to dream them up?!
Apart from weird jaw movements and migraine auras, I have a groin wound with moving bruising. The groin wound is from an incision just up from where one's leg meets one's torso; it is required to get blood to flow back into the body in the bypass procedure. In and of itself it isn't too bad, however, one can get a lump of soft tissue bruising associated with it. The physiotherapist assured me that this is normal, as is the fact that the bruising can travel between layers of muscle to other areas.
Looking down on myself while standing, I look lop-sided with this lump on the right-hand-side just above the wound. The tenderness has now started to move to the left (possibly because I can only sleep on the left, not the right side, at the moment) but the lump hasn't.
In terms of height, it's right around bench height which makes it difficult to use counters. Ian has been fantastic at getting cups of water or tea and snacks in addition to regular meals for me. I'm just a bit concerned with how I'm going to go next week (on Ian's return to work) if it hasn't reduced much.
On a plus note, the right side of my chest isn't as sensitive today. :-)
Laetitia :-)
Monday, October 3, 2011
Progress
In your upper chest, you have pectoral muscles that run under the breast area. You can see a picture of the muscle group I'm talking about on this website (scroll down a little way).
In my surgery, an incision was made through these muscles just under my right breast. To get good contact when it was sewn back up, the muscles were bunched together a little which means that the skin pulls in odd ways and the muscles on the other side of the breast also don't behave as they normally would.
So now my right breast looks and feels deformed (the surgeon assures me that it will smooth out over time, but how much time I don't know) and the skin is very sensitive. I have to wear a close-fitting slip, a bit like a singlet, to stop random brushes of my shirt cloth against my skin from making things worse. Also, any change in temperature gives me goose-bumps on the right but not necessarily on the left. So all this means that my right breast is constantly sensitized and I ache in the right upper part of my torso.
Out of all the things for which I could ask prayer (I'll get to groin bruising and adhesive burns in another post or two) this is the thing that I feel would make the biggest difference to my everyday life.
Laetitia :-)
In my surgery, an incision was made through these muscles just under my right breast. To get good contact when it was sewn back up, the muscles were bunched together a little which means that the skin pulls in odd ways and the muscles on the other side of the breast also don't behave as they normally would.
So now my right breast looks and feels deformed (the surgeon assures me that it will smooth out over time, but how much time I don't know) and the skin is very sensitive. I have to wear a close-fitting slip, a bit like a singlet, to stop random brushes of my shirt cloth against my skin from making things worse. Also, any change in temperature gives me goose-bumps on the right but not necessarily on the left. So all this means that my right breast is constantly sensitized and I ache in the right upper part of my torso.
Out of all the things for which I could ask prayer (I'll get to groin bruising and adhesive burns in another post or two) this is the thing that I feel would make the biggest difference to my everyday life.
Laetitia :-)
Exercise
OK, so we're back in south east Queensland - we arrived home on Saturday night. It is so very nice to back in the warmth where getting out of the shower is not a real chore and, even if I'm still in track-pants during the day (our house is relatively cold), I don't feel the need to turn on the ducted air-conditioning. My sister's house is nice and all but, well, it's in Melbourne and, for the most part of our time there, the maximum temperatures were similar to the minimums that SEQ had been having.
Today we walked down to the local shops (about 700 m away) because (a) I need to get some exercise, (b) I wanted to see if it would be a viable option to walk to the GP's office tomorrow and (c) I wanted fish & chips as a treat.
I got one and a half out of three - (a) and part of (b). I certainly got in some exercise and normally it would be a viable option for going to the GP. However, we decided that maybe driving down tomorrow would be better so that my (already elevated) heart-rate isn't excessively elevated for my GP appointment.
As for (c), well, I forgot that it is Monday today and that means that many take-away places are CLOSED. Sadly, both the fish & chip shop and the Chinese food shop were closed. Maybe I'll treat myself tomorrow after seeing the GP at lunch time.
Laetitia :-)
Today we walked down to the local shops (about 700 m away) because (a) I need to get some exercise, (b) I wanted to see if it would be a viable option to walk to the GP's office tomorrow and (c) I wanted fish & chips as a treat.
I got one and a half out of three - (a) and part of (b). I certainly got in some exercise and normally it would be a viable option for going to the GP. However, we decided that maybe driving down tomorrow would be better so that my (already elevated) heart-rate isn't excessively elevated for my GP appointment.
As for (c), well, I forgot that it is Monday today and that means that many take-away places are CLOSED. Sadly, both the fish & chip shop and the Chinese food shop were closed. Maybe I'll treat myself tomorrow after seeing the GP at lunch time.
Laetitia :-)
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