New stuff

I'm at the hospital with Nancy awaiting an ultrasound before the endoscopic procedure. Why another ultrasound, you ask, well during the night Nancy developed a strange, painful swelling on the right side of her incision. It's black and blue and very, very painful. In Nancy's words " it hurts like hell". Morphine didn't touch it and Dalaudin only made a dent. Nobody knows for sure what it is or how it came about. Some suggestions have included a hematoma ( the best guess), infection or dehiscence. All this is complicated by the fact that she will have to lay on this lump during the ercp procedure.

Joe at work !!!!

I just found this on the hospital website...isn't he cute???? And look at his donate life pin!

Wait, wait and wait some more....

Dinner with Dr Cliff and Karen

Thursday night we also had Cliff and Karen, Joe's new employers, over for dinner. It was very nice having them over to the house and it had been awhile since we had had people over for dinner other than quick bites here and there.

They hadn't been to the house before and we all wanted to get together for a last minute pow wow before Joe gets started over there on Monday!

They are such nice people and we get along very well with them. We are all looking forward to a long and productive relationship together.

They ran a big ad in the local paper today, Sunday, welcoming Joe back to the High Desert and to the practice. We are very excited about the move and I will write more about the practice later. It will be a big change for us having Joe so close to home and we are looking forward to that as well. Joe will look forward to seeing you local friends and your pets here in town!

Hello, yes I'm still here just haven't written much.

Really enjoyed the LLU transplant centers picnic. Great to meet you and finally put faces to the names that I hear so much about.
As you probably know I'm starting work at a new hospital next week. Very excited about this, It's a great practice.
Must make plans for Nancy's birthday (June 8 th).
I really enjoy reading what Nancy writes in this blog. She is always after me to write something but she has always been more verbose and eloquent than I.
Must go now since Nancy is making Eggs Benedict for Memorial Day breakfast. Yum.

The Boys Adventure

Here are some photo's from the boys trip. The first one is sailing in St John. Look closely they are on the bow together... 2nd one, in the dining room, 3rd one is the Radiance on the left. She currently sails Alaska, Caribbean, So American, So Pacific. etc... next to her is Liberty of the Seas. The largest cruise ship afloat with her sister Freedom. Sails in the Caribbean. I love the bow lines criss crossing in front of the ships holding them tight to the dock. That was in San Juan. 4th photo is in Key West and the Southern most point in the USA. (double click on the photo to view larger)

report from the Radiance

Joe and Joey and the Radiance Gang have all been having a wonderful time. They charted a 50+ foot sailboat as a group in St Johns and really enjoyed that. Neither one had been on a REAL sailboat since we left the Caribbean so many years ago. I am so glad got to do it in the beautiful, warm blue waters....

They also rented scooters and explored Antigua, got lost a bit so I hear!

The biggest news is that they won the Quest game. Joey made his mom proud if you know what I mean...... LOL That's my son!

Tomorrow is Sea Day for them. They were going to come home this weekend and I told them to go ahead and stay for the duration. Maybe I will get something accomplished next week!

Mary or I will put something on the blog after tomorrow's events...

Immunosuppressants friend or foe

The body is amazing. It has the ability to recognize proteins that can do harm to itself. This is all good when we are concerned with incursions of bacteria, or a virus even the occasional fungi or mold. Sometimes it cannot distinguish between a foreign protein and one of its own then it can destroy itself. So what happens when we put a new liver (a huge mass of foreign substance) into a person. That persons body recognizes the liver as a foreign protein and mounts a massive attack to reject it. The white blood cell and all it's allies rally to eliminate this threat. Well... we want to keep this liver so we must suppress this natural defense mechanism but not much as to allow the bacteria and its allies to take over. What a dilemma. You thought that once the surgery was over the battle was won but now you find that it has only began. Enter the pharmacologist an the juggling act begins...just enough immunity to keep the body healthy, the new liver happy and the patient alive. This life long symbiotic relationship begins.
This is only one part of the marvelous adventure that Nancy is beginning
To think that that we ( man ) can do this is amazing to me.
Tomarrow we visit the social worker.... should be interesting.

Joe

Blogging is very new to me but I think this will be good for all of us so here goes...
Nancy looks and acts like she's feeling great. Sometimes I look at her and think that someone made a mistake... but alas the numbers don't lie. I do remember the times that she was vomiting and so sick that she would hardly get out of bed. I am afraid we will see more of those days before this is over and I'm glad that we can enjoy these " good times" now.
Well I must get back to work but now that I have tested the waters I will be blogging more.
ps; I hope this works... here goes