Welcome And The Big Question

Welcome to the Only Child Diaries Podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Wallace. Have you ever felt like you didn't receive the how-to brochure on life? That you didn't get enough guidance about major life issues? So did I. You don't have to be an only child to feel this way. In my podcast, we'll explore some of the best ways to better navigate adulthood by doing so with humor and light. Welcome everyone to the Only Child Diaries Podcast.

The Discharge That Kept Changing

Today, I'm gonna talk about Bill's triumphant return to home. But it's not without its drama and its uh its uh its tense moments, if you will. Last weekend on Sunday, they told Bill that he could come home that day, but that didn't work out. And then the next day, Monday, they said, You're going home today. And again, that didn't work out. I had stayed home hoping that the oxygen would be delivered, but it wasn't. And then I promptly fell asleep. I was so tired. And well, Tuesday, the hospitalist doctor, who is like the internal medicine doctor who oversees the whole case, you know, they're one week on, one week off. And so it was a new doctor's week. And she told me that since it was her first day with him, she wanted to be careful, and she didn't want to discharge him that day, which didn't go over very well. I kept that to myself, hoping that things would kind of work out, but they didn't. And then I hoped that the oxygen wouldn't be delivered because he knew that he needed that. But unfortunately, it was delivered at the end of the afternoon. So, not wanting anybody else to take the hit, I told him I went in and I told him you're not going home today. Anyway, Wednesday came and they said he was going home, or he could go home, but they wanted the cardiology team to look at him one more time. Now, this week, at the beginning of the week, we found out that our nephrologist was taking some more time off, and the cardiologist was also taking more time off, which was slightly disappointing. Of course, they both have teams of people backing them up. So I was on the way up to the pharmacy to get the rest of his prescriptions when Bill called me from the hospital room to tell me that the cardiology team was there, and they went through the whole case, you know, detailing everything. And I said, Yes, I know, I know. And they said, Okay, well, did you get the results of the nuclear stress test? And I said, Yes. And they said, Oh, well, your doctor didn't put the notes in the file, and I told him what he told us. Anyway, it finally worked out. Now,

What Hospital At Home Really Means

it didn't just mean that he was coming home like you would normally come home from the hospital. They wanted to put him in this program called Hospital at Home. And they talked to me quite extensively about it the last two or three days before he came home. It's a newer program, it's been in effect for two years or so, and it's really a transition or a bridge, and it's a lot more detailed than the usual home health services that a person can get. I had no idea how much more detailed and how much more uh supportive it could be, which is a good thing. But remembering that my husband had already been in the hospital for 58 days, we're both mentally and physically exhausted. But I will say that this program has been short of nothing but miraculous and wonderful, if not exhausting. They offered to bring him home with transport. And who am I to disagree? Driving you know, an hour through traffic to get there and put him in the car and drive an hour back, and then have to worry about getting him in the house. So they let me stay home and let me just emphasize the word let because they said they were sending over some supplies, which sounded great, right? Well, this wonderful man showed up in the middle of the afternoon with literally a van full of things for our house, and I had spent most of the day trying to straighten up, put things away, clean up. I mean, remember, I'd spent most of the last two months at the hospital, and when I was home, I was doing just you know minimal work to keep things going, you know, feed myself, feed the animals, take out the trash, but there's a lot of things just strewn around. So I was working on that, and then this man showed up with uh boxes of boxes, let me not one box, but boxes of supplies, uh, a stand with shelves where they put the phone, um, a tablet with a backup battery and an internet router, right? Uh, the oxygen. Now we already had oxygen little delivered the day before to the hospital. We had a home unit and a portable unit, but they have their own oxygen that they bring. That's fine. So another oxygen unit, which if you're uh I don't know if it's gonna pick it up, but I'm in the other room, and I where I usually record, I can't record in there because that's where the oxygen machine is, and it's quite loud and it's chirping too. Uh, and then backup oxygen tanks, an IV pole, uh a bunch of supplies for blood draws and labs. I mean, all sorts of things, plus enough medication for five days. So then this nurse shows up when he arrived. She came separately, but uh the transport van brought him. I went out to greet them. They brought him in on a gurney, they got him into bed, and then the nurse started working on the medications. And I looked over, and it looked like there were 20 bottles of medications, and my head just kind of exploded. But they didn't expect me to figure out his medications. Not yet, we're not there yet. So the nurse was going over, sorting things out, making sure everything was there. Uh, she put she put them in a bag for the daily medications. There's a green bag, and there's a black bag for the extra medications. I'm not really sure exactly what the well, there's an epi pen in case he has an allergic reaction. That's I mean, that's really going above and beyond being prepared because he doesn't have really any allergies, but just in case, there's a sharp's container, they brought their own trash container. Uh it's really it's amazing. Extra cannulas for the oxygen. So they brought him in, and we were told that there would be a nurse twice a day. They could draw labs. It sounds like a great thing, right? Well, also, there's this tablet, and you can just hit the button and call a nurse 24-7, which is great. There's a scale, there's a blood pressure cuff, and an oxygen meter. And whenever you use that, it translates directly back to home base, the command center, if you will. And there's also a way, obviously, with the tablet to take a photo, and that gets translated back to home base. Um, so they can see that almost immediately. When they do the labs, there's a they send a courier here to pick it up. Uh, so the first night was, you know, I was grateful to have the help.

Tracking Everything And Home Treatments

A lot of a lot of activity. Okay, great, okay. He's in bed. This is good. Uh, but then it's, you know, we have to document what he eats. I have to document what he eats, I have to document what he drinks, how much, I have to document what he pees out. Then we have to document his blood sugars, have to document all sorts of things. He had some neuropathy foot pain the first night, so we had to get special approval for him to take one of his trauma dolls. Um, so it was still a little bit like being in the hospital, still a lot of questions. But overall, I would say that I uh have been incredibly grateful uh for the service because I was a little nervous about the transition to home. He's got a lot of things going on this time, and they're concerned about his weight because they want to make sure he's not retaining fluid. They're checking his lungs to make sure there's no new congestion. And then they were concerned at one point. So they sent, yes, an x-ray machine and they did a chest x-ray. Now, this is another comical moment because here ding dong, the man comes at the door with the chest x-ray. It's on wheels, it comes in, it's quite large. And then he says that he needs a three-prong plug, you know, outlet, and our house is just few and far between. I had already struggled to find an outlet for that oxygen machine, which we did. We need to upgrade many of the outlets in our house. Some of them are three-prong, but most of them are not. Uh, we had to maneuver, and that's so Bill had to get out of bed because the hallways and the doorways, they're not ADA compliant, they're very small. We did that. Um, they've had, they've been able to do IV LASICs because they were a little worried that he had too much congestion in his lungs. We also get on the tablet by video with the doctor every day. And we're able to review the labs. It's really been an incredibly, I mean, I'm just incredibly grateful. It's been an incredible experience. They're very helpful. Uh, yesterday they said they're sending a nebulizer so that he could have breathing treatments. And I said, okay, well, when are they coming? Because I need to go out and get an extra power strip because we're running out of places to plug things in. Because they also have a help button that's plugged in next to the bed, and so that we've kind of maxed out on outlets in the bedroom. Uh, and he has a watch, too, that he that he uh wears, and he can press that and get immediate assistance. It's like a life alert thing or something, I guess. Uh, and so anyway, I told this gal, I said, you know, when are they coming to deliver the nebulizer? Because I want to go out and buy a power strip. And she said, Oh, I can send that to you. And I was like, wait, wow, really? I mean, it's very helpful. It's very comforting to me as a spouse. I will say that the first day, the first full day, especially, was exhausting. Having people come and go and come and go and ding-dong, and you think they say, Oh, it's gonna be a quick visit. Well, a quick visit is an hour. And I understand that in the scope of things, an hour is not very long, but it's an hour of questions and catching up, and is he doing this? And is this happening, and how much is this? And and it's been really it's been kind of exhausting. So

The Hidden Cost For Caregivers

um when he was at the hospital, that all happened somewhere else. And I could rest quietly here, the cat could rest quietly here, the dog could rest quietly here. When they come, and when all these people come, the doorbell drives the dog crazy. And when they're here, I've tried to keep her inside, but it's too much for her. She's bouncing all over the place, so I have to put her out in the on the patio, the back patio. Um I have a gate, so she can't go down below. She's just where I can see her because I'm always worried about coyotes, but she's out there for an hour, hour and a half, and sometimes it gets dark, and she's like, Oh, wow, you know, and then the cat has unfortunately thrown up more because he gets upset. So I've had to medicate him. I just started medicating him every day, uh, because somebody's always coming and going, and some of the people have a lot of perfume on, which aggravates his asthma. Um, you know, there's just there's just a lot going on. I wish I could medicate myself, but I can't. So uh this is day, let's see. This is day Thursday, Friday, so this is the fourth full day that Bill's been home. Yesterday, last night we um watched a movie together. And he said, you know, I feel I feel stronger, I feel better. Um, he is recovering. Uh, you know, he's been through a lot, and he's gotta rest, he's gonna continue to eat. He's got more of an appetite, which I'm very grateful for. We've got to be really careful with what he eats, of course. Uh, I'm kind of nervous this week. We have an uh you know, follow-up appointment out of the house, and so we have to get in the car and we have to drive down there to Cedars, and that's gonna be a little scary uh to see how we do, but I think we can probably by then we can manage it. We're gonna take the mobile oxygen with us, and so overall it's good, it's better than we were a month ago, certainly. Um and one of the nurses came here because they come from the Cedars area, and she said, How did you get into this program? You're so far away. And I, you know, I laughed because yeah, I know. I drove down there every day, and she said, Usually it's within like five miles, so you could get back to the hospital quick, you know, easily. Um, and I asked today, and they said that they have about 10 10 patients at a time that they monitor. So I guess I did, I guess we are really special, and we did get really lucky because I think Bill would have needed more follow-up care that it would have been really difficult to do this without this program. Home health has limits on what they can do. Um so I'm very grateful for the team. Um, it's been very comforting to be able to call somebody at any time of the day or night on video and ask a question to have these resources available to us. It's just been great. And I think that he'll just continue to get stronger. It's definitely an adjustment for me and the pets. They have the schedule every day on the tablet. And last night I looked ahead to today because the nurses usually come around 10:30 in the morning. And I looked, and today's nurse was scheduled at 8 a.m. And if you know me, you know that 8 a.m. is way too early, and especially because we've both been exhausted. I just I thought they're gonna kill me. They are just they're trying to kill me, let alone him. Um so I, you know, it was one o'clock. I gave Bubby his shot at one, and I said, look, is there any way you guys could push this back? Because 8 a.m. is just way too early. And I kind of woke up around 7:30 anyway, because the cat woke me up, and I thought, you know, there's no way I'd be able to do it. I mean, I could, but I'd just be like so exhausted. So anyway, they did. They came in around 10 or something, and that worked out much better for both of us. Um so no to self. Um, there's

Advocating For Rest And Closing

there's always ways around things. Like I always say, you've got to advocate for yourself and your loved ones, and that's what we've continued to do. Um, the doctors and the doctor and the staff, the nurses have all complimented me on how attentive I am and how deep the doctor today, she said, You're so detailed, we love it. Because I am, I'm just so uh I know it bothers a lot of people, but I am, I'm so observant, and I keep track of every frickin' molecule, and that's what you need sometimes. So anyway, but that being said, I had to escape today because I had to go and do laundry at the laundromat. There's some things that you just have to go do. I did that, and uh, I haven't really been in my backyard at all. I've been trying to water quickly, but I can't really leave the house because there's always somebody calling or stopping by or delivering something. Um but it's all good. It's all good. Um grateful to have him home and glad to be taking care of him. So next week, well, we're gonna tackle another topic together. I hope you'll join me. If you like this episode, please follow the Only Child Diaries Podcast on Apple Podcasts or other platforms you might listen on. And consider rating Only Child Diaries and writing a review. It helps others to find us. Please share it with a friend you think might like it as well. Visit my Instagram page, Only Child Diaries, or Facebook, Only Child Diaries Podcast. Thanks for listening. I'm Tracy Wallace, and these are the OnlyCild Diaries.