ICU Sweet ICU

Well, today went different than I expected.

Folks, bear with me for this post. I’ve been staring at this blank screen for ten minutes trying to collect my thoughts and make them intelligible for you to read. I’m exhausted and wide awake, ecstatic, but sad. Yet, eternally optimistic.

Here it goes,

Nothing in life will ever prepare you to see your spouse like this.

But here he is. Resting. Stable. Peaceful. And my world is going to be ok.

Without gory detail, here’s a rundown of Justin’s day.

8:00 – back to the operating room

8:30 – surgery began, starting with the IVC filter placement. Note, since Justin recently developed an allergy to iodine contrast, this procedure 1) took a little longer and 2) a less common technique was used. Either way, it’s there and we’re happy.

9:30’ish – Dr Ahrendt began the debulking portion of the surgery. For a man with very little outward emotion, he was uncharacteristically positive about what he was able to achieve. They were able to mobilize the liver from the diaphragm to reach a couple of pesky tumors. However, in this process they punctured the diaphragm in a couple spots, that not only bled a lot, but will likely cause him some discomfort for the next several days. To address the drainage, he will be sporting a sweet chest tube until the Tuesday timeframe.

Oh, and how I mentioned it bled a lot… he received 3 units of blood during surgery. And I’m halfway expecting another unit sometime tonight. A special shout out to all you B+ donors out there!

18:30 – HIPEC is initiated. The team allowed this “chemo bath” to run for the better part of two hours.

20:30 – HIPEC complete and reconstruction began. This included new hernia mesh as Justin’s previous repair failed and in the doctor’s words was “floating around in there.”

22:00 – Surgery was complete. So for those of you keeping track, that’s 13.5 hours. Ugh.

As with his previous surgery, they brought Justin to ICU without stopping in recovery. He is currently still intubated and resting quite well. I’ve been in the room with him for a couple of hours now and he has been 100% stable for every minute.

For tomorrow, we’ll get that breathing tube out, hopefully without the struggle we had last time, and pray for a couple of precious moments awake.

I’ll see you back here tomorrow,

Christina