Scleroderma Sucks

I am very grateful for the outcome of the last few days. On May 5, my Mom calls me and tells my that Dad isn't feeling well. He never feels well, so I wasn't surprised. He hadn't ate since Sunday..it was Wednesday. When I had gotten the phone call I was waiting on Ryan to come out of his interview at Siemens. He got a call from them for a new job opportunity. We went to eat lunch and then went to see my Dad. He looked worse than I'd ever seen him before. His eyes were sunken in, his skin was gray and his voice was nearly gone. The room smelled strongly of foul vomit and I was, for the first time, afraid for the outcome. I convinced him that we had to do something. I called the doctor and we were able to get an emergency visit with her in one hour. I cleaned him up, helped him dress and we went to the doctor's office. The doctor immediately suggested that we go directly to the emergency room for x-rays. She suspected a bowel obstruction, along with the obvious severe dehydration. We arrived at the emergency department and after four hours of trying to gain intervenous access, a surgeon came in to initiate a femoral line. Iv fluids were started, a 1000mL bolus and after it completed, he felt a million times better. He was able to speak more clearly, and his color was normal. Of course, he was admitted. The orders were for him to drink a 8oz bottle of Magnesium Citrate to cleanse his GI tract so a scope could explore the cause of this problem the next day. The medication smelled bad and tasted horrible and it took all night for me to convince him to drink just half of the bottle. The results of his blood work came back and surprisingly everything was within normal range. The next morning, after a sleepless night, the GI attending, Dr. Zaph came in and recommended a Colonoscopy with decompression. I wasn't able to be in the room during the colonoscopy, but he was given Versed and pain medication to sedate him. I am always concerned about someone hurting him...he is so fragile. I stood outside of the procedure room and could hear most of the conversations amongst the techs. I found it highly inappropriate that they were discussing jury duty cases while doing the procedure. After the decompression started, they were able to remove most of the impaction. His bowel habits have never been normal, and apparently h e was severely impacted, enough to cause it to come up as vomit. The procedure lasted about 1.5 hours and they left in a rectal tube to drain. I was amazed that he didn't complain about the tube at all. The rest of the day, he was comfortable, mostly sedated. Mom and Ashley went home and I sat by his side all night. He had several episodes of being incontinent of his bowels and I can't even count how many times I cleaned him up. The next morning Mom and Ashley came back and Dad was hungry. He was "npo" meaning he wasn't able to have food. He wasn't having nausea anymore, obviously he is having bowel movements and I couldn't see any reason why he couldn't eat. He weighs 83 pounds and hasn't ate in 5 days. He needs to at least make an attempt if he has the appetite. We went to the cafe and Mom got him eggs and toast. He was able to eat about half and was satisfied. He started to get some of his energy back and wanted the tube out. I called for the nurse and 5 hours later (not an exaggeration) someone came in to remove the rectal tube. I, and the nurse, expected it to be like a catheter tube, but the tube was 36 inches long! Again, not an exaggeration. Apparently, the tube proceeded though the rectum, colon and large intestine. The tube drained nothing all night, and was pretty much worthless. After that traumatic event, he felt good enough to get cleaned up and go home AMA. I know how much he hated being there, and I really should have convinced him to stay until actual discharge. We made it home around 7pm. He hadn't looked that good in a long time. His face was fuller, and his eyes were him again.
I hope and pray that he will continue on the new medication plan and recover from this.