Health Updates

I have been procrastinating doing an update on our health situations. I am tired of always having health stuff to blog about but I need to get these updates out there.

First I will give an update on how I am doing. I saw my surgeon and he said that after putting my gallbladder under the microscope it showed as being chronically inflammed. So I guess it was a good thing to have it removed. I am starting to feel better but I am still having some fatigue. I tend to get worn out by the evening. But it is getting better so I am trying not to complain. My incisions are healing nicely and hardly bother me much anymore. I still have some occasional stomach pain but the doctor said that is to be expected because the inflammation affected other areas around the gallbladder.

Now on to Rick. You know, the more important one.

Rick saw his surgeon on Friday. The news was not what we were hoping for. It seems that the fusion has NOT started to take at all. There is zero bone growth. Which basically means he is still in the same position he was in eight weeks ago right after surgery. Although he is starting to get his energy back and he doesn't really have incision pain anymore, he is NOT healed. He has to continue to wear his brace for the next six weeks, which at that time he will have another x-ray to determine if there is any fusion happening yet. That will be 14 weeks since surgery. I don't really know for sure what it will mean if there is still no bone growth at that point. I don't really even want to think about that right now. I can't change the situation so I am going to just try not to worry about it.

Dr S thinks that all of Rick's other diseases are what is causing him to not heal. That makes sense because he takes immune suppressing drugs. But he needs the medications to prevent him from getting sicker. It is a tough situation to be in. He is going back to work next week. He hasn't been getting a paycheck for over 3 weeks now which is starting to cause him stress. Fortunately he will only be going back to work part-time for now. I can understand his need to get back to work. But I am nervous about it because I don't want him to get hurt or cause some damage since he isn't healed. We thought that by this time he would have at least had some bone growth, making him more stable and making it safer to go back to work.

This is not the position we thought we would be in at this point. I was expecting that by now things would be getting back to normal. And I use the term normal very loosely. But we deal with the cards we have been dealt. Nothing we can do to change it.

Until next time,
Jaime