An Update from Amber

Yesterday was a rough day for Beth.  Her first room mate had a lot of problems and she didn't get much rest her first night, which always makes healing difficult.   She has been dealing with a lot of nausea when she eats and yesterday morning when she got up for the first time, she was only able to stay up for a few minutes.  Off and on all day, she dealt with nausea and was unable to eat anything but saltines and some juice.  Her head has a lot of pain from the surgery, and she says that she has a headache and neck ache almost constantly.  None of the medications they gave her yesterday seemed to help.  Fortunately in the afternoon, she was able to take a few naps and seemed to be able to get some healing rest.

Today, Beth seems to be doing much better (in my opinion).  When we arrived, they were working on her IV which was no longer in a vein, but injecting medications subcutaneously (under the skin).  This meant that for the past 24 hours or so, the medications they were giving her through the IV (most of them) weren't able to work the way they were supposed to.  Fortunately, they could easily fix this, but it might help explain why her pain and nausea wasn't helped much by medications.

This morning, they continued to try intravenous pain meds to help relieve her pain, but it wasn't working very well.  Through the new IV, they gave her some meds for nausea and once her nausea was better controlled they tried giving her some oral meds for her pain which she seemed to tolerate without nausea.  We were very excited when she said that they finally seemed to help relieve some of her pain!  This is a huge praise because the doctors want her pain under control before she leaves the hospital.  All of her pain meds before were given through the IV, which she obviously can't do at home, so this is a big step toward going home.

This afternoon when we left her, she was sleeping peacefully and we hope that she will get some good rest so that she can get up and walk a little bit more or sit up in a chair which would be another huge step toward going home.  I know that Beth (and I) really appreciate each of your prayers, continue to pray for pain relief, strength, and courage for Beth!