Ben's Update For Friday

I got a call from the hospital while I was in my Caregiver's Support Group this morning. They wanted my permission to let them do another paracentesis on him, which I approved. I got to Kaiser at noon and Dejon told me they drained another 5 liters of fluids from his belly. Ben was very tired and cranky. He usually does get tired after this procedure, but he usually just goes to sleep. Today he was arguing with me about everything. He slept for about 45 minutes and then he woke up and was still very angry. He pulled the sheet up over his head and I asked him what he was doing. He told me he was dying. I took the sheet off his face and told him to stop that. He told me that he wished he could get more air to breath. I'm afraid that his lungs are getting weaker because he was complaining about this yesterday. I spoke with the respiratory therapist yesterday and she said everything looked fine. Ben was confused today too because he kept telling me that he was not at Kaiser and that we were only 2 miles from home. He asked me how many miles I thought we were from home and I said about 20 and he told me I was crazy. Then he kept trying to tell me that they did two different procedures on him before I got there. He knew the did the paracentesis but he kept wanting me to ask the nurse what the other one was. I asked and she told me they ONLY did the paracentesis, so I don't know what he was talking about. I think he was confused because usually a nurse comes in first and prepares him by cleaning the area they will insert the needle and they give him a local to numb the area. Then the doctor comes in and runs the ultrasound on his belly to see where to go in and then they do the procedure. I'm thinking he thought the nurse did one procedure and the doctor did another. He fell back to sleep around 1:35 PM, so I left to come home. Around 3:15 PM, Dr. Hu called me. He said that he got a "5th opinion" from the Gastro guys on Ben. He asked again if there was anything else they could do for Ben to get his intestines moving and the Gastro guy told him no, that they have done everything possible. Now it's just "wait and see" if they start working on their own. He told me that he's still hoping Ben's bowels will start moving. He wants to keep him on TPN for about 1 to 2 more weeks because he said every time they try to start him on tube feeding, that's when he bloats up and starts accumulating the fluids again. He is talking about moving Ben back to All Saints on Monday. He said they can give him the TPN there and give him the therapy he needs to get stronger. I told Dr. Hu about Ben complaining about not getting enough air and Dr. Hu said it's probably because he is just so week.