Friday

Ben arrived around midnight last night so he was with Jay when they came to pick me up in the morning.  Ben had not seen his mom yet.  Jeanne was happy to see him.  All the staff seemed to talk to him since he is a doctor.

I just had a bowl of cereal for breakfast at the little hotel cafe.  The hotel also has a nice restaurant and bar.  I have only gone there in the evening for my glass of wine.  The menu looks good.

It was a busy day for Jeanne.  Ben read a couple of short stories to her.  They were pretty bad.  The PTs came in to exercise Jeanne.  They did a bunch of exercises and they also got her sitting up for a little while.  She does not have the trunk support yet to stay sitting.  We did not get to see it.  They kicked us out.  But they did comment on her increased strength.  She can now lift her left hand off the pillow a couple of inches. We sat in the family guest room while they did their thing.  They came to tell us about her improvements.  It was nice to hear that I was not way off base with the things that I had been noticing.

After visiting a while the nurses came in to get her ready for the plasmapheresis treatment.  They sedated her for that.

Not a very good picture, but this is the plasmapheresis machine.  Her blood is pumped out, treated and then pumped back into her.  It  takes about 2 hours.  Once this was going on we went downstairs for lunch.  Then Ben went to go for a run and he stopped by a book store to get some other short story books. He went to my room after running, to shower.  His hotel with Jay is further away.

Because of the PT and the plasmapheresis they did not do the weaning until about 5 pm.  She went around 4 hours this time.  Not bad with all the other stuff she did.  Her cough and breath inspiration are both stronger.  Ben read some more.  Much better choices of stories.  

We headed out for dinner around 6 pm.  We had heard about a steak place sort of close to the hospital.  The woman that was raving about it was funny.  After raving about the steak she says she always orders the Chicken Kiev.  LOL.  Anyway, we decided to check it out.  Hammond Steakhouse.  It was in Wisconsin!!    It was quite good.  I had the steak, baked potato and salad. Ben ordered the cheesecake for dessert.  I enjoyed it as well. We shared a bottle of wine.    The restaurant was on the second floor.  First floor was the bar and the grocery store. 

This is a tree in the middle of the restaurant. The restaurant had a lot of personality.

When we got back, Ben read one more story before we were ready to leave and she was ready to be set up for bedtime.

Several doctors came to talk with us today.  Naturally they do not agree.  But they do agree that they will wait until Monday to decide about the trach.  They will be looking at how strong a cough Jeanne has and how deep a breath she can take.

Today was practically balming.  It got up to 37 degrees!!