The knee continues.....

Well let's see this will be a LONG post as there is much to tell.

Friday 22nd - knee surgery (already told about this) all is going well other then the fact I am on crutches for 6 weeks.

Saturday 23rd - Home taking it easy all is going ok. Notice my calf is kinda sore but chalk it up to surgery and keep on going. I found if I put a pillow under my knee it helped with the pain. Tony knows how icky I feel so he wrapped my leg up in a trash bag so I could get a shower and oh that was heaven!!

Sunday 24th - We go to church. This is the first time I have been in the church elevator. Sat at church did ok, left church came home and took it easy. My parents took the girls for Catherine's skating and then up to Omaha to take them to the zoo. My calf is hurting more and so that night we took my leg wrapping off (it was allowed to come off the next day) and went to bed.

Monday 25th - Tony went back to work and Christopher and I are at home. I finally get a full shower and oh yes how good it feels. We make a great team. We played leggos and had lunch. As the day goes on my calf hurts more and more. I just keep taking my pain meds and using ice on my knee.

Tuesday 26th - I talk to our neighbor and she is concerned about my calf hurting. At this point I am getting worried so I call the Dr. The nurse tells me it could be pain from surgery but I should get a Doppler check of my calf to make sure we are not dealing with a blood clot. So I get an appointment for 3:30 pm so Tony can come home and take me. We get to the imaging center and the lady scans both my right and left leg. She then tells me yes their is a blood clot in my left leg and hands me the phone to talk to the nurse of the Dr. who did my surgery. The nurse tells me to go straight to the hospital as I am being admitted and put on blood thinners.

So we get to the hospital and get checked in. I am taking up to the 9th floor of the pavilion and in my room. They get an IV line in and prepped with Heparin, however the IV could not be started till they had baseline blood work. Dr. Adiga came in and talked to me, this is a new Dr. I had never met and was assigned to my by my surgeon. She asked TONS of questions and said part of her blood work would be to see if I have any genetic markers for a clotting issue. So 9 villes of blood were taken and then the IV was started. They put a funky band on my arms that was bright yellow and said "Fall Risk" as well as a sign on my door. I was told I could not get out of my bed unless someone was in the room with me at all times. So we just laid there and got filled up with Heparin. Every 6 hours they drew blood to see how the level was in my system. The reason was the were aiming for a level between 63-100. So at one point they gave me a heparin bolise to try to speed up the process. Finally by Thursday we where maintaining a level of 79! While all this is going on I was given Coumadin to also thin my blood.

Finally on Thursday I was told I could go home but I have to give myself Lovenox injections every 12 hours for the next 7 days. I will also be on Coumadin for a minimum of 6 months! I will be participating in the Coumadin Clinic at the hospital to monitor my levels and such.

So today is now Friday, we have been home for just over 24 hours and we are doing ok. The first shot was terrible as I cried so hard and finally gave up and Tony had to give it to me. Since then I have done one other shot on my own. This is defiantly a new road for me.