Mom is finally in her own room!

Today started out much like yesterday. I (Leah) spent the first visit with her starting at 9am. After a little kind persuasion I was able to stay by her side for a grand total of 45 minutes. During the visit I was told that she would be moving into her room very soon... I have come to learn that in hospital language "soon" means anytime within the next 4 hours. At 9:45am I went back into the "Family Atrium" to wait until the next visit or until she was moved into her room. During our visit Mom seemed to drift in and out of consciousness more than before. She said several things that did not make much sense as she would come to and then quickly fall back asleep.

At 11:45am Kelty and I were right by her side along with two nurses as she was transferred to her private hospital room. It has lots of windows which she was happy about, but even as we moved from recovery to her new room she drifted in and out of sleep.
Soon a physical therapist named Sara came in and was time for Mom to attempt her first steps! She wanted to make sure that Kelty captured this event on camera to add it to her recovery video that Duane is going to be making for the benefit of others who are investigating undergoing the same surgery.

She was very strong through the pain and took about 6 small, slow steps forward with the assistance of the P.T. and a walker. Then she took 6 steps backwards. She wanted to try again a second time and took about 4 steps forward and then back. By the time she got back to sitting on her bed she was in quite a bit of pain. We had the nurse administer more oral pain medication along with the morphine drip that she is receiving medicine from continually.

I am typing from the side of her bed right now as she is trying to rest. She has been talking and even singing a tune or two as she drifts in and out of sleep. Sometimes she wakes up and seems confused about where she is. I remind her that we are in New York. She has asked to see various family members and friends, but then I remind her that again that we are not in Utah right now. Even though at this moment she is barely consciousness and confused she has really wanted to call her brothers Scott and Ken. Neither one answered but she did her very best to leave a good voice message for each of them and then quickly drifted back into sleep.

My plan is to stay by the side of her bed tonight along with her private nurse to make sure that she knows I am here for her even if only to provide brief moments of comfort to her in those spontaneous moments of awake time.

Kelty is back from her lunch break and my pregnant belly is dreaming of food and now it's my turn to take a quick lunch.

Love,
Leah