Tuesday 3 November 2009

Potassium

No more drama from Will's heart so far, but they put him on some extra potassium for a while as his levels were a bit low and potentially contributing to the heart thing. This meant drinking vile tasting soluble potassium (think of those lovely orange soluble vitamin C tablets, minus the nice taste and healing sensation, plus an extremely "repetitive" quality - yuk). Apparently these are unanimously the most hated medication prescribed on the ward. Anyway, his levels are now fine so they have thankfully stopped this again.

Will has continued to embrace the exercise - more walks around the duck pond, plus a series of physical jerks with the physio and more biking. I think he's really enjoying starting to feel like proper exercise will be possible again. There's still some pain, and he's struggling a bit with his tummy and eating and feeling sick. They're trying a higher dose of an antacid, which could help. The cocktail he's on is quite likely to lead to problems with nausea and upset tummy, but these should hopefully settle with time. He has continued to be a star pupil is other respects, and has already reached Level 2 on self-administration of his drugs, meaning he requests what he needs. Level 3 might mean he gets his own key to his drug cabinet - can't remember. Feel like there should be badges to sew onto your pyjamas. The boredom continues, although ward life is pretty busy in some ways. He certainly appreciates everyone's comments and letters and Facebook entries.

I've started working half days this week, which means I can keep things ticking over at work while also spending time at Papworth. I want to make sure I can take time off when he first comes home.

p.s. I had the seasonal flu and swine flu vaccines today. One in each arm. As you can imagine, my slight upper arm ache (mostly the left arm thanks for asking) gains me no sympathy whatsoever at this time.

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