Day in the Garden

Got Justin out of the room today and spent most of it in the garden. Justin's trache area is giving him fits with the itching. Friday night it got red and they had to cut the bandage size down to the size of the hole. They think he developed a reaction to the tape but it had pulled skin out from around the stitch holes of the trache. They started benedril and exposed the area keeping the neck brace off confining him to bed till morning.

Saturday morning it looked quite a bit better and had reduced in size but the neck brace soon had him scratching like a flea ridden dog again. I called his nurse from the garden (he said I couldn't get them to bring meds to the garden) and the desk said they would get Stanley to see what they could do. He couldn't find any topical itch cream but he brought the benedril out to the garden with a cup of water. Justin was surprised, I told Stanley he probably needed a break anyway and he agreed.

Lydia and Robyn took Preston to Walmart and bought a bunch of outdoor activity toys and bubble blowers. Judy, Lydia and the girls tried to tire Preston out with the games and bubbles but I think it went the other way. They worked him in shifts and kept swapping out but he outlasted all of them. (pics) Justin went into his weight transfer position and probably got some well deserved sleep. Humidity made the afternoon balmy out and we decided to move everyone back in to cool off. They turned on one of the personal tv's and watched "Finding Nemo" I believe.

Judy and Lydia fixed some cajun dishes for supper including crawfish etouphe, red beans and rice with some jambalaya. My stomach was a little queasy but everyone seemed to like it and Judy has a lot of leftovers for lunch next week. Started trying to get everything organized to get ready to leave tomorrow (regretably with broken hearts) knowing we won't be able to go across the street and be with him or take him out just to get away for awhile. But we've got it setup to come back on Thursday night or Friday morning to be with him all weekend until we come back for discharge training and the transfer to VA.

We have decided that my truck will be the best vehicle to convert for transport because of the room, ease of entry and storage of equipment. Now I have to just get it back on the road as quick as possible (another reason to have to go home) so we can use it to transport Justin.