It was a semi eventful day, but not until the afternoon. And, after I left yesterday, they decided to remove Bill's catheter and switch to a condom catheter. This is just what it sounds like, a condom attached to tubing is placed over the penis with a sticky substance of some kind and it acts just like an internal catheter. It's used mainly to make sure the sensation to urinate is there. Bill had told me from the beginning of having the catheter that he needed to go and he told me that all day today. Convincing him to just go ahead was hard, but he managed to do it. The condom had to be changed this afternoon and his nurse offered him a regular urinal, but he said no. 

I've noticed that there seems to be a lot of blood in the urine that wasn't there when he had the catheter. I suspect that when it was removed it scratched him some, but I didn't think to ask about it and his nurse didn't seem to be concerned about it. They have done some tweaking of his blood thinner and that may have something to do with it. She drew blood twice for labs today, which is also unusual.

Dr. El Hadad decided to go ahead and bronch him this afternoon and got a lot of junk out again. I had noticed that what he was coughing up was pretty thick and clogging his trach tube, which would lower his sats because the oxygen couldn't get through. He may do it again tomorrow to get him good and clean. 

I asked his nurse, and she said that she asked the dr., what causes the secretions to thicken and multiply like they do so fast. He said it was just the nature of the disease and the infection. But, according to Dr. Threlkeld, the infection is on it's last legs, at least for now.

Bill keeps asking about food and they have requested the speech consult again. I hope the therapist will be Amber as she knows Bill, and I'm going to make sure he has his teeth in. I may go ahead and put them in tomorrow anyway since they don't need to be out for the bronch with the trach. Then maybe he can start having a little food. Usually the therapist has to be in the room the first few times he eats, and to make sure we know how to put the valve on and off. So, we'll see what happens.

He's still talking around the trach some and we're getting pretty good at understanding what he wants. But I know he'll be happy to actually say words instead of just mouthing them for the most part.

So, that's his exciting day and a half. It wasn't quite as exciting for me, just sit and wait in either his room or the waiting room. But, he's my husband, that's my job! I'll let you know how tomorrow goes!