The last 2 weeks

Finally Pete has come to the end of his 3 month recovery program.

The last 2 weeks have been busy ones for us.  Our days began early because we counted on 4 hours of driving back and forth from home to the city. Pete had the regular blood work, chest x-rays, a couple of bronc's, an ECG, spirometry checks, regular clinic visits and the daily physio which continued like clock work.  Then when that was all done we both headed to our work place.  This tends to make one a bit lethargic by evening.......:)!

Pete has been feeling a bit under the weather so they did another bronc to see what's brewing in his lungs and he definitely has a lung infection.  So another antibiotic is added to the concoction of pills, but one of the anti rejection drug doses has been dropped and that is awesome.

This was also the time for Pete to send his letter to the family of the donor.  A difficult, but very grateful letter.

From now on all the blood work is done in Barrhead once a week and the info faxed to the Team and Pete will still be going to the U of A for his clinic visits which will be on Fridays.  We begin with once a week and soon that will taper off to every other week, then once a month, etc..  The four doctors from the transplant team will remain Pete's doctors for everything and we are very thankful for this.

We also went back to the ICU, 3G3 the transplant ward, 5E3 the pulmonary ward, the gym, and to clinic and expressed our thanks for their care and dedication.  I must say that they are pretty excited to see Pete doing so well :) and appreciated us dropping by!

One nice thing about going to clinic is that we will also meet up with our hospital family on a regular bases. The relationships made in gym made the whole time that much more enjoyable and the supportive aspect was and is an important one.  We all have exchanged our contact info just for this very reason.

This will be the last post for now.  The blog will remain open and if anyone wishes to receive an email notice for when there is a new post, then please send me your email address.  I'll post my email address on the blog page.

Now I'm handing this over to Pete to close.  Hugs to all from Margaret.

Hello all. There's not much more I can add to this except to express my thanks to all who supported us in many and various ways. It is very much appreciated. I would especially like to thank Margaret not only for writing this blog but also for being there for me during this entire time. It was a difficult task as for much of the time I was not an easy patient - some of you witnessed that.

Thanks also to the Respirology staff  under whose care I have been for the last 4 1/2 years and also the hospital staff. Their care and dedication to there calling is awesome.

We thank the Lord that he has been with us during this time and allowed success in this endeavor. We pray for His continuing providence. Thanks again to all!   Pete

Home again!

A number of tests have been done this week, starting with the usual chest x-rays.  In clinic Dr. Weinkauf showed us the comparison x-rays of Pete's lungs from before and after surgery and what a difference in size. I was also bold enough to ask for a copy of the pathology report done on the old lungs.  Severe emphysema noted.....and much more (I'm still in the process of googling what most of it means).

A broncoscopy (where a tiny camera is inserted down the trachea to check around all five lobes of the lungs) No more hissing!! :) :).  Dr. Weinkauf was quite impressed with how quickly and how well Pete is healing from the surgery.

CT chest scan (many precise pictures of the structures inside the chest) followed by a 2-part Nuclear VQ chest scan (of the pulmonary air flow and blood flow in the lungs).  We saw the results of this test and it's amazing to see what technology can produce.  There to, all is looking good!

Then Thursday Pete wakes up from a restless night and is breathing like pre-transplant and also quite congested :(  We of course are worried and call transplant and they do a chest x-ray again, we skip physio and then by afternoon Pete is totally okay again.  The doctors don't know why, but it's not an uncommon hiccup!

So after 2-1/2 months of living in the city, it's time to move home again.  Must say though that it's been such a blessing to have been able to be so close to the hospital.  We enjoyed the 3 weekends that we went home, but always looked forward to heading back into the city.  Pete's also been given the go ahead to drive again.

Now we will be commuting from home into the city for 2 more weeks.

The Lord blesses us all in such different ways.  Pete's on a journey of healing and joy, while others in our church community are on a journey of suffering and pain.  We pray that the Lord will grant healing and give peace.

Getting there!

Well, this week I can report that Pete is getting stronger by the day.  Looking at him, you wouldn't know that anything so miraculous has happened and that in itself is a blessing.

This past week has brought about a few nice changes.  On Tuesday all the things that Pete got aid from have been returned.  No more oxygen concentrators, wheelchair or bathtub accessories.  Gone :)
Even to the long distance appointments we simply walk.

Today in BC my brother Gordon Vanderhorst and Debbie are getting married.  Under normal circumstances we would have gone to celebrate with the family, but at this point the distance is just too far.

Till next week......
We wish you all a blessed Sunday tomorrow

Two thirds there!

One more month to go, but first it's home for the long week-end.

The past week over all has been a good one of gaining strength, balance and focus.  Walking is going really well.  We only use the walker for long distances  :)

Pete's morning routine used to consist of a cup of coffee and off to work he went.  Well things change and now added to that cup of coffee is a whole new routine.  At roughly the same same time each day he starts of with checking his sugar levels, prepares a dish of medication, has breakfast and then a routine check of blood pressure, pulse, temperature, weight and spirometry readings.  This "data"  is to be done each morning for the rest of his life and it basically helps the transplant team to track rejection.  So we will gladly do that :)

Pete's been given the go ahead to just go on with life in a normal fashion using common sense where needed. So he will be able to go to church tomorrow and looking forward to that blessing.

We have experienced the opposite of Pete's progress in the last couple of weeks.  Pete's first roommate Al Richards has passed away after a long hard fight to survive.  Another 2 men we met in the physio program earlier have also passed away.

In this light we pray that our heavenly Father will continue to grant Pete what he stands in need of for each and every day

Blessings

It's been a wonderful week.  Pete is gaining strength by leaps and bounds.  It's awesome to see the exercise list in the gym get longer each day :( -  ;)

Up to now I've been wheeling Pete everywhere and it's our goal this coming week to shed the wheelchair and when we have a longer stretch to walk then we'll just use the walker for balance and security.

We had a wonderful visit with Brian & Allie and thoroughly enjoyed the time out and having Brian push the wheel chair up and down Whyte Ave. Now I must say that it's pretty interesting that each time one of my sisters came ............... it snowed!!!!

We will now be going home for the week-ends.  To us that's pretty exciting!  It'll be great to be able to go to church again and join in the worship service.  Pete will of course stay home and watch a service on live stream.

This week Friday we hope to celebrate Pete's 64th birthday.

All in all, life is good and it's to our heavenly Father that we give the thanks and praise.

A new routine

It's been interesting getting used to our new routine and freedom.

Being in the apartment has allowed Pete to begin working again, seeing as his work is sitting behind a computer.  Went to Barrhead to pick up his computer and monitors and it was nice for Pete to chat with his co-workers.   Then we went home to pick up what was needed and then headed back to the city and proceeded to re-arrange the apartment.  Believe it or not......we got it to work :)

Our mornings are of course spoken for.  Clinic keeps us on track and physio is coming along okay. The sleeping issue is still an ongoing problem, but is being worked on.

Am looking forward to my sister Allie Dalejohnson and her husband Brian from BC coming on Monday.  They are driving up and will be here for a day and a bit .

Unless something major occurs, I won't be posting anything for awhile.  Things have pretty well stabilized and there isn't really anything new to write.  It's just a long slow road as Pete continues to work on gaining his strength.

We really appreciate the caring showed by so many, by their prayers, visits and all other various means of support, which we see as a blessing of our heavenly Father.

It's official

Pete is now officially an out patient. For now the plan is that we will be staying in the apartment till the end of May and commute back and forth from home till the middle of June.

Our mornings are kept fairly busy with blood work, blow tests, clinic with the Respirologists and physio each day.  Between all this there are x-rays, education sessions for diet, medications, caregivers, etc.......basically life after transplant :)

Feeling thankful :)