karenulijohn

Harvey was feeling well enough that we decided to go ahead with our plans to drive to Inverness.  We had a lovely time visiting with our old friends and were glad that we had made the trip.  After staying the night in Petaluma, the next day we drove to Santa Rosa and visited with another old friend and her daughter.  By the time we started for home, and I had taken a short shopping detour at the Vacaville Outlets, we had driven about 300 miles.  In retrospect, the drive may have been a bit ambitious, but we needed to get away.  Harvey was pretty worn out and slept quite a bit once we got home.

We had a few short social outings over the week and Harvey tried very hard to participate, but his energy level is so very low, that he is too exhausted to even talk.  We were both looking forward to our daughter and her family coming to visit on Sunday.  Harvey managed to stay up to chat and have lunch, but soon needed  to lie down and, even after a couple of hours sleep, he was only able to muster a weak goodbye when they took their leave.  I discovered that he was running a fever and immediately broke out the Tylenol and ice packs.  Miraculously, about an hour after they had departed, he was up and looking for his cake and ice cream.  The fever was gone.

While Harvey was sleeping, the family and I decided that he was becoming dehydrated again, similar to his condition before he was hospitalized.  So, I utilized the YourHealthOnLine option and wrote an email directly to Dr. Suhag describing Harvey’s condition and asking him if we could schedule him for hydration infusions on a bi-weekly basis, just until he starts to feel better.  Happily, he agreed and we are due to go to the infusion center this afternoon.  This morning, we saw Harvey’s primary care Dr. Schneidewind for a hospital follow-up.  He did a brief exam, but spent most of the time helping us understand why Harvey is so tired, why his back hurts, and what diet he should try to follow.  He said that Harvey is still anemic and his red blood cell count is low enough that it would make him very tired.  The bottom line is that he will gradually begin to feel better as his colitis eases and he begins to eat and build up his red blood cell count.

During the visit on Sunday, my son-in-law, Dirk, suggested that we should have a juicer to make our own nutrient rich drinks.  Dirk was pretty adamant and we were considering it.  Then today, Dr. Schneidewind said “you should consider getting a juicer!”  Harvey and I looked at each other and just grinned.  We wouldn’t put it past Dirk to have put a call in to the doctor himself.  What a great family we have!!!