A Few Changes. . .

Colleen from Dr. Bromberg's office just called and gave us a few changes. We are going to decrease his Coumadin dose to 1/2 mg. daily instead of alternating days of 1mg and 1/2 mg. This is due to potential interactions with the new thyroid drug.

He also ordered labwork for this Saturday so we made an appt. with Quest for 8am. He wants a digoxin level drawn in addition to the INR level so we need to hold his dig that morning until after the draw.

I was glad she called because I had a couple of questions anyway and I got to ask them without having to call them myself looking like the paranoid mother!! Last evening, Connie's legs got very mottled looking. This is like a purplish-reddish blotchiness all over. It's not a good thing. It went away this morning though so we're attributing it to him being cold (he did go swimming a little with his sister--he missed the water!). Also, his ears and feet have been freezing. She said that those outer most parts of the body are going to be colder, especially on him. Yesterday afternoon he got tired walking from our car in the driveway to the front door and asked for help to get up the one step onto the porch. He also is asking for help to eat. Either he doesn't have the energy to pick up utensils or he is a completely spoiled rotten stinker pot! Maybe it's both. It is a change, though. He's usually pretty independent. I also noticed him having some trouble climbing up into his stagecoach bed. Our lingering thing is knowing what we should be watching for to determine if there is a need for IV heart meds and more serious interventions. I'm scared of his heart working so hard for the next few weeks that he'll not be strong enough for the surgery. Colleen said she'll run all this by the doctor too, but the main things for us to be watching for are just extreme lethargy and increased work of breathing. In little ones, they also look for feeding changes, but we already have those with him and with a toddler, it can just be pickyness too. He had a good night of peaceful sleep, only waking up twice briefly. Greg made the executive decision that he's sleeping with us from now until surgery. Lately, he ends up in our bed most nights anyway, but he starts out in his bed. I told him I was afraid to start the habit of starting him out in our bed, fearing he'd expect that after surgery. But, we decided that we'll deal with that later if we have to. Right now we want to soak up every possible minute we can with him. And it is fun waking up and snuggling together!