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Brian's (Texas T) wife, Brenda

CaringBridge said:
Back home - but not for long

By Brian Thorn — 4 hours ago
Brenda was discharged about a half hour ago and we're back home and she's in bed.

That's the good news.

The not so good news is that she will have another surgery on Wednesday. They will start with an angiogram to determine the amount of the blockage. It is 55mm long and the longest stent is only 40mm so they may need to use two of them. If the blockage is less than 50% they will back out and not do anything. If it is in the 70 - 80% (or higher) they will change to an angioplasty and put in the stent(s). There is a conflict between what the ultrasound shows and what the cat scan shows so until they actually reach the blockage they won't know how much is blocked.

The surgeon feels that they are dealing with scar tissue from the two prior surgeries so there is a "possibility" that when he inflates the balloon to widen the artery the scar tissue may not give way sufficiently to allow the stent into that area. If that happens he will withdraw and go to Plan B which is nothing at this point. While he did state this in front of Brenda she really did not pick up on that part of it, so those of you who speak to her should not bring it up either. She is stressed enough about this and I don't want to compound things and deal with this topic unless it becomes absolutely necessary.

If all goes well this is only about a one hour operation with a discharge the following day. Her recovery periods are typically longer than most people so I would be surprised if she comes home earlier than Friday afternoon.

On the plus side, after the initial crying she has been in fairly good spirits. She talked to her baby sister Patty several times today including after getting the news and after getting into bed at home. She also spoke with her sister Debbie and her sister Isabell will be calling tomorrow morning. It always brightens her day to speak to them.

She was able to walk with her cane into the house with me holding on to her so tomorrow's goal will be for her to get out of bed and go to the bathroom by herself with me just standing by. I have the weekend off so hopefully by the time Monday rolls around she will be self-sufficient again and I'll be able to go to work. We will probably have to do pre-op stuff on Tuesday and then be at the hospital around 5:30 on Wednesday for a scheduled 7:30 surgery.

That's it for now. As always, thank you for your comments, wishes and prayers.

Strength for you Brian as you continue caring for Brenda.
 
CaringBridge said:
Surgery in the morning

By Brian Thorn — 3 hours ago
It's Tuesday evening and we're going to watch a movie and then go to bed. We'll be up at 4:45, at the hospital at 5:30 and then her surgery is scheduled for 7:30 Cross your fingers and toes for a good result.

We will be praying Brian.
 
CaringBridge said:
Not good, not bad
By Brian Thorn — 53 minutes ago

Challenging day today. It started out fairly well and we thought she'd be coming home today after the cardiologist saw her, but fortunately he didn't see her until early in the afternoon and less than an hour prior to that her BP crashed. The machine read 75/51 and sounded the alarm so I grabbed the nurse and she had the machine check it again and it was 60/40. Brenda was sleeping / groggy but felt okay so the nurse flattened out the bed instead of having her head raised.

For the rest of the day the BP continued to fluctuate with the last reading before I headed home being 129/63. The pushed two bags of fluid into her as she hasn't been drinking a lot, nor eating a lot. She probably slept 20+ hours in the past 24.

No fever, no infection at the wound site, minimal pain at the wound site, but she's had a headache since early this morning. They gave her morphine at 9 this morning and then a 5-325 Hydrocodone at 8:30 tonight and that's all the pain meds she's had. The headache was still there when I left and she was dozing off to sleep again. No stroke symptoms either which is a big concern for me because she had a severe headache just prior to the bleeder stroke last year.

Hmmm... I wonder if it's caffeine withdrawal? She only drinks 1-2 cups of coffee a day and when she rarely drinks soda it's not caffeinated, but she hasn't had anything since Tuesday morning.*

At this rate I don't see her coming home tomorrow either unless they get her BP stabilized. She is very upset about being stuck in the hospital another day. If she has to stay yet another day tomorrow she is going to be even more upset.

She refused Ativan tonight because she finally recognized what is was. This is the same med that they gave her mom about 30 minutes before she passed away. Brenda had it several times yesterday but I don't think she really knew what they were giving her and I didn't tell her about it.

Sisters, I know you want to speak to her but she hasn't even called Justin. She has just been too "out of it". If she is able, I'll get the phone in her hands tomorrow but no promises.

Praying that they will get her BP under control.




Sent from my BlackBerry 9930 using Tapatalk and some serious hunting and pecking.
 
Thank you Don and others. She is home. We got home about 4.5 hours ago and she went straight to bed and was asleep within about 10 minutes. She's still sleeping. As much as they talk about being quiet around hospitals, trying to sleep in the ICU is not an easy thing to do.

She slept about 20 hours after surgery, but didn't get much last night so I'm sure her body is trying to get caught up.

Her BP stabilized this morning and was good when they sat her up for the first time and when she walked down the hallway. I haven't been able to check it since she got home because I didn't want to disturb her rest.

It's been a rough year for her; her stroke was one year ago last week and she's had four major surgeries since then and lost both her parents within the last six months.

She's a fighter. She's lost 60 pounds so she's pretty much skin and bones and that's the biggest challenge right now - get some weight on.

So thanks again for thinking of us, and hopefully this will be the last surgery she'll have to endure.
 
Last edited:
That's good news Brian.

Will continue praying you as well.

Sent from my BlackBerry 9930 using Tapatalk and some serious hunting and pecking.
 
Thanks. She slept from noon yesterday until 9 am this morning (minus a little time for bathroom breaks, eating, watching a little TV), and then went back to bed again at noon today.
 
My gosh you two have been through a lot. I can only hope that that if Elaine and I had to go through something like this we could do so as courageously. May God be with you both and we will continue to pray for you.
 
We saw a Mayo Neurologist a couple of weeks ago. She confirmed that Brenda is probably as good as she's going to get with very minor improvements to be seen in the coming years. She continues to have nerve pain on the right side so her Neuro doc is sending notes to her primary care doc with recommendations for some new meds to help with the pain and also help to increase her appetite since she has lost 60 pounds since the stroke.

She does physical therapy twice a week because the pain has caused her to regress in her movements so she is back to a cane but can walk unassisted if she puts her mind to it.

She would like to go back to work but does not have the stamina to stand for very long, and even when sitting she has the nerve pain on the right side so I don't see work for her in the near future.

The bikes have not been ridden since she had the stroke and I'm contemplating just selling them as I don't know when/if we'll ever get her back on again.

Speech/vocabulary/math skills/writing are all fine. She will still transpose words or use the wrong words, or won't be able to think of the right words but she's fine in normal conversations.

One of my co-workers just had a stroke so I'd like to take Brenda with me to see him so that he can see that strokes can be overcome or at least dealt with, but I'm sick as a dog and need to get over this first.

She's self-sufficient around the house - cooking, cleaning, housework, plant care, etc and she's not in any danger by being left alone; she just gets bored to death. Thank goodness she has several brothers and sisters that she can talk to on the phone. I used 100 minutes on my phone last month and she used 1600. :trust:

Our son just left this morning and returned home to New York. He was here almost two weeks and that makes her very happy to have him around. He is contemplating a move out here, but he just got a promotion/raise and he works for the #1 "best company to work for" in his industry. He just hates all the snow.

That's about it. Thanks for asking.
 
Great news. Good to hear that she is still getting better. Hope that you get back in the saddle again. But I do understand what your saying. Get feeling better I was under the weather for a few days first time in forever. I am happy that she is able to go back to a somewhat normal routine. Continued prayers for further healing and success. Happy New Year. Thank you for the update like many other TWT members we worry about our flock.
 
This is what I posted to Caring Bridge a few minutes ago...

For anyone still reading this... today marks the two year anniversary of her stroke. Brenda has never read any of your comments but I can assure you that I have read each and every one, and I thank you all for everything. She also doesn't know that today is her two year anniversary as I try to keep the bad memories at bay. She has seen one video of her therapy at Rehab and she didn't like that one bit, so it may be years (if at all) before she is prepared to see any of those videos.

So now two years later she is not in therapy, she does not use a cane, she has flown back to the east coast by herself, and she is entirely self-sufficient around the house. She still does not have any sensation on the right side (and probably never will) and she still suffers from apraxia and aphasia so she won't ever be able to go back to work, but she can still hold a reasonable conversation with friends and family.

Her biggest frustrations are not being able to drive, to work, or to leave the house by herself. She takes the trash out, checks the mail, feeds the birds, tends to the back porch and the bushes, but that's the extent of her outdoor activities. She wants to get back on the motorcycle so I think I can make that happen since the weather is about to start cooling off. We'll just have to watch her right foot to ensure it stays on the floor board. If not, I'll need to rig up something to keep her foot in place.

She has had two surgeries on her left carotid artery to clean out gunk and scar tissue, and two additional surgeries to put in stents on that side, and one surgery on the right side to clean out the gunk. Her last review was in September and she's about 50% blocked but that is stable from the last review so she won't be seen again until January. I'm sure they will need to go in there again in the future, but hopefully that will continue to be a long time away in the future.

So all in all, her recovery has been been good considering how bad it could have gone if the brain bleed had continued that morning. I'm thankful for my friends and family that supported me in those dark days, and I'm thankful that I still have her around.

Until next time...
 
:clap: Man that is nice to know that she has improved so much. We hope and pray that her recovery continues and it would be neat to see her on the back again with you. The weather is improving here also. Thanks for the update.
 
Thanks for the update Brian! Hopefully a radical diet change has helped.

I guess you could also consider a side-car for her if she has a hard time riding as a passenger on the back.

RB
 
Thanks Brian!

While I am sure that she wishes for more it is so good that she is doing this well.

Definitely take her for a ride. It makes all the difference.

Still praying.
 
So happy for all she can do and all you can still do together!
 
thanks for the update. Yall have been in my thoughts regularly. Wonderful to hear how well she is doing.

Do keep us posted!
 
Fast Forward from 1.5 years ago...

Pardon me if this is a re-hash of some stuff I've already written. I didn't take the time to go back through all the prior posts.

She has had semi-annual vascular checkups since the stroke, and had her most recent one on Monday. She remains 50% blocked on her left side where the stents are, and is clear on the right side. Her doctor is the head of vascular surgery for Mayo and said she doesn't need to come back for a year since the blockage has remained steady. They don't get concerned until you're 80% blocked or more.

Although she can't drive I did buy her a golf cart so she can go to the clubhouse and see the other ladies (we live in a retirement community).

She does want to start riding again, so I'm putting the Connie up for sale (there's a post about it in the F/S Forum), and I've got the Gold Wing running again after being down for the past three years. I'm taking it to the shop tomorrow because I have no back brake, but once it's road-worthy I'll try riding it to work for a while before I try riding with her two-up.

With summer fast approaching (in the 90s all this week) we may not get a lot of riding in until late September, but we can still make a run to the mountains for breakfast and then come home early the next morning.

So all in all, although it's been a tough 3.5 years she has done very well in spite of everything. She lost both her mother and father within a year of her stroke, and she lost one of her brothers at the beginning of this month, so that's been rough on her.

She's self-sufficient and putters around the house most days. She's able to hold a regular conversation unless she's really stressed or upset and then she can't find the right words, and she will still struggle to find a correct word when trying to describe something. I just give her time and she thinks about it, and most of the time she'll grasp the right word within the next 5 - 10 minutes, or I try to get her to describe how the thing is used, or where it's seen or something like that, and I can sometimes guess what it is.

For those of you who posted in this thread, you'll never understand how much it means to me to have that kind of support. Going through this was the toughest thing we've ever had to do, but it made us stronger and closer. So thank you very much, and hopefully I'll be posting some photos the way I used to, and show you some more of this gorgeous state.

Brian
 
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