T"hursday, January 24, 2008

One week later. What a WEEK!!!
John had a much better night last night. I really understand why we go through different experiences to get us where we are today. When "pain management" training occurred for me, I was thrilled to learn that role in healthcare. My friend, Dr. Colella offered me this role. I initially worked with Dr. Rodrigo Herreros and we set up the PCEA (patient controlled epidural analgesia), program. Like all jobs, the chronic pain service was busier than the PCEA program, so I had the opportunity to work with Dr. Dongzin, (Ben) Hur. Dr. Hur was board certified in anesthesia as well as pain management. Dr. Hur taught me so well. He just had an uncanny ability to understand what patients were going through, by symptoms, and we came up with the pain management "recipe" that was truly patient centered and driven. There was not a standard regimen, but rather patient driven. Dr. Hur just passed on in December after a valant fight with lung cancer. I miss him so, but he taught me well. I learned so much. Here is where I am going with this....John has been having difficulty with his neck pain, specifically, when he is sitting. He felt the pain in the back of his incision. Then I remembered, NSAIDS are for bone pain. NSAIDS are those meds that are motrin, alleve, and ASA. In addition to his pain medicine, the motrin 800 mg has really helped. He was able to sleep in 2-3 hour intervals all night. Even when he was awake, he was only up about 30 minutes, and then was able to go back to sleep. So, an absolutely improved night, and he says the pain is decreasing a little bit everyday. That is great news. If you can sleep at night, you usually are able to face the other obstacles in your day. John is very stoic and strong. I believe it is that Marine Corp experience. He has always been very driven and is working hard on his recovery. He will begin physical therapy tomorrow.
Now, I need to write a little bit about John's siblings. As I mentioned, John's brother Don is 13 months younger, then there is Steve who is 19 months younger than Don, then Jeff, who is 3 1/2 years younger, and then Amy. John was 13 when Amy was born. John always felt responsible for his siblings. They have a unique bond. It seems like whenever something traumatic occurs, they are immediately drawn together. I believe it is because they have experienced a lot of life's hardships together, they rely on one another to get through those experiences. Who would have known that when Don came out to Maryland almost 3 years ago, John would have gone through one of the most life changing experiences of his life? Thank God he was here. These two seem to be able to communicate without using words. They just know what one another feels. Steve and John have been able to re-connect after not seeing one another for a long time. I know it makes John very happy to be with his brother again. Don is the glue that continues to try to keep the family together and worked very hard on getting these two back together. Don is all about family. He believes in family, and I believe that is why he and Kay have forged such a bond, because he needed a family and they welcomed him, with very few conditions. John's brother Jeff lives in St. Louis with his family and we don't get to see them very often, but one of his sons, "Little J", is in the Marine Corp and stationed in North Carolina and we try to keep up with his life, and how he is doing. Then there is Amy. Amy and John are kindred spirits. I have known Amy since she was 4 years old. She was everyones little sister. She is a married woman with teenagers of her own, but she will always be John's baby. John also has siblings when his mother and father divorced and his mom remarried. He has 3 sisters from this family. Then, at the age of 48, John found out he also had 2 more siblings. That makes a grand total of 9 siblings! There are lots of family who love him. Two of his sisters and their mother drove all night to get here to see him for about 5 minutes, before they had to go back to St. Louis. They arrived on Friday night the day of his surgery, but were not able to see him until Monday afternoon, before they had to head back to St. Louis. That is the kind of admiration and love that his family feel for him. Amy and John's mom will be heading out this way, as soon as we give them the go-ahead. John's siblings in Tennessee have kept up with the blog daily, and are very concerned about his progress as well. Simply said, John is well loved by family and friends alike. I think we are all blessed to have him in our life.