The Fun Continues

Today was another fun and exciting day....if sitting in appointments can be considered fun. With Ashley and my mom around, it is usually quite entertaining. We met with the Cardiologist, Dr. Nishimura, this morning. He basically wanted to follow up with how things have been going since leaving the hospital. I haven't had any more fevers, chills, or night sweats, which has been heavenly. As we were wrapping things up he mentioned something about having negative blood cultures. I told him that the last blood cultures I had were in the hospital and he got a concerned look on his face. He said that he didn't feel comfortable sending me to surgery without negative blood cultures several days after stopping antibiotics. However, I still had one dose of antibiotics, blood cultures take 2 days to grow, and surgery was in two days. He said he needed to talk to the surgeon, but wanted to make sure he did what was best so there wasn't a chance of the new valve getting ruined.

Dr. Nishimura and Me

 We headed to get blood cultures, wondering if surgery would be pushed back, and for how long. We planned on waiting until our appointment with the surgeon later in the afternoon to find out the plan. While waiting for blood cultures we got a call from the doctor's secretary saying to come back up and see Dr. Nishimura after we were done. On our return visit he told us he had called the experts in the Infectious Disease department and the surgeon and both said it was going to be perfectly fine to go ahead with the surgery. I was so happy to hear that and am glad that as long as all goes well 'I'll be home for Christmas'.

I met with the Surgeon and his Nurse Practitioner in the afternoon. Dr. Pochettino went over the basics of the surgery and what he was going to do. He said there is a 50% chance the valve might be repaired, but I am just planning on it getting replaced and will be pleasantly surprised if the outcome is different. I got all my pre-op info, my Hibiclens wash for my pre-op showers, and some lovely antibiotic goop to stick up my nose, woot woot!  Things are starting to feel a bit more real now, but I don't think this is fully going to hit me until I wake up from surgery. 

A lil EKG action

Nothing facilitates roommate bonding (or bondage) like sitting at doctors appointments

Tonight Ashley and I built ourselves a little gingerbread house as part of our holiday celebrations and  my last nights of freedom entertainment. It  was a blast! I'm pretty sure the parts I did turned out a bit special, but if you don't look too closely it is quite a nice little scene. 

Tomorrow starts the big countdown and I am sure it is going to fly...but I'll be back in Utah with my family and friends before I know it.