Karen slept alright last night, but not as well as the night before. She woke up this morning with a small fever of 99.2°F. Looking over her labs I can see her blood counts have been dropping since yesterday. The doctors think there must be some internal bleeding and one called it hemorrhaging. They have put a stop to her heparin shots. It's a blood thinner that's given to you when they don't think you'll be moving around much so you don't get blood clots. They're painful, burning, "horrible" shots and her primary motivation in getting up and walking around has been being able to refuse them.
She's been walking around a decent amount since they took her off bed rest, but now I wonder if she came off it too soon. Her abdomen has continued to swell throughout the day and her pain level has continued to rise as well. This morning she thought she could do without the PCA pump, just taking oxycodone orally. This, however, turned out to be some bad timing. The unexpected swelling/hemorrhaging has increased her pain level at the same time she agreed to start backing off the pain meds. She can still get something through the IV once an hour, but her pain level jumps up to about 8 out of 10 between doses now.
They took her off food and fluids about an hour ago and gave her an infusion of platelets. They wouldn't do this unless they were also thinking surgery might be required. They said depending on how her blood work turns out after the infusion, she might be able allowed to eat and drink again. And... that was pretty fast, they've lifted the food and water restrictions. That seems almost too fast for them to know anything. The nurse tells us someone should be coming around to talk to us. I'll update again when we know more.
