Huge Milestones!

My Bad--I just went to create a new post and realized that I didn't publish the post from Tuesday...sorry for the delay. GH
=============================
Tuesday, July 16
Wow.  Two days ago, I was thinking we were going to do baby steps to get Shirley off the ventilator.  Maybe a few more hours each day until she eventually could go full time without having to be put back on pressure support.  She went from nine to eleven to thirteen hours, so it was logical to assume the next day would bring fifteen or so.

But yesterday, Shirley surprised me by going over 30 hours and they took her off the vent.  I assumed the next step would be several days of breathing the heated humidified air, but this morning they moved on to the next step, which was to insert a valve into the air line that allowed her to speak.  This isn't that electronic thing that people whom have lost their vocal cords use.  It was something that allowed her to speak in a near normal voice.  This valve had been inserted a couple times in the past, but it had quickly tired her out.

This time, she tolerated the valve for several hours.  And then at 12:30 pm, they removed the heated aerosol AND took out the trachea tube!  So where there was a tube sticking out of her neck, there is now tape and gauze and within a day or two, the hole will begin to close--as long as they don't need to reinsert the tube.

As I write this, Shirley is working with the Speech Therapist who is evaluating her swallowing.  They want to be very sure that anything that is supposed to go down the throat goes down the correct tube and not down her trachea. She just passed the swallow test with flying colors and is now cleared to eat pureed food.

They are now talking about releasing her from Regional Hospital within the next next few days.  From here, it will be on to a rehab facility to help her regain strength.  We hope to be able to go back to UW Medical Center's rehab floor, but I'm not sure if she's strong enough right now to qualify.  They require the ability to tolerate 3 hours of rehab a day and with her back hurting her so much, she has been doing less than one.

That said, I know how Shirley can be when a goal is set in front of her and I would not be surprised to see big jumps in her tolerance for therapy over the next few days.