2 steps forward, 1 step back...

Yesterday (Saturday) was a "one step back kind of a day."  Again, I'm afraid he overdid the day before -- while on my watch, too. We all get so excited that he's back that none of us can stop talking and laughing and eating and remembering -- and acting like we're all just sitting around having a cup of joe at Starbucks together. Apparently after we left, he had a rough night of it with more pain than usual and by the time I got there at 11:30, he was very low and equally miserable.

The bleed is moving down out of his head at an exceedingly slow pace and is still at just about neck level making his neck stiff, sore and hurt like crazy. He keeps describing it as "a very deep, overwhelming pressure that's... odd. It pulses. And hurts. Bad."

MY own personal made up version of what's happening is this:
The venous bleed is filling the Dura Mater at his neck level now (the DM is the enclosed "tube" that the brain and spine live in and are surrounded by, filled with cerebral spinal fluid & in Jamie's case, extra blood).  I imagine it might be like it feels when a big snake eats a huge rabbit and sits for hours with a HUGE blob  s l o w l y  going down his throat. Jamie's blob is at neck level -- with his tail bone as the eventual goal. (No comments from doctors or nurses please. I like my version.)

Gary and I continue to have waves of relief and gratitude that Jamie HOPEFULLY has dodged a major bullet (knock on wood as you read). At the same time, interestingly, it's been hitting harder every day -- the reality of what would have happened if so many things hadn't fallen into place at just the right time. Still want to find the hiker (hero #1) who initially found him, 30 min or so after Jamie collapsed. And the multiple, emergency back up heros who came upon Jamie and the growing group, took off coats and covered him, keeping him as warm as possible with an unwavering core temperature of 91°.

What I realized yesterday that sends me into convulsions is that it took the SAR guy from the sheriff's department (MY own personal hero) 3-1/2 hours to:
(1) run up the mountain to Jamie
(2) work hard to save him
(3) ultimately realize it was a much bigger problem than they had assumed it was and call us.
Can't go there for long.


Enough's enough. When I left last night, they'd moved Jamie back to ICU, but ONLY b/c there were too few patients on the intensive care floor and they wanted to have them all in the same area, so everyone would be better taken care of. That's where the cream of the crop nurses exist too.  Thanks to Chef Extraordinaire Emily (imagine gourmet fried chicken, mac & cheese, big fat amazing fries, best salad EVER, insane slaw), I left an incredibly full and nurse-distracted boy of 30 with his brother Sam, both grinning from ear to ear. There's lots of action on that floor (meaning activity), a room right by said cute nurses & when Jamie learned that his all time favorite nurse was assigned to him, he said with a smirk, Bye Mom.  :o)