A day without adventures

A little background

First, we need a bit of background. Yesterday, during my visit with my primary surgeon, he pulled the feeding tube out since it would get in the way of radiation, and since I am eating well enough to live without it. He also cut the sutures from the trach tube. Those sutures were holding the plastic cover which has a curved plastic tube that extends down into your airway. Inside that tube a removable second plastic tube is fitted. You remove the inner tube to clean out "gunk" that builds up as air moves in and out through the tube. That is, if you are using it as intended. My trach tube is only there as a backup if radiation causes any throat problems. It is capped off normally now. The sutures were holding it in place until the wound set up well enough. Mine was set up just fine, so the doctor cut the sutures off which made it less painful when I swallowed and the tube jiggled.

As I left the hospital, a nurse put a foam padded neck strap around me and attached it to the plastic holder on the tube. I was not sure why, since the plastic was then stitched to my neck. No one explained why it was there, so we forgot about it and wore it most of the time. I removed that strap when taking a shower, not because anyone told me to, it just seemed like what you should do to keep it from getting wet. After the shower, I dried off and we put the strap back on. Seems simple enough!

The adventure begins

This evening things got a bit weird. Bedtime was fast approaching, and I needed a shower. I had walked 3.4 miles today (yeah!) and got fairly sweaty as it approached 100 here in Austin, so a shower seemed like a good way to wrap up the day. Cheryl took the strap off, just like always. I noticed that the tube going into my throat seemed a bit further out than normal while looking at my ugly - er- beautiful face in the mirror.

Then I coughed, and all hell broke loose!. The entire trach apparatus flew out of my throat and bounced onto the floor. Cheryl, who had been getting towels ready, looked at my neck and saw this funny looking hole moving open and closed as I breathed. I just stood there looking at my neck. Wow, that is a funny looking hole, wonder why I cannot talk!

Then it hit both of us that the trach system had blown out. Chery grabbed the whole thing, and as I stood there, shoved it (carefully) back in place. When it looked like I was going to live through this, she grabbed some tape and taped it in place while we considered our next move.

No shower for me

The shower did not seem like a good option at this point. Cheryl was worried that the tube was not sanitary and she had just shoved something (probably cat hair) down my throat. My first thought was that we really needed more information about all this, so I suggested that we head to the hospital.

So that is what we did

The car was on auto-pilot as we headed to the emergency room. Cheryl was coming down off of an adrenalin rush and was now starting to really worry that she might have hurt me. I tried to reassure her that I was "doing great" (remember that) as we got to the hospital.

Entering the ER paper mill!

After the normal 10 pounds of paperwork (will these people ever get this record system set up right?) we headed off to yet another hospital room and were visited by yet another nurse. She listened to our story with some amusement. Seems that she rotates between about seven hospitals, one of which is the Dell Children' Hospital in Austin. Apparently kids with trachs regularly pull them out, then run around showing it to everyone. Their parents just shove the tube back in and life goes on. Who knew?

Relief

Cheryl began to feel much better on hearing this. With nothing but the strap to hold it in place, falling out is not uncommon. No one told us that! So, I went through a round of X-rays to make sure the tube was properly in place and no cat-hair balls were lodged in my throat. Then a respiratory nurse came in and replaced the entire trach tube system with a new one and showed us how to care for it. We finally got the training on life with a trach someone forgot to enroll us in before we left the hospital!

The adventure ends

As we left the hospital, the nurses told us that she enjoyed taking care of us Seems I/we have that affect on everyone in the hospital. We both like that. Normally everyone in such a place is not in a happy place, so the nurses lives are pretty stressful. Having something simple like a blown trach and patients with a sense of humor makes the day just seem better. Great!

As we left the ER, the doctor said "You are doing great!" Is this a new mantra in hospitals?

(As a foot note, we had been to the hospital earlier in the day to deliver a thank you letter and ten pizza gift cards to the staff in the Intensive Care Unit who took such great care of me right after the surgery. The nurse who took the letter told us that this had made his day! We were more than glad to do that, they did an incredible job taking care of both of us!)

On the way home, we had some comfort food. Frosty's are easy to swallow!

The shower will wait until tomorrow!