I went and saw my mom today. Her face and feet are quite swollen from all the fluid that's gone into her in the past two days. She's gained 10 pounds in water weight alone. Her platelets are only at 6,000 and she's had five or six units of blood and four things of platelets. It's kind of frightening because it seems more like her body is consuming platelets either than using them to make more.
Her arms are black and blue from all the times she's been stuck. As my sister and I were leaving, a physician had just found a decent sized vein to put a pick-line in. With a pick-line it would allow easy access to my mom's heart for more blood or platelets to go in, but with platelets initially so low there are many risks. Bleeding that doesn't stop would surely be a bad thing. Her blood is so thin that stuff's just oozing out from where the IVs are putting everything in. Also, the hole where her G-tube usually goes in is oozing. Every few hours a nurse has to come in and clean it all up.
Overall, things sound horrible. My mom's surviving on IVs like she has for the past six or seven months, but relies on them more so now. Her vitals are better than before but her blood pressure is inconsistent. It's up, it's low, but everything looks like my mom'll get to come home within the next couple of days.
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