Day 235, Year 9: Tiny Steps Backward Today
Date: Friday, June 13, 2014
Weather: Rain All Day and Evening—Heavy in the AM
Location: At “Porat’s by the Bay” in Greenland, NH
You move forward and then take some tiny steps backward. That was the case today. Mark is still not able to eat much of anything and today he didn’t feel like he could drink much. And by early evening he had a temperature of 101.3. He immediately took a couple of Extra Strength Tylenol and called the resident on duty at Mass General. He asked all of the standard questions and he told us to just hold tight. He would check with the surgeon on call and get back to us if we needed to head to Boston. But for the time being, the orders were to keep drinking water, rest, and call back if the temp went up even higher. It did. So we called back. He asked many of the same questions and also asked if we took the temp while Mark was in bed under the covers. That is exactly what we had done, so he asked Mark to get out of bed and then take the temp again. It went from 101.8 in bed to 101.1 out of bed. So once again the orders were to drink as much as possible, keep taking the Tylenol every 6 hours, and to call if at any point the temperature rises even higher. I’m hoping this is Friday the 13th pulling a bad joke on us and that tomorrow morning it will be gone. In the meantime, I’ll get Mark up every hour and a half during the night to check his temp.