Louise Got Very Sick Very Quickly After The Last TACE

Well, that didn’t go well. Louise went downhill faster and harder than me on my motorcycle.

On Friday after her chemotherapy liver treatment, I made a prediction she would start spiralling on Monday, with the hope it wasn’t too severe this time. Well, nausea and vomiting started prematurely on Friday night. Then on Saturday, we went to emergency because she couldn’t manage her pain. Then after five days of continuous comatose-sleep, not eating and most alarmingly, the delirious state of confusion, slurred speech and incoherent conversation, it was time to get her into 24-hour care. In hindsight, she should have been in professional care since the procedure.

Lou didn’t want to go to mainstream emergency hospital care and I didn’t want to take her to any clinic, so we had a quick family discussion and I bundled her in the car with her pillow and dooner and drove to Burghausen, close to the Austrian border. The only positive of her being so whacked is that I could make use of the autobahn without her breaking my balls.

Six hours in the car and we were at the Medias Klinikum and in a consult with prof. Dr. med. Karl R. Aigner (who I had connected with in October). Then we had Lou on some fluids and overnight monitored care. It was five days overdue but I’m happy to shoulder the poor judgment and responsibility. She’s here now and that’s the main thing.

This morning, they x-rayed her chest to assess her pleural effusion and also took blood samples to pathology with the results due back today.

Do you know I spent a couple of weeks in a hospital far from here, the university hospital in Innsbruck? It was about a month after I met Lou. Yeah, a “skiing accident.” She was still courting me 😉, so I remember talking to Lou on the hospital pay phone. They didn’t have any English stations on the TV and I was in traction for a few days, it sucked. At least we have two rubbish English stations here now. I also remember sneaking out of the Innsbruck hospital and walking a few kilometres along the river to get a McDonald’s soft serve. I was struggling with the hospital food and my jaw was freshly wired. It’s an interesting and funny story, remind me to divulge one day…….. Sorry, sidetracked, back to Lou.

In all honesty, I don’t mind caring for Lou 24×7 but the only medical experience I have is the dozens of time I have been an inpatient. So a few times lately, when she hasn’t budged for hours and I find myself checking to see if she is breathing and warm, I say to myself, “what the fuck is going on? How are we in this position right now and why am I researching on the internet at 1 am to see why her brain isn’t working and if it’s going to recover. It’s a crazy world sometimes and we’re defiantly in the depths of its ugliness.

So the short-term objective is to get Lou well enough to have a family Christmas back in Frankfurt. Lou’s mum Lynda is shouldering the kids care right now in our Bad Humberg Airbnb and Lou and I want to get back for Christmas Eve. Most importantly to make sure Santa comes by that night. Noah can write now so his wish lists on route to the north pole are pages long out of control. We better be there to answer him if a select few of his requests are not delivered on the 25th.

So I sign this post off from a hospital bed, lined up next to Lou’s, while she receives a big bag of liquid food through her chest port. She seems at ease in the comfort of care here. She’s eaten a little today, she’s still talking nonsense but the colour has returned to her face and I believe she’s on a north-east pointing recovery-trajectory.