Well hello there.
So, if you hadn't already noticed, I have been MIA the past few months.
Josh spent majority of the summer of 2013 in an out of the hospital. It was hard to blog with so much going on.
He was assessed for the lung transplant list early in the summer, but was denied. Thankfully they changed their mind and he was officially added to the list at the end of September 2013. We moved from London to Toronto at the beginning on October to begin a specialized pre-transplant work out program and to begin meeting with all the doctors that would play a very important part in our lives after we got the call for transplant.
On October 21st, 2013 everything changed.
At around 930pm the phone at the hotel rang.
It was a transplant coordinator calling to inform us that there was a set of donor lungs available.
Everything after that is bit of blur.
An emotional roller coaster so to speak.
We packed a small bag and headed straight to the hospital, which was luckily only a five minute walk from the hotel.
After a sleepless night, Josh was taken to the OR at 9am.
After only 46 days of waiting he received his new lungs, and his new chance at life.
Josh spent a total of 17 days bouncing between the ICU, step-down unit, and transplant inpatient unit. He did get a lung infection in his new lungs about a week an a half in and have to get the breathing tube place back in, but he fought it like a champ.
We made arrangements to stay at the hotel for the next 3 months to complete a post-transplant workout program, and to be monitored closely by all the doctors.
A few days before his birthday on December 6th, Josh was very ill with fever, vomiting and was unable to eat or drink. After a trip to the ER they determined that he had contracted CDIFF during his last hospital stay and required emergency surgery on his birthday to remove his colon.
Everything happened so fast that we didn't fully understand everything that was going on.
It is a good thing that the surgery was preformed, because the surgeon who did it told us that his colon was one of the worst ones she had ever seen.
Josh spent a couple more weeks recovering in the hospital then he came back to the hotel for a couple days, then we were headed home for the holidays.
After Christmas Josh became ill again, and was hospitalized with phenomena in late December.
He was eventually able to kick it, and we headed back to Toronto for the final weeks of the workout program and his 3 month post-transplant assessment.
We were given the okay to come home last week and we couldn't be happier. Living in a hotel for 4 months is not nearly as fun as it sounds.
He will be closely monitored here in London, and we will make trips to Toronto still, but it sure beats living in a hotel!
We are slowly getting back into the swing of things so, please bear with me!
Please, if you aren't already, become an organ donor.
