Tuesday, May 19th

It was a busy day here at the hospital. The head doctor came in today and said that he is making improvements every day, which is a relief after all that he's been through. Dad's blood pressure was normal until after his colonoscopy, when it spiked. We found out that the blood in his stool was caused by two ulcers that developed, which will heal in time. He had a low-grade temperature throughout the day, which they think could be caused by infection in the dialysis line. The kidney team had been wanting to do a trial period off of dialysis to see if he could handle it, so they used today as an opportunity to do that. For the first time Dad was able to mouth words to us. The first thing he said was "pop" but we quickly told him he couldn't have any yet. He then responded to us by requesting water, but all the doctors allowed us to give him were swabs with water on them. The ventilator that Dad had in for a couple of weeks made his throat very dry, but he must pass a swallow test before being allowed to drink anything.