Some good news..

Mark is now conscious and no longer listed as critical.
Let me rewind....

Saturday- Saturday morning we did indeed go off to Bunnings. We now have paint for Sarah's room! :0) and lots of other little goodies came home from Bunnings too. I wanted to get a punnet of annuals to plant in the planter next to my letter box and while we were checking out the garden section, Adam and the girls got really keen and bought a selection of vegetable seedlings- tomatoes, leeks, cucumbers and I can't think what else!!!
I had made the decision that I wasn't going up to the hospital and Mum keep me informed by phone. At lunchtime Saturday, Mark had to have his hands restrained and he kept trying to pull the ventilator tubes out of his throat. He was not fully conscious at this stage.
Saturday afternoon Adam and the girls had a lovely afternoon, preparing the garden bed and planting all their seedlings. They even planted my flower seedlings in the letterbox for me. I stayed inside as I was watching a DVD. I watched 'Freedom Writers' - wow, really good movie, very thought provoking. I also got to do a little bit of scrapping. I did wandering out several times to check on the gardeners!
By Saturday night the doctors had made the decision to take Mark off the ventilator and he became more aware of his surroundings. Mum and Dad were there and said that he recognized them, knew who he was, his birth date etc but didn't know what had happened, the year, where he was etc. He kept falling off back to sleep- all normal according to the medical staff.

Sunday- Mum and Dad visited Mark in the hospital and said that he seemed much better than the night before however still didn't know what had happened to him and he just wanted to get out of there. Mum and Dad came to our house for lunch and then they drove back to Bunbury. After coming up here at such short notice, they felt they needed to go home overnight to re sort clothes, appointments etc. Mum is on her way back to Perth as I type. Anyway, with Mum and Dad not in Perth, I spent the afternoon at the hospital with Mark. I was really pleased when I got to see him in ICU that he recognized me straight away. By then he knew where he was, what had happened to him, he even remembered falling as he collapsed at work last Tuesday. While I was there they moved Mark out of ICU to the High Dependency Area (HDA) as he is still on oxygen and his kidneys are still a concern. When I left at about 5:30, I felt really relieved as if a huge step had been taken.

This brings us to this morning, Monday - Mum is on her way from Bunbury to the hospital and should be there by 9:30 however the hospital rang me about 6:30 this morning. Mark had had a restless night, was really confused and the nurses wanted me to talk to him. Poor Mark, he can't remember being moved from ICU to HDA and has woken up not knowing where he is. He can't even remember me being with him all yesterday afternoon. Oh - I feel very flat at the moment. One big step forward, a couple of small steps back. The nurse spoke to me before I spoke to Mark and she said this is normal for Mark to be confused and to forget things after what he has been through. Hopefully when Mum gets there he will be better. In fact, I'm sure that when Mum gets there Mark will fell a whole lot better.

This morning it is raining here. It was bucketing down earlier- great for those little seedlings! :0)
I am going to remove most of Sarah's furniture from her room this morning (better remember to take a 'before' photo) All that furniture will have to sit in my family room (joy oh joy) and then after swimming I am going to start to strip off the wallpaper boarder she now has in her room and prepare the walls for painting. Not really looking forward to this bit but I know I will be really pleased when it is done!

If you are still reading all the way down here- well done, stay safe and have a great day.
Love Janine xxx