This one is easy,
They just slide the tracie out, dead easy. Then it heals its self, very little scarring. They will keep it covered with a dressing on, which they will tell him to put some pressure on when he talks. (helps to stop you blowing it open)
Is he have any more treatment? radiation, chemo?
If so he could keep the PEG for longer, I had mine for three months (just surgery)
Anything else you think of please ask, I'll help if I can. Or some one here will have an answer.
Remember to take out some time for yourself.
The restaurant right downstairs (not WRVS on the ground floor) does good food at reasonable prices, might save you cooking when you get home.
Sunshine.. love and hugs
Helen

Judith- My husband has had his PEG for almost 1 year now. Since his cancer is recurring and spreading he will coninue with it-possibly permanently. It really is a lifesaver if Harold needs chemo/radiation. As Helen said-the trach heals very fast. He probably has a chest infection from it though. Neil did but it went away quickly with medication. The trach is the fastest thing to heal once it is removed. The swelling on his face will probably come and go for awhile. It also seems more evident in the morning.
How are you holding up? You are a wonderful person to be giving blood during this stressful time. It is truly the gift of life and once you know someone you love has benefitted from it-that makes it all the more important.

Sue

I've been crying this afternoon, because when anyone else goes to see Harald he is fine with them but when I see him he isnt very nice to me and Im really doing my very best, I truly am. He threw a bit of a tantrum today and threw his white board across the room and knocked over some water and cups etc. The nurses had to clean it up. He thinks Im making a fuss but he DOES have a chest infection and all I wanted to do was change his pijamas as the ones he was wearing was covered in stuff he had coughed up - hence full of germs. Im not a germ freak, but I know what is right and wrong when it comes to taking the upmost care with hygiene in patients such as Harald with a tracheostomy etc. but I just seem to be getting on his nerves. I feel so very low. Never felt so low in my life.

Im going to sleep all day tomorrow and take 1 vallium pill.

Judith
Stop fretting, this is quite normal, especially when some one is on morphine.
When my husband had his triple bypass, everything I did was wrong, i decided I was not getting involved with a stroppy drugged up idiot. (the nurses get paid we don't) Oh and when he is better he will not remember a thing.
If I sound hard I'm not, my husband is blind and I stayed at the hospital for five days and nights, got good at picking my moment to go off for a coffee.
So stop worrying, the nurses will have him changed in the morning when he gets his wash.
Try and get a good nights sleep, it will all look better in the morning.
Sunshine.. love and hugs
Helen

Hi Helen,

Its breaking my heart to see him like this..... Im not doing well myself and Im already thinking its only been one week and we've got such a long journey to go with this thing. Whenever I go to Kinmonth, there are never enough nurses, no doctors and no information. One of the histolog reports should have come through today - but any doctors around? no - all in theatre. He has been advised to have a second scan - for what? Ive no idea and the nurses say they dont know. So Harald is completely frustrated and Im frustrated too as I can get no info. Now Im worried about the patholog report too. There will be two - one from the flesh and one from the bone they removed. Helen can I contact you separately about this please? tomorrow via the messaging service on here seeing as you know LRI etc.? would be most grateful. Also thanks to Sue Marie for your advice and help too.

Judith xxx

Judith xxx

Judith
PM me or e-mail me. Any thing I can do to help.
Sunshine.. love and hugs
Helen.

Judith- It's going to be ok. Believe me, I understand. My husband called me all kinds of names and I'm not an overly sensitive person but it is such an awful situation. My husband used foul language and hand signals but always seemed to be calm when visitors came. On more than one occasion I walked out of the room and took a walk to the hospital lobby just to get away. By the time I came back he was a different person and even apologized once in awhile. To this day he has no recollection of any of it. Please don't take it personally. The nurses called it Intensive care psychosis and they were right. I too tried to clean him up only to have it backfire. Do what you can but don't go crazy. He'll be fine! Somewhere in his fog-he knows you are there because you love him.

Sue

Judith,

Please don't take anything your husband says or does personally. My brother, who passed in 2006, used to throw things at my mother, who was his main caregiver, and used to tell me tht she is trying to kill him. He wouldn't let her in the room most of the time. Only when he slept could she go in and do what she had to. Sometimes when I was taking care of him, he looked at me in disgust and questioned everything I did. But he did snap out of it and aplogized a million times and told us he loved us. He said he couldn't help what he was doing.

It was a sad, crazy time but we all knew we loved each other and nothing he ever did during that time I ever took personally. I know I loved him, he loved us and I will always remember the brave battle he fought. He was my hero.

So just take a day at a time. YOu are doing a great job, and just remember he loves you, its the medication, not you.

All my best.

Susan

Hello Helen, SueMarie and Susan, thank you all so much for your posts. I was feeling wretched yesterday and realised with horror its only one week into the journey. Yes, Im sure you are right its the medication speaking. I am trying to take each day as it comes and the medication Im on is helping with that - but its very strange as I can only think about the next hour ahead not the next day or month or whatever, and on the other hand, I NEED to think and try and be myself again. Im going to the doctors in the morning to try and get my own medication adjusted. At the moment I feel as though I have no brain, and I want it back, but equally if I get it back, I know what I will be like, I will be fretting about everything that is to come.

I hope Harald is in a better state today than yesterday. Its also frustrating not getting enough information from the nursing staff and I keep asking to see the surgeons but they are either in theatre or "gone home". For e.g. Harald has written on his white board that he needs to have a scan of his jaw - is that to check how the flap is healing? I ask the nurses and they say they dont know. How can they not know. Im going to push for an appointment to see the consultant today. Thanks so much all, love to you all.

Will check in tonight. Helen - will be in touch.

Judith xxx