Day 11: Dad is Feeding

Dad Stats:
Most recent temperature: 97.9F
Most recent blood pressure: 102/56
Today's white blood cell count: 2.89

Weight: 143.7 lb

Today has been one of the best Dad days yet! Dad woke up this morning and was ready to start chowing down on anything and everything. We started off slow with a breakfast of coffee, oatmeal, raisins and jello. Dad cleaned the plate and did not have a single side effect from the food as of yet. We are all really happy because Dad was getting close to the 10 day mark of not eating so this is a really good sign! Take a look at the image of Dad eating up all the breakfast. Dad went and took a shower right after breakfast was delivered so he was able to enjoy about an hour without having the IV attached and dragging behind him. Part of being able to get away without the IV was that we were able to take a walk around the BMTW without dragging that silly machine. We made 5 laps before the nurse slowed us down and hooked up the IV again.

Obviously one of the other awesome stats is Dad's WBC count today. Dad has more than tripled his white cell count from 0.89 to 2.89 in 24 hours! Sorry Joan and Sue...you guys were to low! Just for fun I went ahead and plotted Dad's WBC Count from the low to current date. For even more FUN I added a 2nd order polynomial curve fit

to try and predict the next WBC Count. It does appear to be more of an exponential function but I could just not get a decent R value for the fit... The nurse and Dr. have changed their tone from recovery to becoming an outpatient possibly by Thursday. Dad is a real success story here and is being told that he is the FASTEST recovering patient that anybody can remember in recent history. I have to say that Dad is pushing on so extremely hard because of the support he is getting from all of the people who visit, call, send e-mail and read the blog. We all feel very fortunate have such a good support network and there really is no way to thank everybody for all that is done.

Dad watched the news and read his Kindal all day without taking any sort of nap. I asked him if he was tired and he said that he feels more like he is in recovery mode because his body is not telling him to sleep 24 / 7. It has been more than 24 hours since dad has used any of the morphine so the nurse actually came in and took the pump out. There is still talk of removing one of the main IV lines because all Dad is getting through IV now is electrolytes and fluids.

Today about lunch time (while I was on a tele conn) Dad had a quick snack of peaches. As seen

in the picture Dad is reading his Kindal and chowing down on a peach. Dad was reading his e-mail on the Kindal and got to one e-mail that required a response so I loaned Dad my MacBook. Dad started reading e-mail and surfing the net for about the next 4 hours! One of the first things Dad did was submit his pre-order for a new Nissan Leaf full electric vehicle. Dad went through and selected his desired color, options, charging station and time frame. If anybody recalls Dad and I drove to the factory that makes the Nissan Leaf in Nashville TN for a test drive when the first few were released. Of course this opened up the whole conversation that Dad 'Has to get an iPhone' to control his car now. All very funny conversations.

Dad moved on to read most of his e-mail and then on to looking over NASA SBIRs for upcoming business opportunities. I eventually had to take my MacBook away from Dad because he started to draft a proposal! It was actually pretty good timing because there happened to be a pear delivery around that time that interrupted Dad's idea storming session anyway. Dad took a break to consume what he said was 'about 5 pears.'

Right now Dad and I are still watching the news and chatting about topics like adding solar products and installation to my web site, making a hamster wheel virtual reality simulator and finishing the chicken coop at home. We ordered dinner a little while ago do Dad is anxiously awaiting his first real meal of Penne Pasta with Marinara sauce, Macaroni & Cheese, Mashed Potatoes, and Hot Tea. After dinner we have a video call planed to chat with Vic and if we are real lucky we will catch Eva where she can talk as well. Hopefully everything will godown well tonight and we will have another productive day tomorrow!

P.S. - Post your new guestimate for Dad's WBC Count!