Mom at Shands, 20 Oct

See-Ing and Chu-King arrived overnight. Cara and Sanford picked them up at the airport and brought them to Shands for a brief visit. Uncle King reports that Grandma did not recognize him. However, Grandma was alert this morning when the siblings reunited at the hospital in the a.m., following conversations and lifting her head to watch what was going on. Adelaide, Victoria and Hayley have been decorating some posters with which to decorate Grandma's room and Lian, Leroy and Sean sent a beautiful arrangement of stargazer lilies and pink roses. We also created a small photo album of family photos that Sarah had printed at a local Walgreen's for us to pick up. Our routine of late has been that Dad and Keeng stay overnight (from 8 pm to 9 or 10 am) while the rest of the family visits during the day. It has been a huge help to Dad and Ruth having family here, as they no longer have to do tag-team coverage of only one person at a time, and that one person always having to be awake. Dad and Keeng take turns sleeping. They are both sleep-deprived, but less so than if they were doing this alone. The nurses observed some reddening on Grandma's bottom and so are having to turn her every two hours to prevent against skin breakdown. This causes Grandma pain, so she is being administered morphine. We think that she must be really tired, since with yesterday's chest tube insertion she did not rest as much as usual. The chest tube is still draining fluid, though far less in volume and not as red in color. The pleuodesis procedure will be done on Monday. Jonathan is flying back to Texas as we speak and Cara and Sanford fly out this evening. Lang, Hong, Hayley, Joan, Adelaide and Victoria will be returning to Texas by car tomorrow. Sarah arrives Monday. I am not sure about Keeng's or King's plans. See-Ing, Dad and Ruth will be in Jacksonville indefinitely. Alan and I will be returning home to Tallahassee shortly, so you will receive future updates from another family member. Take care, Megan