Ethanol 70% is what is being pushed into the red lumen on Ivy’s hickman’s line.

I know it’s the red because I think -

red equals  the evil, infected side

and white (the other lumen colour) represents the good, usable side.

Easy to remember, with that whole good versus evil thing.

Anyway, the red lumen gets ethanol and the white gets heparin.

It’s a controversial protocol, to say the very least.

You see, heparin and ethanol don’t mix.

If they do it will cause precipitate – which is kind of like lumpy bits in your gravy.

I’m not sure what that means for Ivy exactly because nobody can answer my questions

or they don’t want to

but I imagine it can’t be good for the line

or Ivy’s vein.

There are warnings everywhere you look that says that the two should not be mixed.

Not that they do  mix – the red and the white represent two separate lines to a point

but eventually, they merge into one

and that’s where I start to feel nervous.

When I ask the doctor what will happen if the heparin and the ethanol meet up he starts to look all shifty

and like he wants to be some place else.

There are issues with the ethanol lock itself

and every time we walk away from the hospital, each Monday morning

early,

so that Ivy doesn’t have to miss another day of school,

I leave with more reservations.

You see, they push the ethanol into the ‘dead space’ of the line and there it dwells for a week.

It’s supposed to kill all the bugs and prevent any more septic showers

well,

at least from the red lumen, anyhow.

The white one still has the standard heparin flush, so who knows what nasty little bugs are growing in there.

The thing is

that at the end of the week they are supposed to then redraw the ethanol

but that never happens.

They push and pull on that red lumen but not a drop comes out and no blood either.

There should at least be blood.

Instead when the nurse pulls back the syringe she gets nothing

just air

or gas

or something

but no ethanol.

I wonder where it goes.

I wonder why there is no flash back of blood.

I asked those very questions and one nurse told me it becomes “thick in the line”

and another told me it “dissipates”.

The paed thinks it “evaporates”

and I ask them all every week, which one is it

and every week they don’t answer

or can’t

but I am told that they “understand my anxiety”

which makes me feel stupid for worrying

and then cranky

because they are taking their inability to give me answers

and deflect that into my inability to control my emotions

when all I want to know is where the ethanol is going

and if it is causing risk to my girl in any way -

if having no ethanol in the line (no anything, really),

whether it  dissipates or evaporates, will make the whole process null and void

because if there is no ethanol (anything) dwelling in the line then isn’t that leaving it open to infection?

Confused?

Yeah, me too.

It’s partly why I’m writing it all down,

to try to make some sense of it all

and partly just to get it out of my head because it’s eating me up inside.

After they unsuccessfully try to redraw the ethanol they just flush it into her body

with saline

and it drops her heart rate right down.

Right down -

into her boots down.

Lets face it, ethanol is a depressant.

I don’t know whether that flush is mixing with heparin at the end of the line

I don’t know what the long term effects may be, having 2 mls of 70% pure ethanol pushed into her system every week

all I know is it makes her sleep for a large part of the trip home

at 8am in the morning.

Either that or she spends the hours drive back home laughing like a loon.

I have so many questions and never any answers

and really

I just want the ethanol locks to stop.

I know that isn’t going to happen though -

the risks of infection without it are high.

Maybe I over think things,

maybe I should just accept that I may never have the answers

and while ever she is not showing any signs of anything bad happening not worry at all

and maybe you should just send the men in white coats now,

with a straight jacket

and the promise of a padded cell

because I can’t see that happening any time soon.