Another Week at the Hospital

Sometimes there is just too much stress.

Ma ended up in the hospital again, this time in Morristown Memorial. She's still there but things seem to have improved dramatically. Still, it's 8 days now and it's been a long, stressful time. I put her there, too. I have zero regrets about that decision as this could have well killed her if I hadn't done that. It's a long story...

She was in Chilton Hospital for 8 days after having seizures, from 9 - 16 July. She was released, came home, and was having a lot of difficulty because she was urinating a lot, and getting in and out of bed and moving around wasn't easy. Add to that the drugs she'd been put on for the seizures (Dilantin and phenobarbitol) and she was tired and sleeping all the time (when not urinating). So it was not a happy combination. And the day she came home or maybe the day after, she tripped over one of the dogs they were babysitting and fell on the safe, potentially breaking some ribs. And when she told me about this on Monday, you can imagine the predictable answer: WHAT?! Why didn't you get those checked out?!

Her response: I just got out of the hospital! I didn't want to go back!

Just like every old patient that I get. Too much time in the hospital and no one goes when they should! I did not do anything about it, except mention every day that she needs to go to her doctor and get those things checked out.

Well, Friday (the 21st), I went to Luis' company picnic. This is not really an enjoyable experience. I really feel like the employees and spouses only ever talk about their kids and have no personalities of their own. The men discuss sports and getting away from their kids. They drink copiously and that is just adding to the agony for me. It is a boring thing to attend. And I had spoken to Ma early and she didn't sound right. So I called from the picnic site, which is right down the road from the house (maybe two miles) and she sounded worse - slurring words and she was going to the bathroom all the time. I was a little upset and somehow the signs were just not clicking into place. I left the picnic and went home, thinking I was just going to hang out and take a nap or something.

Well, I got the messages on the phone and one was from Ma mentioning that her blood sugar was over 500! That was when it all clicked into place! She was going into diabetic shock! I called the house and did not get an answer, so I called 9-1-1 and then raced over there. Somehow and it is a miracle, I did not get pulled over! But I will say I definitely cleaned my engine out. I made it from Parsippany to Wayne in 12 minutes (it is a 25-minute trip). When I got there Ray was home (I had called him a couple of times to keep him informed of what was going on and it turned out he was unwittingly behind the rig going to their house). The ambulance was outside of the house and she was in it with the paramedics. My admittedly nosey neighbour was there (I actually hate that, but EMTs find nosey neighbours a hindrance), and Ray was a little confused. I spoke to the paramedics and EMTs there and they let me in the rig and asked me to come along for the ride. I asked if they'd take her to Morristown instead of Chilton and as a favour to me they did - Morristown is a little outside of their territory but for other EMTs it is amazing what they will do. I am enormously greatful to them!

Her blood sugar was still very high. She was taken for chest films and they found that she'd broken the 9th and 10th ribs (big surprise). They kept her to do a CAT scan and found pneumonia, so she was admitted. Now, I hadn't seen any signs or symptoms of lung issues and pneumonia is a scary ailment. So what I did was absolutely the right thing, just not for the reasons I'd thought. The blood sugar was the hint that something much, much more serious was happening.

At first she was on a nasal cannula getting 4LPM (liters per minute) of oxygen. I remember looking at her and thinking that this was... all wrong. She looked pale and kind of waxy, her breathing was obviously laboured and she was... swollen - edemic. I was also thinking that 4LPM of O2 was not enough. We'd have had her on high-flow oxygen for this... So I asked the nurse about it in the hallway and she corroborated my thoughts and told me that they were monitoring this closely. At this time Luis was flying out to Illinois for a business trip and so it was Ray and me making all the trips to the hospital. Not that there was anything Luis could do but one wants one's closest friends and family at a time like this.

On Sunday night Ma had some kind of serious problem and they did put her on high-flow O2 and get her into more serious care. The pneumonia was steadily worsening and they were thinking that the swelling was some kind of sepsis (blood infection; it could have been anything). They were moving her on Monday to the Medical Step Down area (not ICU but not just Joe-sick-person care) and into a respiratory area. That was both upsetting and reassuring at the same time. She needed to be more closely monitored and by the right people, so this was the right step.

That night we also had a conversation about what route we wanted to go if she did not respond to the new antibiotics and nebulaizers and other treatments for the pneumonia. We discussed ventilator options - easy enough, since I knew what decisions to make there. If things look reversable, yes, we will allow a ventilator. If this looks as though it will be a permanent thing - keeping her on a respirator for nothing, just prolonging the inevitable, then no, absolutely not. Still, it was not a conversation I was really truly prepared to have!

Right now it is 0500, and I'm surrounded by fuzz. Ariel is about five feet away to my left and Chelsea is sitting here just inches to the right of me. They know - they know when I'm upset about something. Sweet fuzzy soft babies. Ariel's new thing is to fall asleep right on my chest in bed, purring heavily. I love that.

Anyway, that night we had one of our intern's going away dinner: me and some of our management and a couple of others. It was a really nice restaurant although as usual I was uptight and unable to relax both due to the outside stress and the normal discomfort I have eating at finer establishments. Take me to a pizza joint, PLEASE! Still, I would have hated not going and saying a proper goodbye to this particular individual, whose stay with us absolutely made life richer and much more fun that it would have been - I loved all of my crazy interns. But this one is super-special to me. And he is the first to make it into our management program.

I got home at 2300 from that, an extraordinarily late night for me. I got up around 0700 and went to work by 0930. I got a lot done for that amount of time (I was out of there on Tuesday afternoon at 1430 to go see her in the new area she was in). I stayed there for a while and then Ray and I went home. I also managed to make it to Yoga, which felt GREAT!

I got in around 0920 on Wednesday and I guess it was around 1230 or so that I called Ma and she picked up the phone but was all out of breath and going on about how they were giving her a blood transfusion - what the hell! I know what treatments are invovled in pneumonia, and blood transfusions are not on the list! She managed to get out something about seeing some minimal heart damage and then she had to hang up as apparently they were having some trouble accessing the needed veins to do this! So I hung up in state, called back to get a medical suthority on the line, and got more (but not more satisfying answers) about this. I was in my office and Anna came in to ask me something and the first round of my meltdown began. She was very sweat and understanding about it and when the hysteria subsided, I tried to do a little more work and really accomplished almost nothing. I finally took her advise and packed up my bag to go to the hospital. I made it down the stairs and into the kitchen where one poor guy on the kitchen staff had the misfortune to run into me and ask how Ma is - I opened my mouth and before I knew it, the hysteria was fresh and new and had started fresh all over. In front of two completely lost men who really had no idea what to do with a totally hysterical, unglued woman, howling away in the Employee Room!

One of my colleagues showed up on the scene and here at last is one man that will keep that cool collected head and make sure that nothing gets too crazy. I kept insisting I was OK to drive but no, he really wanted to get someone to take me to the hospital, thinking that I was too much of a basket case to go. So one of the guys in Security took me to the Morriston Memorial Hospital, where Ray was already there.

Ray brought me back to work after it was all over so I could get my vehicle - well, Luis' vehicle. I was able to let my cool-headed collegeague know that everything was okay - mostly - and to thank him for his concern. And it was pretty OK. There might be some heart damage, and there may not - it is a matter now of getting some tests done.

I'm happy to say that she should be getting out as soon as she has one more test done. Hopefully that will be in the next couple of days. We will see.

Things are finally looking up!

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