So. Well. Let's see. I should have blogged a few weeks ago. I should have written about my middle nephew starting his first varsity football game. How he texted me "I love you too" which is funny because he normally doesn't do anything like that. How he played a great game even though they lost. I should have blogged about my awesome Labor Day weekend. How I spent it with my sister and her family and how I took my MX-5 on a poker run and how after going for a ride with my brother-in-law I was ready to buy a bike. I should have been blogging about how much fun I've had with Wheat since he's been up here. How we've starting going out for supper on Tuesday nights. The first Tuesday night was Hooters and the second was another wing place. How he and his friends taught me how to play Halo in x-box and didn't care that I was hanging out with them in their suite. That's the stuff I should have been blogging about for the past few weeks......
I'm blogging in a hospital room. I'm blogging while looking at my mom in a hospital bed. I'm blogging less than 24 hours after my mom had a quadruple bypass. Blogging from the ICU is not one of the places I even thought I would be blogging from.
It started out a fairly normal week. Monday I was off for Labor Day and watched the parade at my sisters with everyone. My niece was first runner up in the little beauty pageant they have and was waving at us from the convertible she was riding in. My mom had been acting a little weird all weekend, but we really didn't think much about it. She had been complaining of a bad headache. We should have pushed her to do something about it. We should have done a lot of things different. She left my sister's without saying goodbye which was kind of weird, but again, didn't really think anything about it.
On Tuesday I talked to my sister and she told me, "I told Mom, 'Am I making you a doctor's appointment? or are you going to?'" My sister said that my mom had already made an appointment for Wednesday.
My phone rang about 3:30 on Wednesday afternoon. I was in a meeting but saw it was from my sister so I left the room and answered it. I was not prepared for what she said. "They think mom had a heart attack on Friday." was how she started the conversation. I don't know exactly what I said. Something like, "I'm on my way." My sister said that wait because she was pretty sure they were bringing her to Omaha. I went outside, cried a little and then went back inside to get my desk cleaned up and wait for the call.
I met my mom and sister at the hospital around 6pm on Wednesday night. They were going to do a heart cath at 7:30 Thursday morning. We both stayed all night with mom, like we would go anywhere else. They took her down and we went to wait in the waiting room. The doctor came out about 10 minutes later and called us into the little room. I call it the bad news room. He said, "I have good news and bad news, what do you want first?" My sister said, "The bad news." and the doctor said, "Well, the good news is that her heart is strong, but the bad news is she has three blockages of about 95%. If she would have waited another day, you would have brought her in dead." Wow. That's not something you hear everyday. At this point my sister glazed over and I went into listen mode. They were going to do surgery either today or tomorrow and we caught it in time and all was going to be okay.
We were able to go back with my mom and talk to the doctor. He explained everything and said that he would do the surgery on Friday morning. At this time my mom's younger sister and my uncle showed up. I went out and hung out with them while my sister (who I'll go ahead and call Jacque because it's hard to keep typing my sister) stayed with my mom. Mom finally got up to her room around 12:30 and so I left Jacque with my mom and I headed home (only 20 minutes away) and took a shower and got some more clothes. I got back around 3;30 and then Jacque headed home to talk to the kids and let them know what was going on and sleep for a while. Jacque was trying to decided if she should sleep in a little bit or come back before the surgery started. The nurse got me a reclining chair and I slept right beside mom all night. My phone rang around 4am and it was Jacque and she was on her way up. Turns out it was probably a good thing that she did.
I'm skipping a lot of things that I'll probably come back and talk about. (just a FYI)
They come and get mom around 6:30am. Jacque and I follow them down to the pre-op room. There are a lot of people running around and a lot of different rooms. It was amazing that there were that many rooms and that many people and it all seemed to be running smoothly! Mom was in her room and they were hooking her up to a bunch of stuff. Then the fun happened. The dude come to start a few lines for IV's and the such. Jacque was up there talking to mom and I kind of had my back turned. I'm not good and watching the poking so I wasn't it. Then all of a sudden I started not feeling good so I sat on the little chair. I was trying to talk myself out of it because I knew that Jacque will kill me if I got sick. I was sitting there and then the dude came around the bed with some gauze that had blood on it. That's all it took. I said, "I don't feel good" and then I started sweating and turned white. The got mom out of the room and moved her somewhere else to finish things up and brought in a bed for me. I laid down and started feeling better but man was Jacque mad. I know that she was concerned, but in the way that we are, she said a few choice words and was really mad that she had to stay with me. "Mom's having open heart surgery and it's all about you." It made me laugh and she laughed too.
Mom made it through surgery but they got started late thanks to me!
After we knew she was okay, Jacque left to go home and get everyone ready for Jordy's football game. Mom said she the one thing we had to promise was to go to Jordy's football game. We did. Brently & I picked up Wheat and Seth and we all went to the game together. We got there and I went and sat by Jacque and her friend Christy. Christy looked at me at pointed to the ambulance by the field. "The ambulance is right there if you feel like you might faint." Jacque laughed and said, "That's never going to get old."
Jordy lost but it was a much better game than last week.
I got back to the hospital around midnight and sat with mom until 1am. Then I went home for some sleep in my own bed. I got here around 10 this morning and that takes you to present time. I'm here to cover her up, turn the fan up and down and make sure her feet stay uncovered. I can do that.
Yesterday when they wouldn't let me in to see her (they were getting her stable after the surgery) I kept sneaking in. I got kicked out twice and then the third time they said I could come in just for a minuted. I walked in and one of the cute guys working on mom said, "Now you're not the one that passed out this morning are you." Man - I can't catch a break.
Mom is sleeping a little bit right now. They are going to change her sheets in a while and I'll take that time to get something for lunch. I'm hoping they move her to another room this afternoon to get out of ICU.
Thanks for listening and I'll write more later.
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