Sunday, August 4, 2024

Sunday, August 4, 2024

Tonight's picture was taken in August of 2007. We were in Los Angeles visiting my parents. It was an August tradition! That day we went for lunch at a restaurant called Emilio's. Mattie loved the fountain on their terrace, as you can see by the big beaming smile. How I wish Mattie was with me now. I could use the support and would love such a fierce ally. 

Quote of the day: Heaven doesn’t ignore cries of a broken heart. ~ Toba Beta

It hasn't been a good day! It is 4:20am, and I have NOT gone to sleep! At 6:30pm on Sunday, I rushed my dad to the ER and he had emergency surgery at 2am!

I took my parents out to brunch today. Overall, I would say my dad has been struggling all week. My dad has been very lethargic, his appetite has been close to non-existent, and while at the restaurant my dad was having trouble walking. When I got him home, I took all his vitals. At rest, his pulse was over 100, his breathing was labored, and he was running an 101 fever. I gave him a COVID test and it was negative. I contacted his doctor and told him I was going to take my dad to the ER. 


NOTE: Our server gave me a belated happy birthday surprise today. She decorated, got me gifts, and the restaurant gave me a $50 gift card toward today's meal, and dessert! When I look at my photo, I can see just how tired I am.


I got my dad and mom to the emergency room by 7pm. My dad couldn't walk in, so I ran into the ER and asked for a wheelchair. No one helped me, so I had to bring the chair out and get my dad out of the car and into the facility. Mind you I was managing him, bags, blankets, drinks, and holding my mom's hand (as her balance is awful). When we got inside, we were asked to put masks on, and provide IDs. But then the fun began. I met a nurse tonight that I wanted to throttle. This male nurse was doing triage. He took my dad's vitals and from his perspective they were basically normal. He then started to ask my dad questions. If you ask my dad how he is feeling, his natural response is..... FINE! I told this nurse that my dad has dementia and therefore he needs to direct his questions to me. He basically told me to stand down! How I did not leap over the desk and grab him, showed remarkable strength. You know when someone looks at you with a dismissive attitude and basically deemed me as a daughter who was crying wolf. WOW was he wrong and I was RIGHT!

After awaiting about thirty minutes, a tech took my dad's blood in a room right next to the waiting area. She couldn't start an IV in his arm, and landed up going through my dad's hand. Any case within minutes she did a rapid test of my dad's blood and could see that his POCT Lactic Acid score was high, indicating some sort of infection. Back to the waiting area we went, until we were called back about an hour later into an ER room. The ER doctor was a peach! He gathered right away that my dad wasn't tracking him and that he had dementia. He treated me as part of the care team, and we both were on the same page. He ordered a chest and abdominal CT for my dad, a nebulizer treatment (as my dad had labored breathing), and started him on IV antibiotics and Tylenol. The doctor also asked me to catch my dad's urine, in order to run a urinalysis. The urinalysis showed he had a UTI. However, it did not end there. The CT scans revealed that my dad had large kidney stones blocking both of his ureters making it close to impossible to pass urine. So urine was backing up and if I did not catch this early, he would have gotten sepsis and potentially died. It was that life threatening! Thank goodness I followed my instinct, because when I care for someone (I get to know you VERY well), and I assess something is wrong, I am usually correct. 

In any case, at 2pm, I met my dad's urologist. He happened to be on call. He is the one who wanted to do the emergency stent insertion. Because of my dad's infection, they were unable to perform lithotripsy to blast out all the stones (and he has many). So once we stabilize him, I will have to take my dad back to the hospital for two more admissions, to get the stones addressed. We have a long road ahead, and I am so strung out right now, the thought of going to sleep isn't on my radar scope.