My week, the shorter version
Monday: Go to doctor with mom — she has a blood drawn, we drive three hours to our house.
Tuesday: 10am urgent call from the doctor’s office. Weird lab results — go to the hospital in Columbus, there’s a room.
Wednesday: Need to adjust medicines to drop blood pressure — kidneys showing signs of decreased function. Oops — too much cardizem.
Thursday: Now that’s out of her system, she’s just getting her meds adjusted, should be out of here in a couple of days.
Friday: call at 7:45am — your mom’s having difficulties verbalizing, and some weakness in the right side. Get to the hospital. She’s just about to get an angiogram to pinpoint/repair the clot. Mechanical removal? Not as effective as drugs and difficult to do well. Chemical removal? Risky, since she was given heparin for a suspect EKG, but it’s been a few hours so it should be out of her system. After the (chemical) procedure, she’s in ICU. Ventilator ’cause they’re not sure her brain will make her throat work properly, and she’s been short of breath and so might have a pulmonary embolism. We won’t know what’s affected for several days at least.
Saturday: Short visit… waiting, waiting. She’s able to move her right arm and leg now, and her eyes track together (which she wasn’t doing yesterday). But she doesn’t seem to hear/pay attention to people talking to her. She looks scared. And so so small.
