The hits keep coming

I briefly mentioned in a blog last week that my dad was in the hospital and I was worried about him. He was moved last Thursday to a nursing home/rehab facility. Clearly, he needed some physical therapy in order to go back home, where he lives alone. Each day I talked with him, his words became more garbled and he was hard to understand.

I got a friend to keep the kids on Sunday so that Steve and I could head to Toledo to visit with him, get his mail and make sure all was well. Steve stayed back at my dad's apartment while I drove my dad's car over to the rehab center. When I arrived, my dad was sitting in a wheelchair and it quickly became apparent that he was not well. He was rather slumped in the chair and could only open one eye at a time. Within the first five minutes, he dozed off several times. Lunch came and he wasn't hungry. He could not hold the fork by himself nor could he get his drink to his mouth. My heart sunk. Just one week before he had driven himself to the grocery store and done some shopping.

I got the nurse and started asking questions. Without going into too many details, my dad is suffering from severe colitis probably brought on by Chrones Disease. This is a new diagnosis (as of July) but we were also told it wasn't Chrones. It's been a confusing journey to say the least. Suffice it to say, he is SEVERELY dehydrated. So not being able to get a drink to his mouth on his own is NOT good. The nurse told me she thought this was his normal state. I think when she saw how upset I was (I just couldn't get myself under control) she got the picture. In between semi-lucid conversations that were hard to understand, he was having crazy hallucinations. It was scary.

When we left on Sunday (which was incredibly hard for me to do, but had to be done since I had to be back home for a 9:30 chemo treatment on Monday morning), the nurses said they were going to call the house Dr. to see what they should do. Duh! You would think they would have done something a day or two sooner considering a man with severe diarrhea who can't get anything to drink on his own.

I got a phone call 20 minutes later saying they were taking him by ambulance to the ER. He has been in the ICU since Sunday night. He is now on a ventilator, sedated and the docs are waiting to see how to proceed next. His blood pressure was dangerously low. The medication they have been giving him has helped that stabilize a bit. His kidneys are not working properly and they don't know exactly why. They did a scope on his intestines yesterday to determine once and for all if he does have Chrones. We are in a holding pattern. We are praying that as he sleeps he will get the rest he needs for his body to heal.

Honestly, the last 15 months have been some of the hardest of my life. Losing my mom, a cancer diagnosis, chemo, losing Steve's grandma, and now facing the reality that I may lose my dad soon. I am seriously at the end of myself. I hate to be all pity party-ish. I fear being *that friend* who is all gloom and doom. But honestly, it feels like just as soon as I pick myself up from the most recent blow, something else comes in right behind it. I also know there are people in the world who have it (a.k.a. life circumstances) way worse than I do. I have so much to be thankful for... perhaps I need to focus there a bit... but OH MY GOSH... I don't know if I can take one more life drama anytime soon.

I feel as if in some ways I'm turning off emotion. I'm one crappy thing away from hardening my heart. Pray I don't. Thanks for reading. Thanks for caring. Most of all, thanks for praying. Here's hoping I have some good news to share with you some time soon!