Liminal Limbo...

My favorite pic of Mommy and me.

So at the last minute Mom relented and agreed to dialysis and life support. Yesterday the dialysis had to be stopped, but it went ok today. Things are not looking good, though. I have the feeling the doctors are going through the motions, if you know what I mean.

More Mama Drama

Well, Mom was home for two very difficult days, then we had to call an ambulance because she was swelling in a way that reminded me of the girl in Willy Wonka - she turned round and blue. Ugh. The good part is, we got her to the hospital on time and she seems to be getting better, but I've been sleeping at the new hospital again. I wouldn't let them send her back to the other one because of all the problems and infections she had there.

Her kidneys are a little strained, but OK. She may have some kind of obstruction in her bowels that they are treating. The diabetes and congestive heart failure are ongoing conditions, but are under control. Her leg still, after 2 months, needs an operation. I'm really pissed about that - it was the whole reason she was hospitalized in the first place and it still isn't done.

The hospital she is in now is much closer to home - less than 25 miles round trip as opposed to 70. My 73 year old dad gets to sleep in his own bed, which is a vast improvement. This hospital is small but new, very modern and clean. They have the best of everything, and the staff is happy and not overworked. My mom's nurse has responsibility for 2 or 3 people at most and sits literally right outside her room. Mom is observed on video every minute. This hospital even has a lounge for the family to use with comfy couches, a coffee maker and a TV - it's like being in your own living room - and they provide meals for the family that's there with the patient, at least in the intensive care unit. She was in this hospital's rehab unit 4 years ago and also had excellent care then. It's the finest care I've ever seen and we've seen a lot of hospitals.

So, I have hope, we're getting some sleep and mom seems to be on the mend. There are still serious issues but (knock wood) things are getting better.

The Drama with My Mama

It just goes on and on...

After she spent over 3 weeks in rehab, doing great, making us think 2 days in a row that she was coming home, they tell us they have to operate again. Fine.

They move her to a surgical floor and for some unknown reason, give her a sedative - never a good idea with her. She throws off some weird potassium readings, probably due to a kidney infection, they put her in ICU thinking her kidneys were failing. After 2 days, they decide she has double pneumonia. I sit there for a day watching her and trying to figure out how someone who was doing as well as she was wound up intebated with a feeding tube over a weekend. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that he problem was that they sedated her. I insisted that they the tubes out, which took a day and a half to make sure she didn't really need them, and she seemed fine. She was breathing well, she was starting to understand where she was and what was going on. By this time, it's been 5 days and she can't understand why they didn't fix her ankle while she was out. I'd like to know that, too.

Anyway, at this point she has been in that dirty hospital for almost 7 weeks. I tell one of her doctors that I think she needs to come home for a few days before they operate on her leg again because she has been convinced she's never getting out of there. The way this is playing out is very similar to the way her brother died in November and her sister in March. Psychologically, she needs a break from that place, she needs to be home and Dad and I need a rest from driving all the way over there every day. They made us think she might come home today. We go there - no doctor is around, no one has said anything about her leaving or moving her. We figure nothing will happen until tomorrow so we come home to rest, knowing it's going to be really hard work, especially for me, when she comes home.

10:30 tonight, Dad is asleep and I'm fighting off a troll attack on one of my Wikis. I hear Dad talking, and I know something is wrong. Turns out he's on the phone with Mom, who is extremely agitated and demanding that we come get her. Dad and I trade off talking to her while the other tries to call the hospital. Mom is telling tales of being neglected, no one comes when she calls a nurse, etc. We finally - FINALLY - get a nurse on the phone and they're totally freaked out. They can't calm her down, they're afraid of her, she's threatening to climb over the rails on the bed and crawl home. Believe me, my mom is big and mean and can be impossible to control at times. She's in danger of really hurting herself. I told the nurse to give her some ice chips, which is one of her complaints and will calm her down, and tell her her family is on the way.

I wanted to go and let Dad stay in bed, but he won't have it. He tells me to go back to bed and he'll go to the hospital. I know he's completely freaked out because he forgot his keys and had to call my cell phone so I could let him back in. So my poor father, who is exhausted from this ordeal, takes off through the damned mountains in the middle of the night and I'm here dealing with some asshole who put misogynist slurs and KKK propaganda on a wiki I worked really hard to put together.

I know Mom will calm down when Dad gets there. I'm sitting by the phone in case she calls again before he can get there, since the hospital is nearly an hour away. I don't know what the hell we are going to do. There's so much going wrong with me and my disability that isn't being addressed at all because all we can do is react to the stuff happening with Mom.

I've been trying to distract myself with the blogosphere, but I keep getting into fights with people about f-ing Hillary Clinton. The more people defend her, the more I grow to despise her.

So now what? Do I try to sleep? Do I wait to hear from Dad? Do I keep watching Ethan Hawke butcher my favorite Shakepearean play? I'm too hyper to read. My room is a horrid mess, which is not helping anything.

It's all just. too. much.

The saga continues....

Now Mom has double pneumonia. It will be a couple of days before they know what kind of infection she has going on, then they'll know how to treat if. Fun, fun.

All prayers, well wishes and positive energy gratefully accepted right now.

Mom's getting worse~

They moved her onto a surgical floor last night and we expected her to be operated on today, but when Dad called the hospital this morning we found out they were moving her to ICU because she was showing signs of kidney failure. This is starting to follow the same pattern that led to my aunt's death in March. Prayers and positive thoughts that she gets better would be greatly appreciated. It's too early to lose her.

Checking in...

There's so much going on that I want to talk about - Obama, Clinton, Gay Marriage, Bush using the Nazi card, many more things- but I just can't pull it together. I spent two nights in a row sleeping at the hospital, and even though I was home last night, I'm stilll wrecked. I have to go back tomorrow and sleep there and I can't face it. My mom thinks I should be there every minute, but I just can't do it. I'm trying.

The rough part is that it's only going to get worse. Now we have the nurses at the hospital to help. When she gets home it will be Pop and me doing it all. She was already fairly dependent, now it will be worse. I just hope she gets to where she can walk at least a little. We're going to have to have a ramp built for a wheel chair. It's all too much. I feel so guilty about saying that, but I'm disabled myself - getting through the day is already a challenge for me.

Send me good energy, please - I'll write something coherent as soon as I can.

Peace~

Merry Imbolc!

I hope you all had a great Brighid's Day!

My day wasn't bad except for two things. First, my mother told me that buying sketchbooks for myself and my younger cousins is "money thowed [sic] into the fire... but then you throw money away anyway." Then, about the dinner I fixed for my family, which was gorgeous and succulent if I do say so myself: "It was hard to get out of the shell - I don't like sweet lobster."

And people wonder why I can't get out of bed.

On to other news:

Writer Molly Ivins died this week and it breaks my heart that she didn't live long enough to see the end of the Bush Administration. She succumbed to breast cancer, so why don't we all buy one of the many pink Susan G. Komen fund products that are sold these days. I think Molly would appreciate that.

Barbaro had to be put to sleep. Talk about one, brief shining moment. RIP, champ.

In Kentucky this week. two teen boys were convicted of driving around shooting horses for fun. Those are serial killers in the making. Why wait until they get out and move on to killing people? Let's put them down before they do any more damage.