Thursday night:
I call home to see how dad's been doing and mom starts to get upset saying she's concerned he's not recovering very well. He had fallen a couple of times the night before from losing his balance and he wasn't as chipper as he was the week before. Dad's hops on the phone and says, "when are you coming home, your mother's trying to kill me. She put the slippery carpet down in the bedroom and it made me slip" He's a joker like that and I laughed and told him to behave. Mom and I continued talking and I said she should gauge how he's doing and then take him back to the ER. Better to know if there's a problem or if this is just how things will be.
Friday, 3pm:
Mom calls me upset. They're back at the hospital in town and they're just waiting for an ambulance to take dad down to the hospital in TO again. whoa. Apparently the bleeded had happened again and he had just as much pressure on his brain as he did a few weeks ago. He needed surgery again. I gather my thoughts, talk to my boss/friend, wait for my sister to show up and we plan to do it all over again. We end up back at the hospital and dad's in good spirits, but his left side is numb again. Moving him from the chair to his bed was near impossible. His surgery was scheduled for the next morning and we went home at about 11:45pm.
Saturday:
Mom and I head back to the hospital to see how the surgery went. We talk quite seriously about them moving closer to my end of the province. 1. Nothing but the house is holding them to the town. 2. If dad can't work, it doesn't matter where he goes. 3. Mom was looking for a new job anyway and has more options out my way than where they are. I think I've almost got her convinced :) We arrive and he has the drain sticking out of his head again (gross). I joked around that they should just put a tap in there (like a keg) to drain any new blood pressure. He seems to be in more pain than last time and isn't feeling as well as the last time. He takes some codeine and eventually falls asleep. The dr comes in after a while and chats with us. Turns out 20% of patients come back within 2 weeks with more bleeding. This is normal. We're relieved, but still beside ourselves. Mom and I eventually make our way home and get there around 9pm. It's so exhausting!
Sunday:
mom and I made a visit schedule to give each other breaks. She's also bumped up her holidays to be more free. She sent me back to G-town this afternoon because I've just been bagged. I couldn't drive home last night because I was so tired. I think I've found the downfall to being the strength in the family. Once the adrenaline wears off, I wear down. Mom just called with the update and it seems now he's draining the right fluids out of his brain and not blood anymore, which means he should be done with the bleeders. The one downfall is he takes blood thinners for his heart (yes, we dealt with that in the past too) and with the strength and weaknesses of some blood vessels in the brain, he could have this all again in the future or he may not.
Looks like he'll be released again some time this week. We'll see! sigh. I just had a 4 hour nap. I could have slept all night.
