09/27/2010 17:50
Roller Coaster
My grandfather was moved to a nursing home on Thursday for rehab. It was a miracle and the entire family was elated (although a little nervous about the care he'd get in this nursing home). The weekend prior, in the hospital, the doc had the nurses move my gpa to a private room and set aside a family room for relatives to stay or nap in overnight. He did this because when he did his rounds and saw my grandfather's condition on Friday, he didn't think he'd still be alive when he came back through on Monday. He was. And he got stronger.
So by Thursday he was ready for the nursing home. There were some medication mix-ups (not the right breathing treatment--the one they gave him made him anxious--and no sleeping pill prescription and no order for PT as expected) but it was all worked out by Saturday. Saturday, he had his first therapy appointment. It was just my sister and I (and later my dad) watching him as he practiced first flexing his ankles, then outstretching his legs, kicking his legs to the side in a standing leg lift and then finally walking. His O2 level dropped to the 70s (very bad) so they had him sit, focus on breathing through his nose and within 2 minutes he was back in the 90s (very good for him). It all seemed to be going well.
I actually started thinking that he would be out of the nursing home before the 20 days that they said he'd be there and I definitely started thinking he had several more months before we started worrying that his passing was near.
Saturday afternoon, my grandfather's roommate had a lady visitor who came over in a wheelchair, escorted by one of the CNAs (nursing assistants). My aunts and my grandma were there with us, playing cards, trying not to giggle when we realized the roommate was having sex! Good for him, although it would have been nice if he remembered to shut his curtain all the way.
Later, my aunt and I went to her car to get a fan because the room was warm. As we walked back, my grandmother was out in the hall, visibly upset, crying and motioning to us to hurry up.
My grandfather appeared to have what looked like a stroke. At first it seemed like a Bell's Palsy attack, but something wasn't right, so he was transported to the ER. This was just before 6pm. They took chest X-rays (because he's still struggling to recovered from pneumonia) and a CAT scan to see what the problem was. They thought it was one of three things:
Bell's Palsy attack
a mini stroke that's caused from lack of oxygen to the brain
the cancer spread to his brain
It wasn't either of those. Instead, it was a "significant" brain bleed likely caused from a fall sometime between late July and the last week. He's fallen a couple times, and although he's never hit his head, the jarring motion is enough to cause the brain to bleed in the elderly.
Don't call him elderly though. He says "I'm only 82!"
He has about an inch of blood pooled in the front right quadrant of his brain. Because the brain shrinks in the elderly, this is less significant than it would be in someone who is in their 30s, but it's still serious.
The hospital consulted with the neurologist on call in Hartford and by 10/11pm, he was on his way via ambulance to Hartford Hospital. They evaluated him in THEIR ER and didn't get him to a room until 5am (why they couldn't just do a direct admit is beyond me!).
In the meantime, I brought my grandmother home and we sipped a black russian as she cried and told me how much she loved him and how they met. She gave me a mini lecture/pep talk on relationships and how Evan is perfect for me and how the whole family loves him and there's nothing they want more than to see us happy together. Around midnight, we went to bed--with me in the spare room where I slept on overnight visits as a child--but I could tell she wasn't sleeping well without him there. In the ER, in his sleep, he reached out and grabbed her hand. 59 years of marriage and they are still madly and deeply in love with each other.
Even my mom was in tears when she talked about how heartbreaking this is for my grandmother. (These aren't even her parents--they're my dad's.)
Yesterday as I was driving home snarfing down donuts, we learned his options were to have surgery to drain the blood and relieve the pressure or just let it be. He decided to leave it be. The consequences of surgery would just lessen his quality of life and since his symptoms of the bleed are relatively minor. Besides, he's dying. It's time to get him strong enough to go home which is where he wants to live his final days. He wants to sleep his last few weeks/months at my grandmother's side. He wants to be comfortable.
He is dying a long, hard, painful death and I don't like it. Not one bit.