Friday, July 11, 2008

Home for a few days.
Work to do.
Rest to get. I hope.
Whining to do.
Conjunctivitis? Check.
Tooth ache? Check.
Ringworm? Check.
Rash from band-aid on throat? Check.
Heat rash everywhere else? Check.
Rubbed raw area on elbow from waiting in a hard armed chair. while holding jaw in hand during 8.5 hour surgery? Check.

Monday I'll get my horrible aching tooth taken care of so hopefully I can go back to redding and have a little less to give me a headache. Between the smoke and a cantankerous father I don't need anything else to make my head throb.

Update of the father figure.
He came through surgery fine. He did not however transition from anesthesia to pain medication fine. Holy hell. That was bad. Bad ugly and worse.
His hip was as bad as it could possibly be. His doctor said he only sees 2-3 like that in a year and then only maybe.
I hope and pray we do not have to have his neck operated on. I'm not sure I can take that again. Really. It was that bad. And people who know me know I deal with that shit really well. But hearing from your estranged fathers mouth these words, inbetween screams that he's dying, "Amy help me, I thought you said you loved me", not fun. Even though in my mind I know he doesn't mean it. Nor (did we think) would he remember it. He was in extreme pain. They had none of it managed as he'd been under for over 9 hours. Can you blame him? I don't. It still doesn't mean your heart doesn't sink when he says it. Frankly I'm just glad (honored?) that I was even on the list of people he asked for help. I wasn't the first, but I was near the top.
Today the girl who hit him sent him a get well card.
I'm not sure what I think of that. Nice? Thoughtful? Praying like hell we don't sue the shit out of her or better yet press charges?
Frankly I think she should have been made to sit there and watch him wake up, see the pain he was in, see what she's done to him, see the pain SHE caused. It's easy to go to that class for bad drivers and see that video and think oh those poor people. But what if that accident you have to watch is the one you caused. What if that person laying there is the person you hurt. Maybe then it would get through.
During my dads surgery there was a little girl, 16, brought in. Auto accident. Two shattered legs. They fixed those. You can't fix a brain.

Luckily my dads brain is fine. And his body will be too, in time.
I hope he realizes life is really short. Too short for grudges, hard feelings, egos, vanity, stubbornness. Life is too short to be alone.
I don't know. The jury is out on this one. I hope he gets it.

Sunday, July 6, 2008

I'm not even sure where to begin with this update.
I will for sure be out of touch from Tuesday until further notice.

As of this moment;

My father is off the respirator. He is on oxygen due to his sleep apnea. His neck is broken in two places but the halo is in place. He hates it. He can talk. God help them. :-) His right arm is in excruciating pain. They don't know why yet.

The leg injury that the truth was so elusive about is now all cleared up. They believe his knee hit the dash and drove his femur through his hip socket. His hip socket is in a million (ok not literally a million) pieces. His femur and the ball on it's end are in tact.

The surgery to repair the hip is life threatening. The hip is hemeraging but we can't see the bruising because he's been laid flat so it's all on his hind side. Not only will there be a team of orthopedic surgeons there but also a vascular team on call in case anything goes wrong. The surgery will take at least 8 hours.

If he survives this surgery then we are talking at LEAST 3 months of rehab. We are hoping that at least the first 3 weeks can be spent there and then done here with appointments over there.

The hospital thought he had no insurance. We have no idea where his wallet went. Now knowing he has insurance the rehab can fall into place we hope.

Please keep us in your thoughts. The smoke is horrible there. I'm just glad that I don't have to worry about it much as I can hide out in the hospital and not be in it much. Not to mention it's supposed to be 112 there tomorrow.