Mianevem
Well-known member
Congrats on the teddy!
Rainbow Dragon's Lair
- Thread starter Laura Rainbow Dragon
- Start date
Syrius
Well-known member
Valkyrie
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
"Energy and persistence conquers all things. -Benjamin Franklin"
Congratulations on the Teddy Bear!!
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Hi Bees,
I just got home from spending the afternoon and evening in emergency. My mother suffered a massive brain bleed this afternoon. She is in a coma and not expected to wake up.
I will still be mostly around here. (There isn't anything I can do for my mother now, and I won't be living at the hospital while waiting for her to die since she is unconscious, and we didn't have that sort of relationship anyhow.) I should still be able to keep Secret Santa on track. But please give me grace if I am slow to respond to things over the next couple of days. I'm not disappearing. I'm just going to have a lot to deal with.
I'm going to walk Shelby now and then sleep. I am exhausted.
I just got home from spending the afternoon and evening in emergency. My mother suffered a massive brain bleed this afternoon. She is in a coma and not expected to wake up.
I will still be mostly around here. (There isn't anything I can do for my mother now, and I won't be living at the hospital while waiting for her to die since she is unconscious, and we didn't have that sort of relationship anyhow.) I should still be able to keep Secret Santa on track. But please give me grace if I am slow to respond to things over the next couple of days. I'm not disappearing. I'm just going to have a lot to deal with.
I'm going to walk Shelby now and then sleep. I am exhausted.
Mamatigerj
Well-known member
You are in my thoughts & prayers. 
Syrius
Well-known member
Valkyrie
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
"Energy and persistence conquers all things. -Benjamin Franklin"
Mianevem
Well-known member
I am so very sorry @Laura Rainbow Dragon !!!
Please let us all know if there anything we can do. We will give you space, if you need it, but we are also here for you. Please take care of yourself! Hugs!
Please let us all know if there anything we can do. We will give you space, if you need it, but we are also here for you. Please take care of yourself! Hugs!
PetiteSheWolf
Well-known member
So sorry to read that... Hugs, know we will be thinking a lot of you and your mother in this very tough time. If there's something else I could do.... (doubt it, at that distance, but know this wolf is sincere). Again, lots of hugs, and purrs from Mademoiselle Luna. I am glad you have Shelby with you.
from
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Nevetharine
Well-known member
Lots of hugs 
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Thank you:
@Mamatigerj
@Syrius
@f1shtacular
@Mianevem
@neilarey
@Haleth
@PetiteSheWolf
@Fremen
@TopNotch
@Nevetharine
I know it is difficult to know what to say in times like this. But I do appreciate your kind thoughts and support very much.
I just got up and don't have an update from the hospital yet.
Everything is so different from what happened with my father. My father was sick for a very long time. But his brain was the last thing to go. I had multiple conversations with him about his end-of-life care wishes, as did others in our family. He changed his mind on what he wanted a few times. But before the end came he had settled on not wanting to be resuscitated or have extreme measures taken to prolong his life, and we all knew that. Also: I don't know that the hospital would have tried anything even if we'd wanted them to. He was obviously in the final stage of a very long and exhausting battle, and nobody wanted anything but for him to be kept comfortable until he passed.
But with my mother... in spite of both my brother and I having had multiple conversations with her about our father's end-of-life care wishes, neither of us had had that conversation with her about her wishes. She worked out with me this past weekend. She talked to me about her plans to take a vacation in the UK to visit friends and family there. She was going to attend a Tai Chi class this morning and then go out for lunch with her friends from the class afterward.
But then I arrived home from walking Shelby yesterday afternoon to find her lying face-down on the bathroom floor. She was still conscious at that time. Heard me enter the house and called out to me. When I found her lying like that, I asked her if she had fallen. She said no, she had gone into the bathroom because she felt sick, then she had started to feel weak so had purposefully lain down on the floor.
Her story did seem odd to me. She hasn't had an easy time getting down onto the floor for several years, and her bed is only a few steps away from the bathroom. Plus she was too weak to push herself up even into a sitting or kneeling position. So I called for an ambulance. But my mother was still conscious this whole time, still talking to me. (Well, yelling at me mostly. She wanted me to physically haul her up off the floor myself and was angry that I refused to do so.) The ambulance dispatcher had questions which I relayed to my mother and which she answered. Her speech was normal the whole time.
Once I got off the phone with dispatch, I went to put Shelby in the kitchen, so she would not be in the paramedics' way when they arrived. My mother lost consciousness while I was doing this. But at the same time I saw a truck on our street and went outside to wave the paramedics in. (The truck I saw turned out to be a delivery truck. But the ambulance was right behind it.) So the paramedics were working on my mother within ~ 3 minutes of her losing consciousness. They got her out of the house and into the ambulance pretty quickly.
When I arrived at Emergency, I was escorted into the bad news room and told to wait there. After a little while, the ER doc came in and told me I needed to make a decision in the next five minutes about whether or not to have a neurosurgeon operate on my mother. Without having a chance to speak to the neurosurgeon first, find out what the prognosis from surgery would be or even know whether or not the surgeon was even willing to attempt to operate! I told the ER doc I needed the five minutes to call my brother. (Not a simple task, since I didn't know what his phone number was--it's programmed into our home phone, but not into my cell phone which is very new and which I hardly ever use.)
Fortunately I was able to get a hold of my brother. And fortunately the neurosurgeon was willing to call him and talk to him about our mother's prognosis. (Something which surprised the ER doc who said they normally don't do that.) And then my brother was able to call me back, and we made the decision together not to operate. (The prognosis was, "If your mother survives this event she will almost certainly require around-the-clock care for the rest of her life." Having witnessed how stressed out by and unhappy with all the care our father needed during his long disability, my brother and I agreed we did not think she would want that for herself.)
So now we wait. My mother was intubated in the ambulance. So now a machine is breathing for her which may prevent her from physically dying any time soon. So likely we will need to make a decision now on when to pull the plug on that. When I left the hospital last night, they were preparing to admit my mother into the ICU. The ICU doc had come down to the ER to talk to me and my brother (who had arrived by that point--he lives further away from the hospital than I do). I got the impression from the ICU doc that the only purpose to the ventilation now is to give friends and family a chance to "say goodbye". But I don't know who would want to do that, given that mentally she is already gone.
So... that's where things are at right now.
Hold your loved ones close, friends.
And talk to your family about what they would want in a situation like this. Even if you think they're healthy now. It's stressful to have to make these decisions for them without their input.
@Mamatigerj
@Syrius
@f1shtacular
@Mianevem
@neilarey
@Haleth
@PetiteSheWolf
@Fremen
@TopNotch
@Nevetharine
I know it is difficult to know what to say in times like this. But I do appreciate your kind thoughts and support very much.
I just got up and don't have an update from the hospital yet.
Everything is so different from what happened with my father. My father was sick for a very long time. But his brain was the last thing to go. I had multiple conversations with him about his end-of-life care wishes, as did others in our family. He changed his mind on what he wanted a few times. But before the end came he had settled on not wanting to be resuscitated or have extreme measures taken to prolong his life, and we all knew that. Also: I don't know that the hospital would have tried anything even if we'd wanted them to. He was obviously in the final stage of a very long and exhausting battle, and nobody wanted anything but for him to be kept comfortable until he passed.
But with my mother... in spite of both my brother and I having had multiple conversations with her about our father's end-of-life care wishes, neither of us had had that conversation with her about her wishes. She worked out with me this past weekend. She talked to me about her plans to take a vacation in the UK to visit friends and family there. She was going to attend a Tai Chi class this morning and then go out for lunch with her friends from the class afterward.
But then I arrived home from walking Shelby yesterday afternoon to find her lying face-down on the bathroom floor. She was still conscious at that time. Heard me enter the house and called out to me. When I found her lying like that, I asked her if she had fallen. She said no, she had gone into the bathroom because she felt sick, then she had started to feel weak so had purposefully lain down on the floor.
Her story did seem odd to me. She hasn't had an easy time getting down onto the floor for several years, and her bed is only a few steps away from the bathroom. Plus she was too weak to push herself up even into a sitting or kneeling position. So I called for an ambulance. But my mother was still conscious this whole time, still talking to me. (Well, yelling at me mostly. She wanted me to physically haul her up off the floor myself and was angry that I refused to do so.) The ambulance dispatcher had questions which I relayed to my mother and which she answered. Her speech was normal the whole time.
Once I got off the phone with dispatch, I went to put Shelby in the kitchen, so she would not be in the paramedics' way when they arrived. My mother lost consciousness while I was doing this. But at the same time I saw a truck on our street and went outside to wave the paramedics in. (The truck I saw turned out to be a delivery truck. But the ambulance was right behind it.) So the paramedics were working on my mother within ~ 3 minutes of her losing consciousness. They got her out of the house and into the ambulance pretty quickly.
When I arrived at Emergency, I was escorted into the bad news room and told to wait there. After a little while, the ER doc came in and told me I needed to make a decision in the next five minutes about whether or not to have a neurosurgeon operate on my mother. Without having a chance to speak to the neurosurgeon first, find out what the prognosis from surgery would be or even know whether or not the surgeon was even willing to attempt to operate! I told the ER doc I needed the five minutes to call my brother. (Not a simple task, since I didn't know what his phone number was--it's programmed into our home phone, but not into my cell phone which is very new and which I hardly ever use.)
Fortunately I was able to get a hold of my brother. And fortunately the neurosurgeon was willing to call him and talk to him about our mother's prognosis. (Something which surprised the ER doc who said they normally don't do that.) And then my brother was able to call me back, and we made the decision together not to operate. (The prognosis was, "If your mother survives this event she will almost certainly require around-the-clock care for the rest of her life." Having witnessed how stressed out by and unhappy with all the care our father needed during his long disability, my brother and I agreed we did not think she would want that for herself.)
So now we wait. My mother was intubated in the ambulance. So now a machine is breathing for her which may prevent her from physically dying any time soon. So likely we will need to make a decision now on when to pull the plug on that. When I left the hospital last night, they were preparing to admit my mother into the ICU. The ICU doc had come down to the ER to talk to me and my brother (who had arrived by that point--he lives further away from the hospital than I do). I got the impression from the ICU doc that the only purpose to the ventilation now is to give friends and family a chance to "say goodbye". But I don't know who would want to do that, given that mentally she is already gone.
So... that's where things are at right now.
Hold your loved ones close, friends.
And talk to your family about what they would want in a situation like this. Even if you think they're healthy now. It's stressful to have to make these decisions for them without their input.
@Laura Rainbow Dragon there are never enough words for this. Just know we're also here and thinking of you. And personally, I am sending all the good vibes my screen can absorb, your way. 
Anek
Well-known member
Sorceress
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
"If the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember Cedric Diggory."
I'm so sorry Laura, I wish you and your brother strength
Maegaranthelas
Well-known member
from
Sending you and your brother all the love
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Thank you:
@Damer
@Matan
@Anek
@Maegaranthelas
The hospital is stopping ventilation this afternoon.
My brother will sleep in a hotel near the hospital once it is over and then drive home.
My best friend from childhood is driving out here to be with me tonight.
Plus my other best friend Shelby is already here with me, of course. She was pretty stressed out about being left alone so long yesterday and has not left my side since I got back home.
@Damer
@Matan
@Anek
@Maegaranthelas
The hospital is stopping ventilation this afternoon.
My brother will sleep in a hotel near the hospital once it is over and then drive home.
My best friend from childhood is driving out here to be with me tonight.
Plus my other best friend Shelby is already here with me, of course. She was pretty stressed out about being left alone so long yesterday and has not left my side since I got back home.
Mamatigerj
Well-known member
I am so sorry, Laura.
Sending all the love, hugs, strength, and courage i can to you and your brother; 
so glad your friend is able to come and that you have dear Shelby. 
Sending all the love, hugs, strength, and courage i can to you and your brother;
so glad your friend is able to come and that you have dear Shelby.
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Thank you @Mamatigerj
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
December 11:
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge
Daily HIIT Challenge
Fighter's Codex
8 x 50 jumping jacks
8 x 20 squats
4 x 30 seconds forearm plank
2 x 3km with Shelby, ~1 km hiking around hospital
writing: - I don't think so? Did some writing-adjacent work (reading a book on "Kickstarter for Authors") while at the hospital. But I don't think any actual writing. (I could be wrong. I don't remember much from the part of my day that happened before finding my mother on our bathroom floor.)
French: Netflix (Came home last night to find I had a partially-watched episode, which my data suggests I did not start watching on the weekend. So I'm pretty sure this happened at breakfast on Monday.)
GOBOT (At least I don't think so. I could be wrong on this too.)
GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 278/500 squats
Bunny Rabbit: 800/1000 jacks
Shiny Red Sports Car: 4/10 minutes planks
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge
Daily HIIT Challenge
Fighter's Codex
8 x 50 jumping jacks
8 x 20 squats
4 x 30 seconds forearm plank
2 x 3km with Shelby, ~1 km hiking around hospital
writing:
- I don't think so? Did some writing-adjacent work (reading a book on "Kickstarter for Authors") while at the hospital. But I don't think any actual writing. (I could be wrong. I don't remember much from the part of my day that happened before finding my mother on our bathroom floor.)French: Netflix (Came home last night to find I had a partially-watched episode, which my data suggests I did not start watching on the weekend. So I'm pretty sure this happened at breakfast on Monday.)
GOBOT
(At least I don't think so. I could be wrong on this too.)GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 278/500 squats
Bunny Rabbit: 800/1000 jacks
Shiny Red Sports Car: 4/10 minutes planks
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
December 12:
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge days 11 + 12
Daily HIIT Challenge
Fighter's Codex
4x 50 jumping jacks
4 x 50 squats
2 x 60 seconds forearm plank
2 x 30 seconds forearm plank
3km with Shelby + my friend, 1.5 km errand
writing:
French: Netflix
GOBOT
GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 538/500 squats -
Bunny Rabbit: 1000/1000 jacks -
Shiny Red Sports Car: 7/10 minutes planks
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge days 11 + 12
Daily HIIT Challenge
Fighter's Codex
4x 50 jumping jacks
4 x 50 squats
2 x 60 seconds forearm plank
2 x 30 seconds forearm plank
3km with Shelby + my friend, 1.5 km errand
writing:
French: Netflix
GOBOT
GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 538/500 squats -
Bunny Rabbit: 1000/1000 jacks -
Shiny Red Sports Car: 7/10 minutes planks
PetiteSheWolf
Well-known member
Impressed by all the ornaments-getting done! Hugs, hope the endorphines from exercise help a bit.
Mamatigerj
Well-known member
3 down; 2 to go! 
Anek
Well-known member
Sorceress
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
"If the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember Cedric Diggory."
Congrats on the ornament!
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
I have not decided yet.
Syrius
Well-known member
Valkyrie
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
from
The Sonoran Desert
Pronouns: she/her
Posts: 622
"Energy and persistence conquers all things. -Benjamin Franklin"
Congratulations on all your ornaments!! 
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Um... this post is going to be a bit of a mind fuck... but ah, it turns out the reports of my mother's brain death were greatly exaggerated.
Yesterday afternoon (December 12) she was taken off of ventilation. My brother and I had been led to believe this would result in clinical death within hours or a few days at most. But as soon as the tube was out of her mouth, my mother opened her eyes and asked for a throat lozenge. She wanted a very specific type of throat lozenge from a very specific location--which is not a location in which we store throat lozenges--so obviously she has some mental confusion. But she had a reason why she wanted that specific type of throat lozenge and no other and was able to communicate all of this verbally in complete sentences.
I did not post anything about this yesterday, since I do not want everyone to be on the same roller coaster ride my brother and I are on at the moment. The hospital staff all said what happened was not possible. I thought maybe it was an instance of terminal lucidity. But my mother is still talking today.
She still has some confusion. When asked who the current Prime Minister of Canada is, she named Pierre Trudeau. When asked who she lives with, she named me, my father (who died three months ago), our dog Shelby, and my dog Trudy (who died 14 months ago). Clearly there are some issues. But this is also clearly not zero cognitive function.
The hospital did imaging again today. The new imaging shows the same thing Monday's imaging did: my mother should not be able to talk or even be conscious with the amount of damage to her brain. And yet she is. We have been cautioned that this could still be temporary.
Also: my mother's brain is still bleeding. Which may mean she still requires surgery. This surgery cannot happen in the hospital she was admitted to on Monday. So tonight she was airlifted to a different hospital which unfortunately is over 40 minutes further away (so now more than an hour's drive for me and almost 3.5 hours for my brother), but where she could have the surgery if the need arises.
Nobody knows what the frak is going on.
Yesterday afternoon (December 12) she was taken off of ventilation. My brother and I had been led to believe this would result in clinical death within hours or a few days at most. But as soon as the tube was out of her mouth, my mother opened her eyes and asked for a throat lozenge. She wanted a very specific type of throat lozenge from a very specific location--which is not a location in which we store throat lozenges--so obviously she has some mental confusion. But she had a reason why she wanted that specific type of throat lozenge and no other and was able to communicate all of this verbally in complete sentences.
I did not post anything about this yesterday, since I do not want everyone to be on the same roller coaster ride my brother and I are on at the moment. The hospital staff all said what happened was not possible. I thought maybe it was an instance of terminal lucidity. But my mother is still talking today.
She still has some confusion. When asked who the current Prime Minister of Canada is, she named Pierre Trudeau. When asked who she lives with, she named me, my father (who died three months ago), our dog Shelby, and my dog Trudy (who died 14 months ago). Clearly there are some issues. But this is also clearly not zero cognitive function.
The hospital did imaging again today. The new imaging shows the same thing Monday's imaging did: my mother should not be able to talk or even be conscious with the amount of damage to her brain. And yet she is. We have been cautioned that this could still be temporary.
Also: my mother's brain is still bleeding. Which may mean she still requires surgery. This surgery cannot happen in the hospital she was admitted to on Monday. So tonight she was airlifted to a different hospital which unfortunately is over 40 minutes further away (so now more than an hour's drive for me and almost 3.5 hours for my brother), but where she could have the surgery if the need arises.
Nobody knows what the frak is going on.
@Laura Rainbow Dragon exactly what @TopNotch said!
Maegaranthelas
Well-known member
Oh gods, I can't even imagine what you and your brother are going through right now.
PetiteSheWolf
Well-known member
One day at a time, and take our hugs as little comforts.
Mamatigerj
Well-known member
You are on quite an emotional roller coaster, i'm sure.
Anek
Well-known member
Sorceress
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
from
Bavaria, Germany
Pronouns: She/her
Posts: 2,298
"If the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember Cedric Diggory."
Whoa, that's a rollercoaster for sure. Hugs!
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Today more miscommunication, lack of communication and general WTFery from various medical professionals.
My brother, having spent the past two nights in a hotel near the first hospital our mother was taken to, came to my home last night to discuss things with me before heading back to his own home. We received word that our mother was being transferred while he was still with me. So he decided to drive out to the new hospital that night (an hour's drive in the wrong direction for him) to see our mother settled in, and then head home.
When he got to the hospital he was told his power of attorney for our mother was not in effect because she was lucid and able to speak for herself.
My brother said, "Well, she's able to speak."
Our mother is a talker. If you ask her a question, she will answer it. Doesn't matter if she knows the answer or is completely making shit up, she will respond with something. This was true long before the ruptured aneurysm.
So the Windsor hospital staff had asked her: "How long have you lived in Canada?"
She told them 18 years.
She has in fact been in Canada almost 50 years.
They asked her where she lives now.
She named a town she did live in previously for 29 years but has not lived in for almost 20 years now.
One might think that last one at least would have been easy to verify. (I gave her current address to the first hospital the day she was admitted there!) But the new hospital staff just took her at her word.
My brother suggested they ask her a question they actually know the answer to.
So they asked her if she knew what year it was.
She told them 1973.
The hospital was more accepting of my brother's PoA after that.
Then he drove home.
This morning the hospital called him and informed him our mother was getting groggier so they wanted to go ahead and operate today. My brother authorized this. Then he called me to let me know.
I drove out to the new hospital today, which thankfully was not difficult to find. It's in a city I don't know. And I'm not used to city driving anyhow, having lived in a small town w. population <5000 people for the past 15 years, and never having had access to a car when I did live in cities. I do have a smart phone. But it's my first one and very new to me. I cannot afford much data on it and haven't figured out yet how to get it to give me driving directions without data. So I was a little stressed about driving out there. But finding the hospital campus was easy. Navigating the parking garage, on the other hand...
I hate, hate, hate trying to find parking. In a city I know, I will park a good 30 minutes' hike away from my destination if I know parking is easy there rather than drive around searching for something closer in a busy and crowded downtown core. But I had no idea in this city where I could find easy and legal parking. So I went into the hospital's visitor parking garage.
It was a freaking nightmare. Round and around in circles. No useful signage anywhere. And packed to the gills. I drove up one aisle that had no empty spots and turned out to be a dead end. No room to turn around, so had to back out (after waiting for the car that had followed me into the dead end to also back out ahead of me). On the next level I encountered a barrier with a "restricted access" sign. So had to turn away from that. By this point I had been circling around and changing directions so many times, I had no idea if I was coming or going any more. I next found my way onto another level (or perhaps back on the level I had been on previously--I honestly have no idea) where I saw another aisle which I recognized as looking very similar to the first dead-end aisle I had gotten stuck on. And I could see there was a car in that aisle ahead of me, trying to turn around to get back out of it. So I waited. Rolled down my window. Asked the driver when she approached if she had a clue where we could find parking in that garage or, failing that, how to escape it. Unfortunately she was as lost and frustrated as I was. We both kept circling around. Eventually found our way up to the roof level of the parking garage, where there were spots available.
So I parked. Hiked down three flights of stairs before I got to a level that had access to the hospital. Then wandered around lost in the maze of a hospital until I found somebody wearing hospital scrubs who wasn't racing around too quickly for me to stop her to ask for help. She led me onto an elevator, told me which floor to get out on, and which direction to walk in when I did, and where to find the phone I needed to use to request access to the ICU.
I am used to hospitals where you walk in through the front door and there is a reception desk right there, and some nice person gives you directions to where you need to go which really aren't even necessary because everything is clearly signposted. This hospital was not like that! But I found the ICU and the phone and got access to the unit. Which was a freaking zoo. I basically stood in the hallway looking lost until somebody asked me who I was there to see.
Finally made it to my mother's room. She was in a private room which was quite large but also quite full of medical equipment. Her nurse was sitting at a desk outside the room. (In the zoo-like hallway.)
I asked the nurse if my mother had been for the surgery yet.
The nurse looked at me blankly. Said my mother was not scheduled for surgery this day.
I expressed my confusion. Said my brother had called me that morning and informed me she was.
The ICU nurse said she had had a drain put in, but no surgery. (Apparently, in ICU-nurse parlance, having a drain inserted into one's brain does not constitute "surgery". It is only a "procedure".)
(By this point I am so stressed out I feel like crying. And I am an English-speaking person trying to navigate an English-speaking hospital. I am truly worried for any new English-learner trying to navigate that place!)
Anyhow... I went into my mother's room. She was sleeping.
Several times on my route to her room I passed "hand sanitization" stations on the hospital's walls, exhorting me to sanitize my hands to help curb the spread of disease. I want to do my part. But all these sanitization stations only offered the alcohol-based hand sanitizers that you rub on and leave on your skin. That stuff made my skin very itchy the last time I tried it. So I walked past all those stations today and in my mother's room finally found a sink with actual soap and water. So I washed my hands there. Soaped them up thoroughly like one is supposed to do. And then discovered that the tap is one you can only turn on by waving your hand in front of a sensor (which your hand is NOT in front of while your hands are actually under the stream of water) and activating the sensor only causes the faucet to run for two seconds before you have to activate it again.
Anyhow... Eventually my hands were actually clean and the soap rinsed off and dried and then I managed to walk around my mother's bed to get to the visitor chair. (There was seriously a lot of medical junk in the room and I was afraid to accidentally touch any of it.) I sat down in the chair and leaned back, and then got soap in my hair because for some reason there was also a soap dispenser on the wall right above where they had put the visitor chair.
Then I called my brother and said, "WTF? I've made it to the hospital and the ICU nurse just told me Mum isn't scheduled for surgery today."
And he said, "WTF? But I'm glad you're there."
Then my mother started waving one of her hands around.
I said, "Mum? Are you awake?"
She said, "Yes." And then fell back asleep.
Then about five minutes later a neurosurgeon came into the room and started explaining to me the operation which she did in fact want to do on my mother today.
I said, "Let me call my brother, so you can explain this to both of us at once."
So I did. And she did. And my brother and I said, yes, go ahead and do the procedure (that my brother thought he had already authorized this morning).
(The procedure is an endovascular coiling. I have no idea at this point if this is considered a "surgery" or merely a "procedure"!)
Then the neurosurgeon left, and my brother and I discussed plans for how to find out and share with one another information regarding the next steps in our mother's care, and I ended the call with my brother.
Then my mother started moving her hand again, which I had also noticed she was doing while the neuro was in the room. I asked her if she had heard what the doctor said.
She said, "Yes."
I said, "So you're going to have another procedure this afternoon."
She said, "Yes."
Then she fell asleep again.
A third time she woke up and this time moved her hand right up to her nose and started fingering her NG tube.
I said, "Mum, you have to leave that alone."
She said, "I know." And then fell asleep again.
Then the neuro came back and asked for my phone number so she could call me when the procedure was over (or earlier if there were complications). I asked her to call my brother and gave her his #, since I was going to leave once they took our mother in to surgery/procedure/whatever-it-was, and I don't use my cell phone while I'm driving.
Then a couple of other hospital employees came in and unhooked my mother from all of the machines in the ICU room and hooked her up to portable machines and then wheeled her and the whole kit and caboodle out of the room.
Then I left the ICU.
I had no idea how to get back to the parking garage. And in the hallway outside the ICU there were only friends and family of other patients, most of whom looked even more distressed than I felt.
I went into a stairwell where I found two young adults sitting on the floor talking. Neither of them was crying. So I asked them if they could tell me how to get to the parking garage. They decided the guy would actually take me there, which he very kindly did, the only way he knew how, which was to go all the way down to the street level and then go around the outside of the building to get back to the parking garage. Where I had parked on the roof.
But I made it back to the car. Paid for parking. Found my way out of the garage. (Which was blessedly simpler than finding my way into it.) Found a street name I recognized. And managed to get onto the street I needed to take to get back out of town, actually driving in the correct direction to get out of town.
I made it back home shortly before dark. (Which is important to me because I have to drive on country roads to get home where the speed limit is 90kph but I usually cannot have my high beams on because there is oncoming traffic, and there are no street lights, but there are deer and other animals that wander onto the road and sometimes cyclists who for some reason in my neighbourhood like to drive at night with no lights on their bikes and I'm basically terrified to drive at night here as a result.)
My brother called me just as I walked through the door. He had just got off the phone with the neurosurgeon, who said our mother's procedure had gone well. The neuro had not been able to get in through the first leg she had tried, so she tried the other leg and that worked fine. She also had told my brother we should expect our mother to remain in the further-away, scary big city hospital for at least 21 days.
My brother lives a 3.5 hour drive away from this hospital. And he has a wife and two children. And a full time job. He cannot be driving out to this place every day to see our mother. And he cannot keep sleeping in hotels away from his family. Meanwhile, I found the experience of trying to navigate this hospital today so stressful I would very much like to never go there again ever in my life for any reason. And I'm very freaked out that the likelihood of our mother ending up in long term care seems to be growing daily. Which will mean we have to sell the house I am living in. Which will plunge me into a housing crisis. I need to be spending my time and energy on building a long-term future for myself right now. Not burning through my time, money, and nerves driving back and forth from a far away hospital. Also: LTC beds have long waiting lists here. And to free up your hospital bed, they will stick you in the first one that comes available. Which might not be anywhere near where anyone in your family is living.
Also: I feel angry that this happened to our mother only 3 months after she just got her life back after so many years of looking after our father.
I apologize. This is a really stressful and depressing post.
I am super stressed out right now.
But:
I am healthy.
Whatever happens, I will not be losing my current home right away.
My childhood friend who came out to support me this week told me she will not let me become a street person and she would let me crash on her sofa if it comes to that. (Her house is already VERY crowded, and her sofa is the only space she has left to offer me. But it would actually be pretty nice to be living with a friend.)
So I will be okay.
Things are going to be tough for a while. But I will be okay one way or another.
One day at a time, right?
(My brother said, two hours. He feels he's not able to plan his life out more than two hours ahead at the moment.)
My brother, having spent the past two nights in a hotel near the first hospital our mother was taken to, came to my home last night to discuss things with me before heading back to his own home. We received word that our mother was being transferred while he was still with me. So he decided to drive out to the new hospital that night (an hour's drive in the wrong direction for him) to see our mother settled in, and then head home.
When he got to the hospital he was told his power of attorney for our mother was not in effect because she was lucid and able to speak for herself.
My brother said, "Well, she's able to speak."
Our mother is a talker. If you ask her a question, she will answer it. Doesn't matter if she knows the answer or is completely making shit up, she will respond with something. This was true long before the ruptured aneurysm.
So the Windsor hospital staff had asked her: "How long have you lived in Canada?"
She told them 18 years.
She has in fact been in Canada almost 50 years.
They asked her where she lives now.
She named a town she did live in previously for 29 years but has not lived in for almost 20 years now.
One might think that last one at least would have been easy to verify. (I gave her current address to the first hospital the day she was admitted there!) But the new hospital staff just took her at her word.
My brother suggested they ask her a question they actually know the answer to.
So they asked her if she knew what year it was.
She told them 1973.
The hospital was more accepting of my brother's PoA after that.
Then he drove home.
This morning the hospital called him and informed him our mother was getting groggier so they wanted to go ahead and operate today. My brother authorized this. Then he called me to let me know.
I drove out to the new hospital today, which thankfully was not difficult to find. It's in a city I don't know. And I'm not used to city driving anyhow, having lived in a small town w. population <5000 people for the past 15 years, and never having had access to a car when I did live in cities. I do have a smart phone. But it's my first one and very new to me. I cannot afford much data on it and haven't figured out yet how to get it to give me driving directions without data. So I was a little stressed about driving out there. But finding the hospital campus was easy. Navigating the parking garage, on the other hand...
I hate, hate, hate trying to find parking. In a city I know, I will park a good 30 minutes' hike away from my destination if I know parking is easy there rather than drive around searching for something closer in a busy and crowded downtown core. But I had no idea in this city where I could find easy and legal parking. So I went into the hospital's visitor parking garage.
It was a freaking nightmare. Round and around in circles. No useful signage anywhere. And packed to the gills. I drove up one aisle that had no empty spots and turned out to be a dead end. No room to turn around, so had to back out (after waiting for the car that had followed me into the dead end to also back out ahead of me). On the next level I encountered a barrier with a "restricted access" sign. So had to turn away from that. By this point I had been circling around and changing directions so many times, I had no idea if I was coming or going any more. I next found my way onto another level (or perhaps back on the level I had been on previously--I honestly have no idea) where I saw another aisle which I recognized as looking very similar to the first dead-end aisle I had gotten stuck on. And I could see there was a car in that aisle ahead of me, trying to turn around to get back out of it. So I waited. Rolled down my window. Asked the driver when she approached if she had a clue where we could find parking in that garage or, failing that, how to escape it. Unfortunately she was as lost and frustrated as I was. We both kept circling around. Eventually found our way up to the roof level of the parking garage, where there were spots available.
So I parked. Hiked down three flights of stairs before I got to a level that had access to the hospital. Then wandered around lost in the maze of a hospital until I found somebody wearing hospital scrubs who wasn't racing around too quickly for me to stop her to ask for help. She led me onto an elevator, told me which floor to get out on, and which direction to walk in when I did, and where to find the phone I needed to use to request access to the ICU.
I am used to hospitals where you walk in through the front door and there is a reception desk right there, and some nice person gives you directions to where you need to go which really aren't even necessary because everything is clearly signposted. This hospital was not like that! But I found the ICU and the phone and got access to the unit. Which was a freaking zoo. I basically stood in the hallway looking lost until somebody asked me who I was there to see.
Finally made it to my mother's room. She was in a private room which was quite large but also quite full of medical equipment. Her nurse was sitting at a desk outside the room. (In the zoo-like hallway.)
I asked the nurse if my mother had been for the surgery yet.
The nurse looked at me blankly. Said my mother was not scheduled for surgery this day.
I expressed my confusion. Said my brother had called me that morning and informed me she was.
The ICU nurse said she had had a drain put in, but no surgery. (Apparently, in ICU-nurse parlance, having a drain inserted into one's brain does not constitute "surgery". It is only a "procedure".)
(By this point I am so stressed out I feel like crying. And I am an English-speaking person trying to navigate an English-speaking hospital. I am truly worried for any new English-learner trying to navigate that place!)
Anyhow... I went into my mother's room. She was sleeping.
Several times on my route to her room I passed "hand sanitization" stations on the hospital's walls, exhorting me to sanitize my hands to help curb the spread of disease. I want to do my part. But all these sanitization stations only offered the alcohol-based hand sanitizers that you rub on and leave on your skin. That stuff made my skin very itchy the last time I tried it. So I walked past all those stations today and in my mother's room finally found a sink with actual soap and water. So I washed my hands there. Soaped them up thoroughly like one is supposed to do. And then discovered that the tap is one you can only turn on by waving your hand in front of a sensor (which your hand is NOT in front of while your hands are actually under the stream of water) and activating the sensor only causes the faucet to run for two seconds before you have to activate it again.
Anyhow... Eventually my hands were actually clean and the soap rinsed off and dried and then I managed to walk around my mother's bed to get to the visitor chair. (There was seriously a lot of medical junk in the room and I was afraid to accidentally touch any of it.) I sat down in the chair and leaned back, and then got soap in my hair because for some reason there was also a soap dispenser on the wall right above where they had put the visitor chair.
Then I called my brother and said, "WTF? I've made it to the hospital and the ICU nurse just told me Mum isn't scheduled for surgery today."
And he said, "WTF? But I'm glad you're there."
Then my mother started waving one of her hands around.
I said, "Mum? Are you awake?"
She said, "Yes." And then fell back asleep.
Then about five minutes later a neurosurgeon came into the room and started explaining to me the operation which she did in fact want to do on my mother today.
I said, "Let me call my brother, so you can explain this to both of us at once."
So I did. And she did. And my brother and I said, yes, go ahead and do the procedure (that my brother thought he had already authorized this morning).
(The procedure is an endovascular coiling. I have no idea at this point if this is considered a "surgery" or merely a "procedure"!)
Then the neurosurgeon left, and my brother and I discussed plans for how to find out and share with one another information regarding the next steps in our mother's care, and I ended the call with my brother.
Then my mother started moving her hand again, which I had also noticed she was doing while the neuro was in the room. I asked her if she had heard what the doctor said.
She said, "Yes."
I said, "So you're going to have another procedure this afternoon."
She said, "Yes."
Then she fell asleep again.
A third time she woke up and this time moved her hand right up to her nose and started fingering her NG tube.
I said, "Mum, you have to leave that alone."
She said, "I know." And then fell asleep again.
Then the neuro came back and asked for my phone number so she could call me when the procedure was over (or earlier if there were complications). I asked her to call my brother and gave her his #, since I was going to leave once they took our mother in to surgery/procedure/whatever-it-was, and I don't use my cell phone while I'm driving.
Then a couple of other hospital employees came in and unhooked my mother from all of the machines in the ICU room and hooked her up to portable machines and then wheeled her and the whole kit and caboodle out of the room.
Then I left the ICU.
I had no idea how to get back to the parking garage. And in the hallway outside the ICU there were only friends and family of other patients, most of whom looked even more distressed than I felt.
I went into a stairwell where I found two young adults sitting on the floor talking. Neither of them was crying. So I asked them if they could tell me how to get to the parking garage. They decided the guy would actually take me there, which he very kindly did, the only way he knew how, which was to go all the way down to the street level and then go around the outside of the building to get back to the parking garage. Where I had parked on the roof.
But I made it back to the car. Paid for parking. Found my way out of the garage. (Which was blessedly simpler than finding my way into it.) Found a street name I recognized. And managed to get onto the street I needed to take to get back out of town, actually driving in the correct direction to get out of town.
I made it back home shortly before dark. (Which is important to me because I have to drive on country roads to get home where the speed limit is 90kph but I usually cannot have my high beams on because there is oncoming traffic, and there are no street lights, but there are deer and other animals that wander onto the road and sometimes cyclists who for some reason in my neighbourhood like to drive at night with no lights on their bikes and I'm basically terrified to drive at night here as a result.)
My brother called me just as I walked through the door. He had just got off the phone with the neurosurgeon, who said our mother's procedure had gone well. The neuro had not been able to get in through the first leg she had tried, so she tried the other leg and that worked fine. She also had told my brother we should expect our mother to remain in the further-away, scary big city hospital for at least 21 days.
My brother lives a 3.5 hour drive away from this hospital. And he has a wife and two children. And a full time job. He cannot be driving out to this place every day to see our mother. And he cannot keep sleeping in hotels away from his family. Meanwhile, I found the experience of trying to navigate this hospital today so stressful I would very much like to never go there again ever in my life for any reason. And I'm very freaked out that the likelihood of our mother ending up in long term care seems to be growing daily. Which will mean we have to sell the house I am living in. Which will plunge me into a housing crisis. I need to be spending my time and energy on building a long-term future for myself right now. Not burning through my time, money, and nerves driving back and forth from a far away hospital. Also: LTC beds have long waiting lists here. And to free up your hospital bed, they will stick you in the first one that comes available. Which might not be anywhere near where anyone in your family is living.
Also: I feel angry that this happened to our mother only 3 months after she just got her life back after so many years of looking after our father.
I apologize. This is a really stressful and depressing post.
I am super stressed out right now.
But:
I am healthy.
Whatever happens, I will not be losing my current home right away.
My childhood friend who came out to support me this week told me she will not let me become a street person and she would let me crash on her sofa if it comes to that. (Her house is already VERY crowded, and her sofa is the only space she has left to offer me. But it would actually be pretty nice to be living with a friend.)
So I will be okay.
Things are going to be tough for a while. But I will be okay one way or another.
One day at a time, right?
(My brother said, two hours. He feels he's not able to plan his life out more than two hours ahead at the moment.)
WTF? For smart, advanced beings we suck in adding humanity in our moments of health crisis, globally, it appears.Today more miscommunication, lack of communication and general WTFery from various medical professionals.
My brother, having spent the past two nights in a hotel near the first hospital our mother was taken to, came to my home last night to discuss things with me before heading back to his own home. We received word that our mother was being transferred while he was still with me. So he decided to drive out to the new hospital that night (an hour's drive in the wrong direction for him) to see our mother settled in, and then head home.
When he got to the hospital he was told his power of attorney for our mother was not in effect because she was lucid and able to speak for herself.
My brother said, "Well, she's able to speak."
Our mother is a talker. If you ask her a question, she will answer it. Doesn't matter if she knows the answer or is completely making shit up, she will respond with something. This was true long before the ruptured aneurysm.
So the Windsor hospital staff had asked her: "How long have you lived in Canada?"
She told them 18 years.
She has in fact been in Canada almost 50 years.
They asked her where she lives now.
She named a town she did live in previously for 29 years but has not lived in for almost 20 years now.
One might think that last one at least would have been easy to verify. (I gave her current address to the first hospital the day she was admitted there!) But the new hospital staff just took her at her word.
My brother suggested they ask her a question they actually know the answer to.
So they asked her if she knew what year it was.
She told them 1973.
The hospital was more accepting of my brother's PoA after that.
Then he drove home.
This morning the hospital called him and informed him our mother was getting groggier so they wanted to go ahead and operate today. My brother authorized this. Then he called me to let me know.
I drove out to the new hospital today, which thankfully was not difficult to find. It's in a city I don't know. And I'm not used to city driving anyhow, having lived in a small town w. population <5000 people for the past 15 years, and never having had access to a car when I did live in cities. I do have a smart phone. But it's my first one and very new to me. I cannot afford much data on it and haven't figured out yet how to get it to give me driving directions without data. So I was a little stressed about driving out there. But finding the hospital campus was easy. Navigating the parking garage, on the other hand...
I hate, hate, hate trying to find parking. In a city I know, I will park a good 30 minutes' hike away from my destination if I know parking is easy there rather than drive around searching for something closer in a busy and crowded downtown core. But I had no idea in this city where I could find easy and legal parking. So I went into the hospital's visitor parking garage.
It was a freaking nightmare. Round and around in circles. No useful signage anywhere. And packed to the gills. I drove up one aisle that had no empty spots and turned out to be a dead end. No room to turn around, so had to back out (after waiting for the car that had followed me into the dead end to also back out ahead of me). On the next level I encountered a barrier with a "restricted access" sign. So had to turn away from that. By this point I had been circling around and changing directions so many times, I had no idea if I was coming or going any more. I next found my way onto another level (or perhaps back on the level I had been on previously--I honestly have no idea) where I saw another aisle which I recognized as looking very similar to the first dead-end aisle I had gotten stuck on. And I could see there was a car in that aisle ahead of me, trying to turn around to get back out of it. So I waited. Rolled down my window. Asked the driver when she approached if she had a clue where we could find parking in that garage or, failing that, how to escape it. Unfortunately she was as lost and frustrated as I was. We both kept circling around. Eventually found our way up to the roof level of the parking garage, where there were spots available.
So I parked. Hiked down three flights of stairs before I got to a level that had access to the hospital. Then wandered around lost in the maze of a hospital until I found somebody wearing hospital scrubs who wasn't racing around too quickly for me to stop her to ask for help. She led me onto an elevator, told me which floor to get out on, and which direction to walk in when I did, and where to find the phone I needed to use to request access to the ICU.
I am used to hospitals where you walk in through the front door and there is a reception desk right there, and some nice person gives you directions to where you need to go which really aren't even necessary because everything is clearly signposted. This hospital was not like that! But I found the ICU and the phone and got access to the unit. Which was a freaking zoo. I basically stood in the hallway looking lost until somebody asked me who I was there to see.
Finally made it to my mother's room. She was in a private room which was quite large but also quite full of medical equipment. Her nurse was sitting at a desk outside the room. (In the zoo-like hallway.)
I asked the nurse if my mother had been for the surgery yet.
The nurse looked at me blankly. Said my mother was not scheduled for surgery this day.
I expressed my confusion. Said my brother had called me that morning and informed me she was.
The ICU nurse said she had had a drain put in, but no surgery. (Apparently, in ICU-nurse parlance, having a drain inserted into one's brain does not constitute "surgery". It is only a "procedure".)
(By this point I am so stressed out I feel like crying. And I am an English-speaking person trying to navigate an English-speaking hospital. I am truly worried for any new English-learner trying to navigate that place!)
Anyhow... I went into my mother's room. She was sleeping.
Several times on my route to her room I passed "hand sanitization" stations on the hospital's walls, exhorting me to sanitize my hands to help curb the spread of disease. I want to do my part. But all these sanitization stations only offered the alcohol-based hand sanitizers that you rub on and leave on your skin. That stuff made my skin very itchy the last time I tried it. So I walked past all those stations today and in my mother's room finally found a sink with actual soap and water. So I washed my hands there. Soaped them up thoroughly like one is supposed to do. And then discovered that the tap is one you can only turn on by waving your hand in front of a sensor (which your hand is NOT in front of while your hands are actually under the stream of water) and activating the sensor only causes the faucet to run for two seconds before you have to activate it again.
Anyhow... Eventually my hands were actually clean and the soap rinsed off and dried and then I managed to walk around my mother's bed to get to the visitor chair. (There was seriously a lot of medical junk in the room and I was afraid to accidentally touch any of it.) I sat down in the chair and leaned back, and then got soap in my hair because for some reason there was also a soap dispenser on the wall right above where they had put the visitor chair.
Then I called my brother and said, "WTF? I've made it to the hospital and the ICU nurse just told me Mum isn't scheduled for surgery today."
And he said, "WTF? But I'm glad you're there."
Then my mother started waving one of her hands around.
I said, "Mum? Are you awake?"
She said, "Yes." And then fell back asleep.
Then about five minutes later a neurosurgeon came into the room and started explaining to me the operation which she did in fact want to do on my mother today.
I said, "Let me call my brother, so you can explain this to both of us at once."
So I did. And she did. And my brother and I said, yes, go ahead and do the procedure (that my brother thought he had already authorized this morning).
(The procedure is an endovascular coiling. I have no idea at this point if this is considered a "surgery" or merely a "procedure"!)
Then the neurosurgeon left, and my brother and I discussed plans for how to find out and share with one another information regarding the next steps in our mother's care, and I ended the call with my brother.
Then my mother started moving her hand again, which I had also noticed she was doing while the neuro was in the room. I asked her if she had heard what the doctor said.
She said, "Yes."
I said, "So you're going to have another procedure this afternoon."
She said, "Yes."
Then she fell asleep again.
A third time she woke up and this time moved her hand right up to her nose and started fingering her NG tube.
I said, "Mum, you have to leave that alone."
She said, "I know." And then fell asleep again.
Then the neuro came back and asked for my phone number so she could call me when the procedure was over (or earlier if there were complications). I asked her to call my brother and gave her his #, since I was going to leave once they took our mother in to surgery/procedure/whatever-it-was, and I don't use my cell phone while I'm driving.
Then a couple of other hospital employees came in and unhooked my mother from all of the machines in the ICU room and hooked her up to portable machines and then wheeled her and the whole kit and caboodle out of the room.
Then I left the ICU.
I had no idea how to get back to the parking garage. And in the hallway outside the ICU there were only friends and family of other patients, most of whom looked even more distressed than I felt.
I went into a stairwell where I found two young adults sitting on the floor talking. Neither of them was crying. So I asked them if they could tell me how to get to the parking garage. They decided the guy would actually take me there, which he very kindly did, the only way he knew how, which was to go all the way down to the street level and then go around the outside of the building to get back to the parking garage. Where I had parked on the roof.
But I made it back to the car. Paid for parking. Found my way out of the garage. (Which was blessedly simpler than finding my way into it.) Found a street name I recognized. And managed to get onto the street I needed to take to get back out of town, actually driving in the correct direction to get out of town.
I made it back home shortly before dark. (Which is important to me because I have to drive on country roads to get home where the speed limit is 90kph but I usually cannot have my high beams on because there is oncoming traffic, and there are no street lights, but there are deer and other animals that wander onto the road and sometimes cyclists who for some reason in my neighbourhood like to drive at night with no lights on their bikes and I'm basically terrified to drive at night here as a result.)
My brother called me just as I walked through the door. He had just got off the phone with the neurosurgeon, who said our mother's procedure had gone well. The neuro had not been able to get in through the first leg she had tried, so she tried the other leg and that worked fine. She also had told my brother we should expect our mother to remain in the further-away, scary big city hospital for at least 21 days.
My brother lives a 3.5 hour drive away from this hospital. And he has a wife and two children. And a full time job. He cannot be driving out to this place every day to see our mother. And he cannot keep sleeping in hotels away from his family. Meanwhile, I found the experience of trying to navigate this hospital today so stressful I would very much like to never go there again ever in my life for any reason. And I'm very freaked out that the likelihood of our mother ending up in long term care seems to be growing daily. Which will mean we have to sell the house I am living in. Which will plunge me into a housing crisis. I need to be spending my time and energy on building a long-term future for myself right now. Not burning through my time, money, and nerves driving back and forth from a far away hospital. Also: LTC beds have long waiting lists here. And to free up your hospital bed, they will stick you in the first one that comes available. Which might not be anywhere near where anyone in your family is living.
Also: I feel angry that this happened to our mother only 3 months after she just got her life back after so many years of looking after our father.
I apologize. This is a really stressful and depressing post.
I am super stressed out right now.
But:
I am healthy.
Whatever happens, I will not be losing my current home right away.
My childhood friend who came out to support me this week told me she will not let me become a street person and she would let me crash on her sofa if it comes to that. (Her house is already VERY crowded, and her sofa is the only space she has left to offer me. But it would actually be pretty nice to be living with a friend.)
So I will be okay.
Things are going to be tough for a while. But I will be okay one way or another.
One day at a time, right?
(My brother said, two hours. He feels he's not able to plan his life out more than two hours ahead at the moment.)
You are right in your assessment. However chaotic all this is, for now you have control.
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
December 13:
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge day 13
Daily HIIT Challenge day 27
Fighter's Codex
3 x 60 seconds forearm plank
5.5 km with Shelby + my friend, 3 km with just Shelby (Not that she's a "just". Shelby is awesome.)
writing:
French: Netflix
GOBOT
GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 586/500 squats -
Bunny Rabbit: 1000/1000 jacks -
Shiny Red Sports Car: 10/10 minutes planks -
Four down. One to go!
Fit December
Power Squats Challenge day 13
Daily HIIT Challenge day 27
Fighter's Codex
3 x 60 seconds forearm plank
5.5 km with Shelby + my friend, 3 km with just Shelby (Not that she's a "just". Shelby is awesome.)
writing:
French: Netflix
GOBOT
GBOT
FC report:
Nothing to report this day. Didn't look at it.
Ornaments Progress:
Teddy Bear: 2000/2000 punches -
Magical Unicorn: 0/1000 kicks
Gaming Controller: 586/500 squats -
Bunny Rabbit: 1000/1000 jacks -
Shiny Red Sports Car: 10/10 minutes planks -
Four down. One to go!
Mamatigerj
Well-known member
Maegaranthelas
Well-known member
this is so much to have to deal with. Take care of what you can, but do guard your limits. You don't have to burn yourself out looking after of someone else.
PetiteSheWolf
Well-known member
So much to deal with. Take good care of yourself too, enjoy Shelby's presence when you walk with her, and know you and your mom and bro are thought of, even all the way to France.
Laura Rainbow Dragon
Well-known member
Thank you @Maegaranthelas .
I understand this and think I am generally good at giving what I can while still reserving enough of my resources to look after myself.
Part of my stress right now, though, is due to the fact that the only person in my family who respected my choice to walk this line in the past was my father, who is now gone. (And even he didn't respect it so much during the last few years of his life, when his mental faculties also started to go and his medical needs became more dire.)
I have been vilified by family in the past for refusing unreasonable and even unsafe requests.
But my brother has been respecting my limits w.r.t. what I can and cannot do for our mother this past week (in spite of also being under extreme stress due to the situation himself). I am very grateful for this.
I understand this and think I am generally good at giving what I can while still reserving enough of my resources to look after myself.
Part of my stress right now, though, is due to the fact that the only person in my family who respected my choice to walk this line in the past was my father, who is now gone. (And even he didn't respect it so much during the last few years of his life, when his mental faculties also started to go and his medical needs became more dire.)
I have been vilified by family in the past for refusing unreasonable and even unsafe requests.
But my brother has been respecting my limits w.r.t. what I can and cannot do for our mother this past week (in spite of also being under extreme stress due to the situation himself). I am very grateful for this.