Wow, I just was asked by one a friend how my blog was going....I told him I couldn't even remember the last time that I had written in it - and he told me in so many words that I should start back up because he always found my story moving and honest, which is quite a compliment. Writing has always been very theraputic for me, yet it seems like when things in my life have ever gotten too over emotional I clam up and have a hard time writing. So this will be an attempt, not promising that it'll add up to much of anything. I'm not going to try and fill people in on my entire life since I last wrote, I dont have that much time nor patience at the moment to even try to condense that much into a single post....but I will write about the most significant event that occurred, which if you know me at all, you know I'm talking about the death of my father on August 29th, 2011.
After 28 years of being ill and having so many close calls, my Dad finally lost his battle and passed away in his sleep at 10:30 PM on that Monday night in August. He had actually been doing quite well, we had no warning what so ever and although he had been sick for so long it was a huge shock to us when we got that awful phone call. I have to be grateful though because he didn't suffer that night - he fell asleep after a big meal and jokes with his nurses, a perfect last conversation and visit with my mom and died shortly thereafter from not being able to expell enough CO2.
The first week or so I was a complete puddle....then the numbness set in, which I thought was great. Now again it's hitting me like a ton of bricks. I just have so much guilt, so many things I wish I had done differently, so many 'should-a would-a could-a's.' He was the single most important man in my life (my son of course isn't a man yet) and I had been terrified of his death my entire life....God I was imagining what his funeral would be like when I layed in bed during my early childhood. It was always this big looming black monster that I built my life around, as pathetic as that sounds.
So now there's this huge gaping hole. The fact that it's Christmas time is of course making it all the more difficult. It's hard too because I feel as if my Dad was a Ghost to most people during his last years - he wasn't well enough to leave the house, he didn't have friends, no one came to visit - so it was just always us....so it's a really lonely feeling thinking that i'm one of only 2 or 3 other people who are feeling this tremendous loss.
See I can't even write - I attempted, I failed. I'm just turning myself into a blubbering mess and that's just pointless. "Grin and Bare it" right? It's a part of life, no one escapes it. I know everyone says this, and when I lost my grandfather, and then Ellis I said it then too - but what I would give for just one more conversation, hug, "i love you." And now I wish I could just turn it off and go back to that comfortable state of numbness I was living in soon after his death - but the longer it goes the more it sinks in and the more permenant I realize it is. Thank God I have a few very close friends who are there for me, those people really have helped me keep it together these last few months. For some reason the last couple nights have just been extra rough....I have to remember though it's only been 3 months - which in all reality isn't that long when it comes to the whole grieving process. And there are good things in my life right now - wonderful things - I'm not trying to be all doom and gloom. It's just a shitty night, some are shittier then others and for right now this is right up there with the worst of em - but one thing that is pretty amazing about life, no matter how good or bad things are - they change, and one day I can feel like I do right now, and tomorrow I could be in the most peaceful place imaginable....it just is what it is.
But right now I'm just tired, and forcing myself to write isn't what this should be, just stating facts and rambling to try and fill a page was never the point of this blog....so I'll just stop here. Hopefully in the near future I'll be in a better place and will be able to really write about things, not just explain details, if that makes sense. So Im going to go get my beautiful little boy fed, bathed and ready for bed....I hope anyone who reads this can find themselves in a wonderful place, ready for the holidays and you are content with your life right now! I'm going to turn the faucet off and go spend the two hours with Brian before he's in bed, and pray that I'm able to sleep tonight - I will complain and whine about one more thing...nights! I won't even attempt to go to bed until I'm to the point of such exhaustion that i know I will pass right out - too many things run through my mind if I try and lie in bed waiting to sleep. Thank you to my friends and family who have listened and not told me to shut up these last few months - who have been here for me and my mom as much as possible. I dont know where I'd be without those 'good ole folks' lol :-) If you've made it this far in reading this blog I give you lots of credit, I dont know if I could handle reading someone go on and on about this kind of subject matter. Next time I write I'll try and do it in the daytime - nothing for me is as sad or scary in the day as they are at night. XOXOXO
Monday, December 5, 2011
Saturday, July 2, 2011
6 months!
I'm so disappointed with myself, SIX months since I've written my last blog entry. The main reason I wanted to write daily was so when I did write I didn't have to spend hours filling people in on what's been occurring - there goes that grand idea, huh? There is just so much that's happened in the last 6 months, that I know without a doubt that it'd be impossible to sit here that long and try to cover it all. So I'm going to make a list of a few of the main things that have 'gone down' and then I'm just going to write about the last few weeks I've had, best plan I could come up with :-)
-Dad came down with double pneumonia. As a family we've always been so scared of pneumonia, that's been like the big scary sickness my dad's done everything to avoid since I can remember. Anyone who lives in or has lived in this household for any period of time has gotten their yearly flu shots, if someone was sick with any type of bad cold or had a fever they weren't allowed in, my dad wouldn't share drinks with any of us if we had the slightest cold, etc. So the fact that he had double pneumonia, was just scary icing on the cake. Yet, after some time in the hospital and lots of IV antibiotics, he beat it...and it was a severe case also which made it even more impressive. When he was discharged from the hospital he went into the nursing home, for good this time. It's been super difficult because he hates it there and wants so badly to come home...if he could just accept it and stop thinking there was a way for him to come home, then I believe it would be easier on us all. It doesn't help though that his current roommate is deaf, dumb and blind and is in pain so he moans all the time. Poor man. But it's so hard for my dad to be there anyhow, but to have to deal with such a sad and depressing situation right in his room doesn't help. See and my dad still is 100% mentally coherent, and with it...and many of the other patients over there just aren't, many people with dementia of all kinds, and for someone who is mentally as sharp as a tack, it's scary, depressing and can make you feel very alone. I could go on for a really long time about this scenario, how we made this decision, how we've all been dealing with it, why he's in there permanently, etc etc etc - but like I said I really don't want to just write about past events to catch everyone up, because my recent event is long enough of a story to try and explain.
Just by looking at how long that one explanation became, I changed my mind and will try to catch everyone up in another blog post...because I can't sit at my computer desk for very long periods of time and I'd never make it if I wrote what I had intended on writing. "Krista, why can't you sit at your computer desk for any long length of time?" Computer, I'm so glad you asked, because I was just getting to that, lol - yeah I'm pathetic, haha.
On June 4th I was walking down my porch steps and slipped and fell. It didn't hurt that badly, I got a small scratch on the top of my foot, twisted my ankle a bit, but nothing sever to say the least. I didn't even need a band aid on my foot, it wasn't even bleeding - just a little scrape. The next morning I noticed that my left foot was swollen up quite a lot, but just figured it was due to the fact that I had twisted my ankle and assumed it was sprained. By that night though it began hurting really badly and I could barely walk on it. The next 2 days it just got worse, swelled more, hurt terribly, and I couldn't even put an ounce of weight on it. On the 2nd night I called my Aunt Sass after realizing my temp was 104 and asked her if the next morning she could bring me down to the ER...which of course she agreed to.
As soon as I hobbled into triage I knew things were much worse then I had expected. The nurse looked at my foot and had me sent within 2 minutes into the ER. Then when doctors started flocking around me I knew things were a lot more serious then I had expected. I started hearing words like "septic, emergency surgery, cellulites, MRSA, fever, etc." They then gave me a big ole shot of fentynal which got me pretty fuzzy and I don't remember too much after that.
An amazing Doctor who is head of the vascular unit at GFH was my surgeon and I felt very comfortable with him right off the bat, thank God! So the next time I really started sobering up was up in the ICU, with my first IV's, and a heart monitor, and all sorts of tubes and machines. I found out that in my surgery the Doctor had to remove 3 big holes from the top of my foot, in hopes that the infection would drain through those and not cause more damage. I was on two super heavy duty antibiotics through my IV's, and it turns out that my specific strain of infection was a Strep. The main three that are like what I had are Staph, MRSA, and Strep. The Dr. told me that the little scratch on my foot was the reason behind it, and assured me that I'd be ok and that everyone would be keeping a close eye on me.
The next day when the surgeon came in to change my bandaging all hell broke loose in my room. First off I had a mild panic attack when I looked at the three huge holes in my foot...and the pain was so intense that I came close to passing out. Then he told me that we were most likely going to have to operate again because there were new black area's of my skin, which means dying tissue. Yeah isn't that nice, I had a flesh eating disease, ick. Then he noticed that my left leg was bright red and hot too the touch - meaning the infection had traveled upwards. He quickly scheduled my second surgery for the following day, and drew some lines on my leg so he'd be able to tell if the red area's were higher or lower the next time he saw me. I was warned though that if black area's showed up on my leg then an amputation might be my only option.
So of course I was scared out of my mind, my family was in and out of the hospital visiting, and they were all scared to death...it was just a nightmare. The second surgery sucked! I woke up very quickly after being wheeled out of the OR, and when I did, the pain was so unbearable that I had never experienced anything close to it, yes even in childbirth. When I got back to my room my grandmother, and mom were in there and my crying only got worse and the pain wasn't getting any better. Luckily the nurses ended up rushing in and giving me more pain meds through my IV and it was just enough to bring it down to a humane level. I was still in the ICU at this point, had barely slept a wink because of pain and fear, and was missing Brian like crazy.
The next morning my surgeon came in to look at his handwork. First though he looked at my leg, and finally I was cut a break and the redness had started to lighten up and move down! So for the time being I was keeping my leg, which made things so much less terrifying. Then he took off my bandage and the panic attack I had after the first surgery was nothing compared to the freak out I had this time. I wish I had a picture of what it looked like on that first day, but I do have a picture from a week later...lucky you all, I'll show you - it's already been on facebook so most of you have se
en it.
I spent another 5 or 6 days in the ICU, which is the way to go if your in a hospital! The nurses only have like 2 patients at a time, so you get tons of great and quick care, private room, and just a few other nice perks that aren't available in other parts of the hospital. After that time I was transferred down to the surgical floor and stayed there about another week. Totaling my hospital stay at 16 days.
To sum this up quickly because my foot's starting to hurt - if it's not elevated it does that. I am now home. I have to go to the wound center once a week to see my surgeon, and I have a private nurse come into the house once a day to change my bandages. I'm now off antibiotics, which makes me a little nervous since I have a huge open wound, but ah well. I've got about 3 or more operations to look forward too. Skin grafts, harvesting healthy tissue from my hip, and whatever else they need to do. Once I start feeling better I'll start physical therapy, ect. No question that my summer will be spent with my foot up in bed, unable to work or anything, after that I can't even guess what the time period will look like, neither can the doctors. I'm keeping a good attitude though, grateful that this wasn't all much much worse. I'm figuring out how to still do fun stuff with Brian, inside and out. It is what it is though and all I can do is make the best of it, because like I said, it's going to be a long recovery.
I'll definitely write again soon to get my blog caught up. If I was crazy with details in the beginning and then just raced through things in the end that's just because my foot started throbbing so I wanted to wrap things up quickley. Hope you are all well....lots of love.
-Dad came down with double pneumonia. As a family we've always been so scared of pneumonia, that's been like the big scary sickness my dad's done everything to avoid since I can remember. Anyone who lives in or has lived in this household for any period of time has gotten their yearly flu shots, if someone was sick with any type of bad cold or had a fever they weren't allowed in, my dad wouldn't share drinks with any of us if we had the slightest cold, etc. So the fact that he had double pneumonia, was just scary icing on the cake. Yet, after some time in the hospital and lots of IV antibiotics, he beat it...and it was a severe case also which made it even more impressive. When he was discharged from the hospital he went into the nursing home, for good this time. It's been super difficult because he hates it there and wants so badly to come home...if he could just accept it and stop thinking there was a way for him to come home, then I believe it would be easier on us all. It doesn't help though that his current roommate is deaf, dumb and blind and is in pain so he moans all the time. Poor man. But it's so hard for my dad to be there anyhow, but to have to deal with such a sad and depressing situation right in his room doesn't help. See and my dad still is 100% mentally coherent, and with it...and many of the other patients over there just aren't, many people with dementia of all kinds, and for someone who is mentally as sharp as a tack, it's scary, depressing and can make you feel very alone. I could go on for a really long time about this scenario, how we made this decision, how we've all been dealing with it, why he's in there permanently, etc etc etc - but like I said I really don't want to just write about past events to catch everyone up, because my recent event is long enough of a story to try and explain.
Just by looking at how long that one explanation became, I changed my mind and will try to catch everyone up in another blog post...because I can't sit at my computer desk for very long periods of time and I'd never make it if I wrote what I had intended on writing. "Krista, why can't you sit at your computer desk for any long length of time?" Computer, I'm so glad you asked, because I was just getting to that, lol - yeah I'm pathetic, haha.
On June 4th I was walking down my porch steps and slipped and fell. It didn't hurt that badly, I got a small scratch on the top of my foot, twisted my ankle a bit, but nothing sever to say the least. I didn't even need a band aid on my foot, it wasn't even bleeding - just a little scrape. The next morning I noticed that my left foot was swollen up quite a lot, but just figured it was due to the fact that I had twisted my ankle and assumed it was sprained. By that night though it began hurting really badly and I could barely walk on it. The next 2 days it just got worse, swelled more, hurt terribly, and I couldn't even put an ounce of weight on it. On the 2nd night I called my Aunt Sass after realizing my temp was 104 and asked her if the next morning she could bring me down to the ER...which of course she agreed to.
As soon as I hobbled into triage I knew things were much worse then I had expected. The nurse looked at my foot and had me sent within 2 minutes into the ER. Then when doctors started flocking around me I knew things were a lot more serious then I had expected. I started hearing words like "septic, emergency surgery, cellulites, MRSA, fever, etc." They then gave me a big ole shot of fentynal which got me pretty fuzzy and I don't remember too much after that.
An amazing Doctor who is head of the vascular unit at GFH was my surgeon and I felt very comfortable with him right off the bat, thank God! So the next time I really started sobering up was up in the ICU, with my first IV's, and a heart monitor, and all sorts of tubes and machines. I found out that in my surgery the Doctor had to remove 3 big holes from the top of my foot, in hopes that the infection would drain through those and not cause more damage. I was on two super heavy duty antibiotics through my IV's, and it turns out that my specific strain of infection was a Strep. The main three that are like what I had are Staph, MRSA, and Strep. The Dr. told me that the little scratch on my foot was the reason behind it, and assured me that I'd be ok and that everyone would be keeping a close eye on me.
The next day when the surgeon came in to change my bandaging all hell broke loose in my room. First off I had a mild panic attack when I looked at the three huge holes in my foot...and the pain was so intense that I came close to passing out. Then he told me that we were most likely going to have to operate again because there were new black area's of my skin, which means dying tissue. Yeah isn't that nice, I had a flesh eating disease, ick. Then he noticed that my left leg was bright red and hot too the touch - meaning the infection had traveled upwards. He quickly scheduled my second surgery for the following day, and drew some lines on my leg so he'd be able to tell if the red area's were higher or lower the next time he saw me. I was warned though that if black area's showed up on my leg then an amputation might be my only option.
So of course I was scared out of my mind, my family was in and out of the hospital visiting, and they were all scared to death...it was just a nightmare. The second surgery sucked! I woke up very quickly after being wheeled out of the OR, and when I did, the pain was so unbearable that I had never experienced anything close to it, yes even in childbirth. When I got back to my room my grandmother, and mom were in there and my crying only got worse and the pain wasn't getting any better. Luckily the nurses ended up rushing in and giving me more pain meds through my IV and it was just enough to bring it down to a humane level. I was still in the ICU at this point, had barely slept a wink because of pain and fear, and was missing Brian like crazy.
The next morning my surgeon came in to look at his handwork. First though he looked at my leg, and finally I was cut a break and the redness had started to lighten up and move down! So for the time being I was keeping my leg, which made things so much less terrifying. Then he took off my bandage and the panic attack I had after the first surgery was nothing compared to the freak out I had this time. I wish I had a picture of what it looked like on that first day, but I do have a picture from a week later...lucky you all, I'll show you - it's already been on facebook so most of you have se
en it.
I spent another 5 or 6 days in the ICU, which is the way to go if your in a hospital! The nurses only have like 2 patients at a time, so you get tons of great and quick care, private room, and just a few other nice perks that aren't available in other parts of the hospital. After that time I was transferred down to the surgical floor and stayed there about another week. Totaling my hospital stay at 16 days.
To sum this up quickly because my foot's starting to hurt - if it's not elevated it does that. I am now home. I have to go to the wound center once a week to see my surgeon, and I have a private nurse come into the house once a day to change my bandages. I'm now off antibiotics, which makes me a little nervous since I have a huge open wound, but ah well. I've got about 3 or more operations to look forward too. Skin grafts, harvesting healthy tissue from my hip, and whatever else they need to do. Once I start feeling better I'll start physical therapy, ect. No question that my summer will be spent with my foot up in bed, unable to work or anything, after that I can't even guess what the time period will look like, neither can the doctors. I'm keeping a good attitude though, grateful that this wasn't all much much worse. I'm figuring out how to still do fun stuff with Brian, inside and out. It is what it is though and all I can do is make the best of it, because like I said, it's going to be a long recovery.
I'll definitely write again soon to get my blog caught up. If I was crazy with details in the beginning and then just raced through things in the end that's just because my foot started throbbing so I wanted to wrap things up quickley. Hope you are all well....lots of love.
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