During my 4 1/2 hour car ride from Reno down to San Jose, I rehearsed several blog posts in my head that I would post when I arrived at my parents house. I had a really good political diatribe (and you know, I generally tend to shy away from that topic) all set up. I also had a great post talking about songs that make me think of college. No, really, it sounded awesome in my head! And I still may do these posts eventually. But about an hour away from our destination, I got a call on my cell phone from my dad.
We’d been in contact with him just about an hour earlier, letting him know where we were at and when we expected to be there. I’d had a hard time getting ahold of my parents the last couple of days and eventually had to track my dad down on his cell phone. It’s unusual, but not altogether unheard of. My sister had gotten to town the day before and it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that they’d be out and about with her. Still, I wondered. And I worried a little.
Well, I was right to do so. Thursday morning my mom went to the emergency room complaining of weakness (I mean, falling down on the way to the bathroom and not being able to get back up again sort of weakness). She’s had a lot of health problems in the last several months (months? try years) and so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that all her illnesses and aches and pains were affecting her strength. But before she could be sprung with a prescription for a pain killer, she fell again. And it took four people to get her into a wheelchair. Once in a bed, it was determined she had a decent fever. She wasn’t going anywhere. They ran a battery of tests on her and it was determined she had a bladder infection. Only it had gotten so bad that the infection had entered her bloodstream. And she may (may) have had a mild heart attack. They won’t know for sure until the infection clears up.
So my dad wanted to know if we wanted to stop by the hospital on our way in and say hi. Uhm…. YEAH! Why wasn’t I told about this YESTERDAY? Apparently, because they didn’t want to ruin our trip down. Nevermind that we would have come down yesterday had we known. Nevermind that as family members, we should have KNOWN.
At this rate, we don’t know when she’ll get sprung. She hopes to be home by tomorrow afternoon. We have a huge amount of family coming over to the house for a party tomorrow evening. And then Sunday is a wedding that we’ve all been planning months to attend. And it’s doubtful she’ll get to go to that too. She doesn’t know. I don’t want to tell her. Do you? Didn’t think so. But apparently, not telling people things sort of runs in this family.
My first thought after this phone call… “This is how it happens.” This is how it starts. Only it’s been starting for a long time now. She just doesn’t take of herself. It starts with a bladder infection. What next? I felt very scared, all of the sudden. Like there was suddenly too much life staring me down.
We’re here now. We stopped to see my mom, who looked well until about 10 minutes into the visit when she got flushed and her eyes drooped with exhaustion and the nurse determined her fever was back. We’ll be back to visit in the morning. In the meantime, it feels strange to be in this house without her. None of us seem to know what to do with ourselves, the food, the dishes, etc. Very strange. Very wrong.
Related Posts
- No related posts
Posted by cagey 
This is me. I'm a thirtysomething stay at home mom to three kids. For years I was a stay at home mom to one kid and trying very hard to have more. It took a LONG time (ie: 6 1/2 years), but finally Liam arrived and charmed us with his blue eyes and ginormous, round head. Then we got a shock: I was pregnant again and this time it was a GIRL. Our hearts and home are full at last and now that we're done having babies, we get to relax (snort) and watch them grow (not too fast now, you hear?). Thanks for coming by, feel free to dip into my archives, read my About and History pages (just don't do Jackson's Story without tissues!) and make yourself at home.
