Heart Attacks, Hospitals and Family

Not long after I posted the last post my mom called. In her calm and collected voice she informed me that the ambulance was at their house because dad was having a heart attack. How she stays so calm I will never know, because my reaction was at the other end of the spectrum. Jay rushed upstairs thinking I had cut my hand off. We jumped in the car and headed for St. Boniface hospital... not knowing what we would find when we arrived there. We actually got gas but didn’t pay for it until the next day, small towns are great!

When we arrived at the hospital mom met us outside. Dad was still in pain, and was getting pumped full of medications. I guess things got a little scary when the ambulance people couldn’t get an IV in. My dad has really bad veins from all his chemo so they couldn’t give him the medication that they wanted. It took a couple of people and tries before the IV’s were in. The bruises will probably last weeks.
We went into the emergency room dad was in and talked with him. The nurses were watching him really closely and the pain was being managed with lots of drugs. They were hoping the clot busting drug would stop the pain but it didn’t work. As a family we talked, poked fun and each other and talked some more. Being around a hospital bed isn’t that foreign to us. At midnight we sent Jay and Joel home (Ashley had gone home earlier). Mom and I prepared for a long night of waiting.

Around 1am they took dad for an angiogram to see where the blockage was and if they could get it out. Mom and I slept (at least we tried to sleep) in the waiting room and waited, and waited and waited some more. They told us that these things don’t take that long, 30 minutes or so.... but we waited for over two hours with no updates or signs of human life (the hospital seemed empty). The doctors and nurses had to be called in from home, I am sure those 1am phone calls don’t make them that happy.

Just after 3am they called us into the room to see dad. The nurse said the doctor had performed two miracles getting the two shunts in to keep the artery open. He was doped up on whatever drugs they gave him but was feeling a little better. The nurse got him settled in the cardiac care unit and we said good bye. By the time we caught a taxi (mom came in the ambulance, me with Jay) we got home at 4:30am. After cleaning up the medical supplies that the ambulance left we fell into bed and slept soundly until 7ish when dad’s cell started ringing with guys wondering why he wasn’t at work.

By 10:30 we were up again, and phone calls were the main objective for the first little while. To the hospital, to family that didn’t know yet, to update Joel, Jay, and Ashley. In my panic the night before I didn’t bring anything with me so a trip to Zellers saved the day and I picked up necessities. Mom and I headed up to the hospital to check in on dad. He was still receiving drugs, on a heart monitor, and such but was feeling better. He was very happy to learn lunch had been delivered, he couldn’t sit up so mom fed him lying down. His normal heart rhythm had returned and his stats looked good.

When we left we headed to the new condo (mom and dad had started moving, hence the over exertion and therefore the heart attack) and checked it out, and ran some errands and headed home. June (my mother-in-law) popped in to see how we were doing. We headed to Joel and Ashley’s to eat (thanks again Ash). Thankfully between Joel and Ash and Ashley’s parents I was able to borrow a car to get home (family is a wonderful thing). I made one last visit with dad before driving back home last night. Dad was up walking, and frustrated he couldn’t walk further. He was off everything but the heart monitor, he even made phone calls to work last night.

Today things sound like the improvement has continued. I am back in Riverton as Jay and I are running Space camp, exhausted today, and looking forward to getting a full night’s sleep. We are heading back to the city on Friday morning after space camp is over. We will help mom get the old house cleaned and ready for the new owners.
We don’t know when dad is coming home yet, but we hope to have the condo all set up and ready to go so he has nothing to do when he gets there. Mom has hired movers to finish up the move on Thursday morning.

I am sure the recovery will be a little slower than dad would want it to be. I hope to spend next week with mom and dad in city, to help where I can.

Thank you for your prayers, phone calls, emails, offers of help and concern, they have meant a lot to us all.