Of hospitals, rehabilitation centers, outpatient surgery centers, life, death, and miracles…

You know, I never wanted to be a nurse. But this month I’ve done a lot of nursing. This morning Randy went in for surgery for Meniere’s disease. The doctor had to drill into his skull, carve out the bone, and puncture the sac in his inner ear that fills up with fluid (the fluid build-up is what causes his Meniere’s attacks). He also put a tube in his eardrum so the pressure wouldn’t build up. The doctor said everything went really well, but Randy had a hard time coming out of the anesthesia and had a lot of nausea. I thought we would be home around noon, but it was after 3pm. He has a large cup over his ear that can come off tomorrow. He says his ear really hurts like a bad earache and he gets especially strong pains in it when he belches (from the pressure). If he sneezes, he needs to be sure he keeps his mouth open. He’s got antibiotics and pain pills to take. The doctor said his equilibrium should return within the week, although it could take up to a month.

One Sunday as we went to church, Randy was having pains in his abdomen. Shortly after we sat down, he decided that he needed to get up and walk around. He thought that maybe his bowels just needed to move. After a short time, a friend came in and told me that he was going to take Randy home. I guess things hurt so bad that he ended up throwing up outside. So, our friend took him home and then got another Elder to go and administer to him. I guess Randy was shaking from the pain by then. Dylan went home to help him, and he was trying to decide whether to go to the emergency room or not. Finally, though, he was able to fall asleep and eventually felt better. By that evening he decided that he had probably passed a kidney stone.

On Monday morning, Feb 14 (Valentine’s Day), Randy got a call from a friend of his younger sister Janna – the news was not good. She said Janna was in the hospital because she had a kidney stone and it had gotten infected and the infection had gone through her blood stream – she was septic. All of her organs were trying to shut down. They performed surgery on Monday afternoon and did a bypass for that kidney because the stone was too big to pass. That afternoon and evening she was not doing well at all. I guess they almost lost her that night. She was flat-lining and everybody rushed in her room and started working on her like crazy. One thing they had to do was give her lots of fluids, so she was extremely bloated. The ER guy that is a friend of (her husband) Marty's went up to ICU and took charge and wouldn't let anyone in the room that he didn't trust could help. After they got her going again, the ER guy wasn't very encouraged and told Marty that he'd better get the family around. Then, she had a good night and by morning her vitals were really good. But, her lungs were filling up with the fluids that her body needed. They kept her highly sedated because otherwise she would fight the tube down her throat. They had her on a respirator because she couldn’t breathe by herself. Randy flew to Dallas Tuesday morning and stayed at their place. His 2 brothers, his older sister and her husband, a nephew and 2 of his kids also went down there. All of Janna’s kids that weren’t in town (she still has 2 at home) flew or drove in from where they live. She continued to improve throughout the day and Tuesday night - she even coughed, which was a good sign that she was breathing on her own. The culture showed that it was e-coli so then they were able to give her correct antibiotics. Randy spent 4 days there and ended up flying home on Friday even though she still hadn’t regained consciousness. On Sunday, her 47th birthday, her husband let Randy know that she was awake, eating and talking – although only in a whisper because her throat was raw from having a tube down it for 6 days. It seems that she will be fine with no residual effects, although they still need to get the kidney stone out. She came home last Friday. So, the ER guy saved her life. What’s really cool is that the reason that the ER guy even saw Marty in that part of the hospital is that he came in a different door than he usually does because he was going to check himself into the psych unit because he was having suicidal thoughts. So, Janna also saved HIS life! Two miracles happened that day. What a testimony to the way God works with each of us!!

Becky and Dave were up one weekend to visit his brother that had a kidney removed because it had a cancerous growth in it – all went well with that. They stopped by the rehab center and chatted with mom. I also got to visit with Connie Hubbard for a few hours one morning and catch up on all that’s happening in her life. She is now the Stake Relief Society President in their stake, was diagnosed with 2 stomach ulcers, she talked about her trips to Fresno, CA and to Spain, and about the happenings in Jim’s family since his father passed away.

My mom finally came home from the rehabilitation center last week. She was so glad to leave there, although she had made some friends and really liked the people that worked with her on physical rehabilitation. She will have a nurse, occupational therapist, and a physical therapist come in a few times a week for a short time. Hopefully, she will be able to keep up the exercises that strengthened her. We will have to make some adjustments to the height of her chair and toilet, maybe add some bars to hold onto, etc. because everything has been wearing her out and her knees have really been hurting. I’ll get some recommendations from the therapists.

Then, at the beginning of the month the receptionist at Randy’s work died unexpectedly from an infection. She was in her mid 30’s and had a couple of small children at home. One of her ex-husband’s will raise the children, I guess. Pretty sad.

In other news, Brisco is really becoming a part of our family. He has been to the vet twice to finish up his puppy shots and get his rabies vaccination. I had his hair clipped, although I’m not sure if I like him better this way or not. One Saturday I took him to a clinic to get neutered. While Randy was in Texas, Tyler came over and installed a doggie door in our wash room. It took Brisco a few days to get used to it, but now he can go outside whenever he needs to (I close it up at night though, so we don’t have any strange animals enter through it!). I viewed a video on YouTube that showed a possum coming through someone’s doggie door at night, and I certainly don’t want that to happen. He is really a ‘mama’s boy’ and doesn’t ever want to leave my side. It also takes him a few minutes to get used to strangers – especially men. He barks or growls at them.

Randy’s blues band played several shows in February. One was up in Ogden on Valentine’s weekend and they had a couple hundred people at it, I think. Then they played at one in Murray the following weekend, but the crowd was small. I’m sure the promoters lost money on that one.

I will finish the class that I am on (Managing Information Technology) this week. I have had to do a consultant’s report plus a power point presentation in it, along with all the usual discussion board entries and unit assessments. For the next 3 terms I am doubling up classes and will have 2 every 8 weeks instead of just one. This way, I will be able to graduate by the end of this year with an MBA in Marketing. And finally, we had record-breaking weather this past month that was really mild. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

Karen and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad month

Wow – what a difference a few days can make. Several days after my last post my mom called me down to her room early in the morning (Tuesday). She told me that she hadn’t slept much and could hardly put any weight on her legs. They progressively got worse throughout the day and by that afternoon we met my brother Derek at the doctor’s office. They ran a lot of tests and put her on an antibiotic for a slight bladder infection. The next few days she didn’t regain any strength in her legs and couldn’t get around by herself. By Friday the doctor told us that he couldn’t reach any conclusions for her leg weakness from what he had done, and that we should take her to the emergency room where they could do more tests. So, we took her to the hospital and after awhile, they decided to admit her. They ended up doing an MRI on her brain and one on her lower spine. The results of those were that she had had a small stroke, but LONG ago. She also had a lot of bone growth on the inside of her spine (so it is not really noticeable just to look at her), and that could be pressing against the nerves that go down into her legs. They suggested that she talk to a neurologist about surgery, but at her age she is not interested in that. So, on Monday she was moved to a rehabilitation center where physical therapists are working with her to regain strength in her arms and legs so that she can be mobile again, if possible. I have been stopping by there every day with Connie. She seems to be making slow and steady progress, but she HATES being there.

Randy went to Florida on a business trip at the same time my mom was having all this trouble. Originally I was going to go along and we were going to go to Disney World, but luckily we had decided against it a few months ago. Randy also saw the ear specialist at the beginning of January. He gave him a 6-day dose of medication to take when he feels an episode coming on. Randy had to take it within a week, but it was hard to tell if it really did anything. The doctor gave him another prescription for it and is having him go in for more testing in 2 weeks. They are going to administer the same kind of tests that he had almost 30 years ago when they diagnosed the Menieres disease. The other new medication that he was given tends to make him very sleepy. As far as the surgery goes - sometimes just drilling a hole in the skull behind the ear relieves the pressure, and sometimes they actually have to puncture the sac where the fluid build-up is. Cool.

On the 25^th, Randy needed to drive some supplies down to southern Utah and do an inspection on a job down there. He was a little worried about driving that far alone (in case he started getting sick) so he took Dylan along. He wanted to leave by 8:30am, but getting the supplies took several hours, so it was 10:30am by the time they took off. This was the same morning that I had come out of the temple to slick snow (it was not doing anything when I went in) and almost hit a couple of cars when I slid down a hill in my Blazer. I slid to the left and to the right and my brakes kept locking up. I was able to maneuver into the far right lane and into the cross road, where luckily there was no traffic. For Randy and Dylan there was only snow for the first hour or so. Randy was also going to see about a dog (a Labrador retriever that was being trained for police work, but was too timid) that his friend had left at a non-euthanizing shelter down near Kanab. To make a long story short, after finally finding the shelter, Randy found out that the dog was already taken; the job he was going to inspect was not at all where he thought it was and he didn’t need to drive nearly as far as he did; he finally found the foreman at his hotel so that he could give him the supplies but it was too late to do an inspection; there were lots of deer along the road that made him really nervous because he hoped they wouldn’t jump out into the road; and he got a speeding ticket for going too fast as he was leaving a small town. They didn’t get home until 11pm. At least Randy and Dylan enjoyed their time together and Randy’s ear didn’t give him any trouble.

For Christmas I got a kennel and food dishes for a dog – I just didn’t have a dog yet. I’d been looking at KSL classifieds online and at online shelters for a Yorkshire terrier. I wanted a dog that is small this time and would be a house-dog. Randy answered an ad for a 5 month old schnauzer-poodle mix (schnoodle) and liked it enough to bring him home. We have named him Brisco. He is not house-trained yet, so we are working on that.

Randy and I went to an art showing of Carl Bloch paintings at BYU. The exhibit was free, but we were really glad that we rented the ipads because they gave you so much more information about the pieces of art and had some interviews included. We grabbed lunch (steak sandwiches) at an Italian Place in Orem. We really like the food, but it also reminds us of when we were dating and we used to get those sandwiches with coupons in the BYU paper for 2 for 1. While we were there Frank and Stormy Draney came in. They were in town (from Evanston, WY) to celebrate Franks birthday. They also stopped for lunch at the Italian Place because of nostalgia from college. We talked to them for awhile and caught up on things.

We had Stake Conference last weekend – it was great, as usual. Randy had to sit out in the foyer Saturday night (because of his ear – the noise drives him up the wall) and he could only stay for the first hour on Sunday morning because there wasn’t a place to sit in the foyers that didn’t have crying babies. I HOPE the surgery fixes things.

Ingrid came to visit for a few days. Her husband Jeff has family visiting for an annual ski trip and she didn’t want to sit in the lodge all day (she can’t ski because she is pregnant.) Heidi gave her a baby shower where she invited family members and a few old friends. It was nice.

Ingrid brought her two dogs (Vizslas) and the first night Brisco was kind of intimated and real protective of his territory. He has relaxed, though, and gets along with them great now. He will really miss them when Ingrid leaves.