I just had the scare of my life! [View all]

[slightlv]

People don't think what comes out their mouths, I swear!

Wednesday night hubby experienced excruciating chest pains, so we rushed him to the ER. Since we're in a city with no real hospitals any longer, they transferred him to a hospital in the next large city near us. He had a 100% occlusion in one of his stents. I'm thinking the meds they had him on must have dissolved the clot, because they didn't take him into surgery... and the cardio notes just said "aggressive med"... which could mean anything and everything that only a doc could figure out! grrr...

While I was up there today with him, the nurse said there's talk of letting him go home tomorrow. Couldn't find out much from him, he was basically sleeping the whole time I was there. But he's got an excellent nurse who's been with him since the beginning, so I've been thankful for that.

Anyway, tonight while trying to clean the bedroom and arrange things for getting around easier in here, the hospital called. The person (probably an orderly) spoke broken English and was hard to understand. But evidently hubby tried to get out of bed and hit the floor before his feet even touched down. The guy was calling to tell me that he fell, and that he was ok. But for the life of me, going over the conversation, I swear he told me they tried to get to him but he failed. For a hot minute, I thought they were calling to tell me that he'd died. My heart stopped until I finally said, are you telling me he's okay or what?

I guess his pronunciation of "fell" sounded to me like "fail"... or he was telling me he failed to stop him from getting out of bed. I'm not sure which, but it scared the holy hell out of me. Hospitals ought to be a bit more sensitive to this type of thing and who they're assigning to make these calls. I know they passed it over to the orderly in charge of the room... and I know the nurses are extremely busy. But these types of calls need to be made by someone who speaks English clearly. The information they're passing on to us is important... not just a hospital "cover your butt" policy, IMO.

I'm working on the assumption this won't change his schedule... supposedly he didn't break anything or get hurt. I'm looking forward to having him back home... as is his puppy dog! But that opens another full can of worms for me. He HATES taking his meds and fights me about it. But I know he must have skipped some of them for this clot to form. Grandson half jokingly said something about mashing up the pills in his food to make sure he gets them. I hadn't reached that far into ideas... but it's in the back of my mind!

He's 74 and falling deeper into dementia. Lately he's become belligerent, which is so NOT his personality. I'm trying to ignore the words and actions and take care of him... but anyone have any advice? I'm all ears!

I've reached out to the counselor from my doc's med group. That was for me and my anxiety and depression in trying to care of him. Haven't heard back, but it's at least 6 telemed sessions free of charge, and they don't charge my insurance, either. Sounded too good to pass up for when I feel I'm at a total loss... like I'm feeling right now... I love the man to pieces. I know what it means to have a soul mate, but sometimes, I swear....!