crazyfurries | Entries tagged with mom

...on this day in 1950, Johanna M. Schwalbe was born in Rome, Georgia. Her father and mother were both teachers, Jack Schwalbe teaching engineering and machine shop, Nina Schwalbe teaching English and Home Economics.

I could fill in the rest of the details between that day and today, but the important thing is this. I'd rather honor the day my mother entered the world, than spend a day weeping on the anniversary of when she left this mortal coil.

Every year, if I have the funds to do so, I make a donation to the Alpha-1 Foundation.

This year, is probably the first time I've actually be able to be coherent enough to talk about it and actually do the deed exactly on the date in question.

I guess this is what's called progress.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: Florence and the Machine - My Boy Builds Coffins
Crossposts: http://crazyfurries.livejournal.com/290860.html

Hello funny humans, this is Newton the Satyr matriarch from Fuzzy's head. I'm making a public announcement as she is indisposed at the moment. The final tally after having spent 6 hours cleaning out her mother's room today...

38 bags of clothing for goodwill

5 boxes of clothes

4 copypaper boxes of BOOKS.

2 clear rubbermaid totes of linens and wool blankets

4 rubbermaid totes of fabric for the memory quilts

$1237 in mom's top drawer.

Furniture at this time is not being counted. It will be tallied at a later date.

This covers all expressions.

*incoherent babbling and frothing*

Excuse me, I need to go sedate her again before we take her to someplace to decompress.

Current Mood: crazy

Mom went into cardiac arrest last night in Loyola. They couldn't save her.

..................not again. this doesn't feel real.

Current Mood: fragile

Mom is intibated, there's a machine helping her to breathe, but thanks to her meds she wasn't awake during any hour of today. Still I think she knew I was there chattering softly and babbling about the powerpuff girl kimono. She's been put onto dialysis, the low blood pressure variation because thanks to other meds her kidneys aren't functioning 100%, and the docs want it higher before they go draining the abscess in her abdomen. We'll know more tomorrow and the current motto is this much: No news at this point is good news.

Also have been informed 4 times now that this sort of hospial merry-go round is common the first year after transplant.

Been running from about 5:30 am today on about 3 hours of sleep (eff you too body, stupid wound up nervous wreck). Had a great lunch and a lovely dinner at an italian and a 'greek' family place. Worth noting not getting drinks at the family place again, or their veggies. Bleh. Good ribs though! Also worth noting that little brother seems to have eaten the humility boot, and said I was handling today pretty well (other brother, martin, the one I live with who doesn't try to chew out my hear, was very emotional for him).

Going to take bath now.

Tomorrow will be better with sleep and the punk she-hulk outfit.

Ta, and I love all of you guys for keeping mom in your thoughts and prayers lately.

Current Mood: exhausted

She's still in the hospital, though they've given her a clean bill as far as the pneumonia is concerned she's got other issues.

Such as her white bloodcell count being up and her red bloodcell count being down.

Sorta. she might not be losing the lung now according to the docs and the coordinator, it all depends on how the biopsy comes back from the labs Monday. And she's not leaving St. Nicholaus hospital anytime soon either, every doctor is agreeing that she shouldn't be home now, and needs to rest in a hospital with professionals who will enforce the shit out of her drug regime, and her resting, among other things.

Me? right now I'm relieved since I got to talk to her today, but she was still very forgetful of things she'd said even five minutes prior. When I pointed it out she placed blame onto the drugs but I don't think she's entirely out of the woods yet, the drugs made her hands shake so much she could barely get the food to her own mouth.

Also? NOT VISITING HER AGAIN. Woman tried to rope me into helping her walk to the bathroom in her hospital gown, while she was still hooked up to the tubes and wires... And I AM NOT THE FUCK ASS A REGISTERED OR EVEN KNOWLEDGABLE NURSING MEDICAL TYPE.

One last massive update on mom before I go to bed.

She's stabilizing in the local ICU, and sometime tomorrow Loyola will be picking her up with a helicopter/flight for life, once a room in their Chicago Hospital opens up. Mom is being mom, and sadly that means that instead of getting rest to recover, rebuild her mineral levels and get her temperature back down...

Well. She's got tubes in everywhere and iv lines and oxygen going. By morning she's going to be a bit more lucid since she isn't horribly hellish feverish. (104 when she got in and by 4 pm same day it was only just getting under 100).

Right after this I am taking two sleeping pills so I get a full night's sleep. I have been running today on maybe 1 hour of sleep.

Night, love you all, and please keep mom in your thoughts as we're not out of the woods yet.

Current Mood: exhausted

shit. shit. shit.

Mom is getting rushed to Loyola by Ambulance.

The lung is rejecting.

I knew today would be the oh-god o'clock morning wake up, so yesterday I planned ahead and went to sleep early.

EXCEPT I didn't sleep much because mom, bless her, kept puttering about and it took her a while to head for bed...

EXCEPT, she shouldn't have been since she was running a hot temperature and has had bowel issues for the past 2 days...

EXCEPT, she coughed so hard all through the night that it woke up both Bob and I, along with horrible chills and sweats.. We are talking groaning and hyperventilating for a good solid hour last night.

Sometime around midnight she finally gets to sleep, and gets about 3 hours solid sleep in while I wake up normally and things go fairly smoothly for me making us bentos for the day...

EXCEPT mom woke up, and tried getting up out of the laz-e-boy chair to head for the bathroom, and fell down, calling on me to help her up, which should've been an easy job...

EXCEPT she wouldn't let me turn on any lights to see in the pitch-dark room full of furniture and dog toys, because she didn't want to wake up Bob...who was up anyway, and would've gone back to bed,

EXCEPT she couldn't get the air up to stand up for 20 minutes, and then took 45 minutes just to get through the bathroom, shower and another bathroom trip...

...and I had to help her shower and dress.

And right now she should FINALLY be at the local hospital getting some freaking oxygen and help and a ride to Loyola hospital and I'm staying here to watch the poor scared dauschaund puppy.

To quote Bob "You shoulda been going to the hospital at 11 last night, not 3 fucking am right now!!"

EDIT AS OF 7:30 AM: Bob just got back and informed me that mom was in the emergency room, before being transferred to the ICU for a SEVERE UPPER RESPIRATORY INFECTION (Nasal, but everything goes down so FUCK). All appointments in Chicago have been cancelled and she's going to have to reschedule them. She's also not leaving the ICU for at least 3 days.

......shit.

Mom had to go to the Chicago in an ambulance today, for her fever. It was, origionally when she called me, just going to be lab tests at the local hospital to check her creatin levels and other mineral levels and see about her fever.

Except her coordinator called and she got rushed in an ambulance to Loyola and...

...I'm just going to freak out now and...

fuck, I'm not home right now I'm house-sitting for friends.

Current Mood: freaked out

Got call just before I had to run into work for the menu and wine tasting that the lungs were declared non-viable due to defects. So no transplant for Mom, but at least this round Bob was ready for the entire shebang.

Thanks again to all who offered their good thoughts and support.

SO!

Not ten minutes ago I was asleep in bed and groggily dreaming about talking on the phone with mom as usual for the morning routine.

Right on the dot, at 10 am, mom calls as my usual wake up call. Except she's calling from her cellphone.

She's got a call at 7am this morning.

There's a possible lung transplant in Chicago.

And that's all they know and she's almost there right now.

Hggggnaaaahaaaahaaah.

No need sleepz now kthnx.

Okay, emergency state of the fuzzy address.

Sine 1996 my mom has been diagnosed with Alpha 1 Antitripsin Disorder (google it, PLEASE.) which is a degenerative lung condition, and for the past 7 years she's been on oxygen.

For the past 3 years she's been jumping through every hoop with the transplant coordinator for a lung transplant. Today, while we were staying as a vacation at a friend's house and finishing up lunch, she got a Call.

There's a single right lung in Chicago.

This is mixed news, they haven't YET gotten the crossmatching done for her bloodtype and the donor's yet. 15-75 minutes away from that little nugget of news. A single lung isn't good because her other bad lung will likely keep expanding and push the new one out, decreasing her odds of survival (not to mention she'll be banned for life from pomegranates and grapefruits due to the medications she'll be taking after the transplant).

We're actually praying it isn't a match but we're going to have to go down to Chicago anyways just in case.

Milliways friends, PLEASE PASS THIS EMERGENCY NOTICE ON.

...but half the time I'm not sure if you're operating with half the brain of a crazy chatspeaker or half the brain of the average woman your age.

I'll be glad to be your driving buddy for the 3-4 hour drive down to Chicago to see your very good oncologist.

But here is a thing. I will not be any more able to understand what the hell you two are going on about anymore than the last time we did this. Taking away my sewing or my sketchbook is NOT going to improve my ability to comprehend and concentrate. Last time I recall the gist of your talk being about compatibility, talking about how the doctors in Milwaukee had dropped the ball and now you're stuck picking up the slack with these doctors. It was the same thing you complained about for 3 hours on the drive down there.

And then there's the DELIGHTFUL tidbit about what's happening on the way back. Clothes shopping.

I can count the number of times that a trip for clothes that didn't have frustration involved on ONE HAND. Seriously. Just give me $150, let me arrange a day for me to get Michelle Burgdof to come with me and we will find me several new interview outfits. Put simply, mom, I love ya, but I don't trust your judgement with my affairs anymore. Your definition of 'nice clothes' make me feel like a seal stuffed into a business suit. Always a few months later the shirts will not fit my chest without looking like the buttons are going to pop right off.

We've had the talk about our differences in vocabulary too, what one phrase reads to you, means something totally different for me. I've heard this broken record too many times before, can we please just take it outback and use it for target practice?

In memory of family and friends who have lost the battle with cancer; and in support of the ones who continue to conquer it! Post this on your LJ if you know someone who has or had cancer.

Current Mood: contemplative

Mom's coming to 'help clean' her room.

...God I should start with the whiskey shots now because it's going to be pulling TEETH to get her to throw some things away.

...one that I will be hiding in, with whiskey in a few moments.

The good news last week thursday was that mom made it out of surgery okay, her lymph nodes were clean and it looked like she was going to make a wonderful recovery.

Today's news from mom.

My Uncle Tom (Dad's side) got heatstroke at the workplace, his last recorded bodytemp was 108 which was as high as the thermometer went. He's been cooled down, but other problems, such as kidney and liver failure as well as no brain function... He has stated numerous times before that he doesn't want to be put onto life support. I'm worried for Josh, his son, who should be coming out of highschool right about now.

My aunt Diane (married to an uncle on dad's side, and my favorite, due to a mixture of culture, cooking and non-boujie behavior) has had her breast cancer resurface. This is more unsettling due to the fact that I NEVER KNEW SHE HAD IT BEFORE.

Mom's medical consultants have been looking at the skin to graft from, to make up for what was taken away during the masectomy. Apparently the skin on her back it too thin, both from Alpha-1 and her previous surgeries, so she won't be getting that fixed...and the flap that lets the wound drain out is messed up, so she has to go in Wedensday to get it fixed in surgery again.

...okay. Y'all on my friendslist can kick me over not reporting this earlier.

About 12 years ago my mom became diagnosed with a degenerative genetic lung condition, referred to as Alpha-1 Antitripstein disorder. Her lungs don't retract back when she breathes in, which over the years have resulted in two surgeries for lung reduction, and recently last year, her getting onto a list for lung transplant recipients.

As of three weeks ago, this changed when mom had a mamogram. It came up with a lump. Breast Cancer. She's been removed from the transplant list for treatment. This Thursday she's going to have the lumps and her breasts removed.

I'll be there for the surgery.

Right now....

I'm just gonna hide in my blanket fort for a while.

Memphis is here too.