Sometimes I get tired.......

I have to be honest - sometimes I really get tired of how much time I have to spend at medical facilities. It seems like every time I turn around I am having to spend long hours at a hospital. My husband's 6 days stay in the hospital really took it out of me. We had not expected that at all. We had thought maybe 2-3 days or so. And each day I hoped that maybe he could come home and he didn't.

This week was a busy week for me. Thursday a family member had a court appearance to make and I was going to go for support. Well I was happy when it got postponed. I was thinking of all the things around my house that I could get done. Things that I had been putting off because of being too busy.

So I was on a walk and had not even walked a mile when my MIL called in and said she was having a hard time breathing. She explained that she had just gotten out of shower and had put meds on her legs and then when she stood up she felt week and was gasping for air. I had thought that she needed to rest for a bit and maybe use her inhaler to help her breath. The plan was for her to call me back in 10 minutes if she wasn't feeling better. Well I decided to go on over to her house - and it was a good thing because just as I saw her house my phone began to ring.

I decided it was best to take her to a small ER nearby. It has been a great one to help her- it's where my oldest son had taken her a couple of years ago when she ended up having heart attack there. We ended up staying there for like 5 hours- before they transferred her to the hospital.

During that 5 hours they ran all sorts of tests. Lots of poking and prodding. It was finally discovered that she had a PE - a blood clot in her lung - a pretty good sized one. She was sent to the hospital where more tests were run. The blood clot was putting a lot of strain on her heart - so they needed to be aggressive with dealing with the clot. Last night they called a team back in to do a procedure in which they stuck a cath down the artery in her neck - to be able to put the clot dissolving meds directly on the clot. The cath was left in there for 12 hours. Oh I forgot to mention - they found a clot in the other lung as well- so 2 clots had made it to the lungs. And they said that the clots had come from her legs. They did not get her to her room in the ICU until after 10:00pm. Which meant it was after 11:00pm when we got home. I was exhausted.

During that long stay at the hospital, I really realized how much I was getting tired of being at hospitals. It seems that I spend more than my fair share at hospitals. And I have about had my fill. There is no telling how much longer she will be there. So there will be more time for me to spend at the hospital. I am depending on God to give me patience to handle it with grace.

I will be sharing a few more thoughts about what this time in the medical facilities have taught me. I have several important things it has taught me. And how it has encouraged me to continue to make good choices in how I take care of me. Just hoping I don't have any late night stays in hospitals - that really takes it out of me. Will be back as soon as I can to share the lessons learned.