Unpleasant Friday

I know I spend an unreasonable amount of time there, but I really do hate hospitals!

So, Friday, I go to dialysis, as usual at 4 AM.
At 7 AM, they send me to the emergency room because they can not get the needles in me!
And, I would rather have the needles than go ER!

So, after a day of being poked, squeezed and otherwise manhandled we now know what I already suspected:
I am allergic to latex based adhesives!
Really?
And, how much is that going to cost me?!?!?!?!

It is like taking your car to the shop and after a complete going over, they tell you that it is a car!
Gees!

No, they have no idea why
i am suddenly allergic to latex on that arm only,
Or alternatives to latex,
or any of the multitudes of possibilities that come to mind ...

So, being stuck, because I have to have my blood filtered,
I told them to install tubes.
Oh, retch!

And that took three more hours to install in my jugular artery.
So, later today I get to have them used for the first time in dialysis.
BLEEEEEECH!!!!!

Oh well.
God is apparently not done with me yet.
But honestly I am getting real close.

Whew!

So Gaelic Girl had her knee replacement surgery.
I was a very nervous pup, she has never had major surgery and her mother died from the gases used on her!
So nervous, I was up Tuesday night face down in the throne room.
Sigh .....
I really hate throwing up!

So, she is laying here, mind blown on morphine.
A machine running a circular pattern, like a bicycle would do, with the new knee.
Such a cool device!
How I wish such existed back in 1971!
(when I blew out my kinees ... )

I was so frightened that she might not survive!
Happy she has.
No, nothing will make her truly like me.
But, I would have her in my life - than gone from it!

So, praising God for small victories ...

Catch Up

What a past week!

So, you tear your diaphragm - breathing is all but impossible and lifting my right arm is also impossible!
So, why not throw your back out, as well?!?

Yeah, Swede and I went to Barnes and Nobel bookstore, I dropped my cane on the floor,  bent over ...
and that was all she wrote concerning my back!
And would anyone help me?
At all?
Heck no.
I  even had to shuffle over to a book rack, kicking my cane!
So, I could steady myself while leaning and stretching and squealing like the little piggy I am to get my cane!
Poor Swede finally had to kick my folded over body to the curb.

So, back on codeine, aspercream and ben-gay!
Oh that minty fresh old people scent!
Yeah, I am in the twilight zone.
And everybody is a fuzzy bunny ...

But, doing better - sort of.
Lots of pain but at least I can sit upright at the moment.

Injured Again!

Lord, this is getting old!
And it wasn't even my fault!

One of the unshared joys of dialysis is cramping.
Across my 87 "runs", I have cramped all but twice!
And I have no idea what made those two times special!

Yesterday was a run through the depths of hell.
Cramping for four hours straight!
I finally cramped so hard that I tore part of my diaphragm muscle!

Yeah, breathing is such joy now.
And moving my right arm, only a memory today.
And codeine is not cutting the pain.
ah the joys of life.

So watching really horrible 1950's sci-fi on ROKU.
And reading a book by Christopher Lane.
I let you know if I like him ....

Unbelievable!

I simply can not believe that in the process of preparing for my travels to say good-bye yo my deceased Step-Mother, I tripped on one of the bags!
Pulled bunches of muscles in my back and hips!
Then to add insult to injury,
I broke what is left of my stump bones - AGAIN!!!!!!!!

Gees!

You think that if you looked up klutz in the dictionary, my picture would be there!

So, going to be hobbling for a while.
Unfortunately, over rough terrain in Colorado.
sigh ....

Oh well.
It is the thought that counts, right?
Condition is only secondary.  Yes?
It will be a small turn out.
My sister and three cousins.
Most of the people whom knew Gwen are long dead by now

Tell you all about it next week.
(keep me in your prayers ... the cousins and I are not of the same cloth ...)

One Hundred Miles

Well, the day had to come, in which I have to face my PTSD, and drive move than just a few miles.
I have done one 25 mile drive a month ago, but terror was so bad I could not drive back home!
Yeah, not pleasant!

So, Oldest Daughter, was holding a BBQ and I opted to drive.
I was a mixture of terrified and excited.
But, I held at highway speeds for the 50 miles down there and back!
I also drove all of us up to Bonnie Lake to shop a sale at their Ben Franklin craft store.
Daughter had arm loads of stuff, grandchildren found toys and slippers.
For me, they had a new travel watercolor set by Koi.
Added some small paper pads and a few water brushes and I am ready for Colorado, again.

And that was really what the drive was about, doing distance.
I have to drive 250 miles each way to the memorial service.
Yes, I am still stressed over this, and only 24 days to prepare!

Oh, yeah, the BBQ was great.
Burger building bar.
And awesome potato salad ----- :)

So, very successful day with number one daughter!
And while enjoying our time together, next youngest daughter, was writing a piece on the internet about living in a toxic family!
No reason to assume she is referring to her Russian family, they only killed all of her siblings and then left her to die on the Siberian ice sheet in mid-winter!
My guess, due to her narcissism, she thinks me evil and not even remembering the HORRORible teenager she was.
sigh ....
No, it is always someone else's fault with her.
All of her decisions.
Life just is not fair!
I dearly love her, but next to my last God-Daughter, she is the hardest teen I ever had to deal with!

As you might remember, not so long ago, troubled God-Daughter surprisingly appeared one night at my door.  Bringing gifts and gratitude!
I am still moved by this.

Well, time to get my day going!

Box of Memories

I have been looking for my Great-Uncle Leonard's wedding ring.
I know I had it back before the trip to Canada, but 7 surgeries wiped any memory of it from my mind!
Where the heck could I have put it?

I thought it was in my safety-deposit box. but no.
Perhaps in my keepsake box?  But no again!
Out of ideas!

Somewhere in this house ... sigh

But, I did go through my box:
Cards from my grandchildren.
Little notes from my children.
A thank you from my youngest for having adopted her ....

A thank you, from the SHE, for not having been like every other male.
In the end, she never understood.
Her worldview was too far from my reality.
What do I know now, other than sorrow?
Thanks for nothing amnesia!
(you will have to know your H Rider Haggard,to understand!)

School pictures.
All of my report cards.
(yeah, well,  they said it  all!)
The map from my canoe trip into Canada, longest taken in 650 years!
All of the newspaper articles.

The target from the first time I ever shot a rifle.
Awards for school attendance.
Old passports with the "NATO Death Stamp" - " not allowed within 70 miles of a communist  border!"
Funny photos which will never appear here!

A letter from a friend in high school.
Who just now popped into town as I was writing this!
I have NO memory of him.
What-so-ever!
So it will be interesting to see what "pops" loose in my mind!
(and i now have my first fiancee's name, thanks to the letter!  yeah, really old! 1974!)

In fact, I would guess than my memories are now solid through age 12 only!

Bad Thursday

So the ladies whom disconnect me from the machine have all suffered from the wrath of my veins!
Pull a needle and blood goes everywhere!
Floor, furniture, clothing and them.
Clotting can take 20 minutes.
And this is all a problem with management!
Then the Latvian lady observed they a case long ago like this - too much back pressure.
Whatever that is.

So surgeon does an ultrasound but finds nothing.
Yet, this lady is highly respected.
So he sends me to a specialist with the big ultrasound.

Now, I am expecting an ultrasound,
But the admissions desk is acting like something else is happening!
So, I am cautiously nervous now.....

Sure enough, the tech running this big machine,
Finds that there is an 85% restriction in the end of the fistula.
So, in spite of the pain this was causing me,
She was able to identify the restriction as a blood clot.
What, me finally clot!?!?!?!?!?
My Hapsburg clad would be proud!

So, I was rushed in to surgery.
Had an angiogram right then and there.
My stress levels went through the roof!
And I started randomly blabbering, like stress always does to me!
Sigh ....
I hear I gave a great lecture on disk drive theory  ... LOL!

So what better way to end the day than three heart attacks in a row!
But I have to do dialysis today,
So, we will see how Friday goes ......


For now, exhausted,
In pain,
And frightened ....

Short Out

One of the pains of having a concussion is its side effects.
Sleeplessness for days on end.
Until you finally find sleep at the most awkward of times!
Headaches from hell.
Clumsiness far in excess of my usual state of affairs.
Ringing ears so loudly its is hard to understand people.
And if that is no bad enough;You can not concentrate!

Imagine you are out and someone talks to you.
But you are in a crowd or there is background music;
And you are not going to hear a word of it!
Just lips moving but no sound comes through.

And people insist upon talking to me in a crowd or with blaring music!
That would be people I am continually having to remind I have a concussion and can not hear them!
No worries, I will get to do it again in five minutes.

I need a new brain ....

Rehydrate

A slight programming error by my dialysis technian left me crippled on Monday.
Yeah she miss programmed the machine to pull too much water from my body!

I should have known she was a problem when it took her half an hour and four attempts to stab me3 with two needle!
And there is no vein to hit!
All she had to do was puncture the artificial mylar baggie in my arm!
sigh

So my joints all froze up!
Could barely walk,
and typing?
Forget that , no finger movement at all!

Bare recovered on Thursday
and now I must evacuate the house for yet another fumigation for ants.
Not a good day or week!

Expiration Date

We live in a world where everytthing comes with an expiration date.  Everything wears out, runs down, dies.  Just a fact, there are no exceptions.  Of course we live our lives as though we are the exception.

To make a long story short, I was predicted to reach that date this Friday.  No argument from me, my body is wasted -just to have lied through this week has been a miracle of medications and technology!  Were it not for that auto accident ...sigh ......

I continue to fight for life.
I have no fear of death,
I am assured of what lies beyond this life.
But at what cost do I continue this fight?

For now I will fight against this expiration date.
I would so much rather face my final demise.
But, it seems God has a purpose,
If I "play" along.
And get past my own hang ups in a major way.

So, Friday morning I start dialysis,
For my kidneys killed in the auto accident in December.
August would have been better timing for me.
But thank heavens I had the surgery in December,
Now, if only I was healed from it so the veins were usable.
Sigh ...

To those whom know me:
I Hate needles.
With a paranoia bordering on the psychotic.
Friday, I have to have a catheter installed for the needles.
And then there is the dialysis .....
All prayer gratefully sought.

Turkey Day

I can't think of a least productive way to start a cooking session than breaking something ..... in this case, my face again .....

So, there I was walking across the house with as load of laundry to start and then I am coming to under a chair and my face tells me "I am hurt!".  As my wits return to me, I realize that my leg had come off! The leg is a pressure fit type with a pressure cuff to assure this type of leg ejection will not happen!  As I figure it, my body decided to lose a few inches of water weight gain during the night, and there was insufficient leg mass for the friction hold!  So, it popped off, I went straight down on the tip of my stump, bruised the tibia bone and meat of the stump - but as an added bonus - as I went down, my face impacted the steel supports for a chair, re-breaking my cheek bone only!  Yes, black eye returned during the day .....

Between ice packs, for the next 5 hours, I was making appetizers for eldest daughter's dinner.  I made boiled shrimp, cocktail sauce, a veggie tray, little phyllo cups filled with cream cheese and crab, and asparagus ham rolls.  This was my first real cooking since the surgeries and it was rewarding to be creating again!  :)

About now son shows up with girl friend, he has been missing for three days - uncool!  And we get into it because he had left a loaded gun out, my grand-kids found it and racked a round!  He was within a split second of ugly Papa over that one!  But he agreed it was a major whoops and locked all of them away in his gun safe.  Sigh ... Thank God they did not pull the trigger!  So, I will be sending off to the NRA for their kids training program materials.

And what is a holiday without drama?!?!  Yes, mother was as crazy as a loon!

I called to tell her to be ready in five minutes for pick up and she is screaming. "who is this?"
Then refused to come because she could not hear me and I was yelling at her.
Good God!, her and her manic depression!  Or her and her refusal to take  meds!
It is really unfortunate because all of the kids were there.
I doubt this will ever happen in my lifetime again, busy lives.

Oldest daughter laid out quite the spread.  And she did well!
Even the Siberian vegan was able to eat well, as did all of us meat-a-saurs!
So, a success!
Just a darn shame that mother's brain fried again ....

Good News

Just a short post today,
Too much to do!

In the week I have been out of intensive care,
The testing has continued - as has my frustration dealing with hospital empowered morons.
Sigh

But, all of the testr results are encouraging:
Eye socket is healing correctly.
Eye ball is intact and returning to normal.
Retina is undamaged.

nose bones are healing.
Cheek bones look to be healing.
Headache is greatly reduced.

But, blood pressure is still out of control,
The concussion great limits my concentration time
Or ability to listen to music!
Bright light is so painful!

So, keep on praying!

In continuing good news:
More memories have returned
but of no value.

Concussion

I have to beg your indulgence - the last two posts have been written with a concussion - it will apparently be months before i will be able to read these and know if they make sense or not.  Add that I only have one working eye at the moment - as the right one is still swollen up!  Yup, these writings ought to keep spelling and grammar Nazi's up at night!

And even I recognize that my brain is damaged.  There are simple questions it takes me much thought to answer!  And  even harder to proof read what I write!

My mother is calling constantly and driving me crazy!  She is like: go buy a new car and drive me around shopping next week!  She does not understand that Washington State suspends your drivers license when you pass out!  But with one eye - I am not going to be driving anyone, even me, anywhere!

Much less, I am not comfortable using my inheritance to buy a car ... but i realize that my mind is hindered - so maybe my mother and sister are right - go buy a car!  But how does that honor Gwen's memory?  Some how I think the question of honoring Gwen and her memory ... does not involve things nor my comfort - but investing in others the way she invested in me for 42 years!

But, as I said, I am very confused by this concussion ... I am just not ready for reality ...

Not Possible

Did you ever see a photo and wonder how did that happen?
Like the one of thr American tourist in Paris, whom launched her car on to a barge on the Seine River?  And wonder ...?

Or a car standing on its nose next to a freeway retaining wall .... and wonder, what the heck!? Is that even possible?

In the latter example, let me tell you how improbable it was ....

I was just approaching the Seattle airport landing lights (over the freeway) , it is a downgrade with a merging traffic lane that runs into the exit I take.  I remember signalling for lane change, checking my mirrors, slowing to move over and ... then, many minutes later, I am looking at the roadway in front of me - rather than under me!

I could not exit the car due my door not opening and the height off the ground!  I tried to get my mind around this fact - how was this even possible?

It took many hours to sort this out.

I had breakfast in Orting with my grandchildren.
I drove up the hill to Bonnie Lake.
I checked out candles and used the toilet.
I then had a deep radiating pain in my left arm.
I took two nitroglycerin pills.
Pain went away/
So I headed the 40 miles home.
45 minutes later I am suspended in the air.

According to my son, I started swerving as I came down the hill by the airport.
And the car went out of control on the rain soaked roads.
The car slid in the gravel, rear to the right.
Slid up a concrete retaining wall, came to a stop,
and fell off the wall onto its nose!

So, car standing on its nose ... next to the freeway ...
A miracle of God's protection,
and I am sure obscure laws of physics ...

But not without injury.
Broken facial bones and eye socket.
Blood pressure out of control and kidney function took a nose dive!
Then the headache!  Well that was a constant due to the blood pressure.

And the following four days in intensive care!
Never ending tests due to the concussion,
Heart failure and kidney disaster.
Never ending needles and blood draws.

To survive, when even the first cop on the scene was expecting no survivors.
Amazed paramedics shaking their heads in amazement.
And eye specialists willing to drive in from Seattle as there was no room at the trauma center.
And the heart team.  My cardiologist flew in from Hawaii!
My kidney doctor spent her weekend caring for me!
And a dedicated team whom survived me!
LOL!

exhaustion conquers me and I must close ...

Crash

Sorry but an auto accident has hospitalized me.
I will try to write more later,
As I am able.

Prayer is needed for healing
I have broken facial bones,
pulled muscles everywhere,
car is totaled,
heart and kidneys now history.

yes heart attack while on the freeway,
sigh ...

Amnesia

For those whom know me personally and read my ramblings, I finally figured out a way to explain what amnesia is like:

Imagine that before your brain trauma you were normal.
You know someone named Bob.
They live on Bob Lane in Bobville.
You might even know everything there is to know about Bob.

And then "wake up".

You now have buckets.
One contains names:
Bob
Bob Lane
Bobville

One contains the contents of every conversation you have ever had.
Another bucket is all of your activities.

But each of the people, place and things are all equal in your mind - there is no way to tell one from another.

Conversations are worse because you have content but they are not attached to anyone, nor is the context known!

Same for activities, or everything you have ever seen!

So there are memories but the index into my mind is broken. 
Nothing is attached to anything else. 
Sigh.

And I know that even with a broken mind, I know all is not how it should be. 
But I have no way of knowing what it is! 
But I have no way of knowing what should be.

So frustrating.

For those whom interact with me - this is the best I can do to explain my strange new world ....

Reset

So, I was put on a new memory enhancing drug this week.
And it seems it performs as advertised.
Memories flooded back.
And the anger arose within me:
At all of the betrayals
All of the broken promises
Of having my new heart ripped out
Piece by piece.
Yesterday was horrible!

Rounded out with twin minor heart attacks.

Yeah, something in that chemical mix is not good for me.
Nor are the memories.
So, stopping the meds and pray I can quickly forget ....
Again.
Permanently .....

and I really do need your prayers for recovery from this ...

Leg Update

Thought I would take a moment tolet you know how I am doing recovering from the three surgeries this year - pretty darn good across the past week!

Albeit, it was a hard month getting to this last week!  But the gaping wound has gone from 17.5x4.5x8 cm in size to yesterdays measurements of 6.5x1.5x2.7 cm!  Such a significant change!  Given this rate, it is possible that by the end of May the incision will be closed and I will be cast for the new socket!

Outside of intense boredom - I am healthy and healing :)

My nephew, aka babysitter,  got some weird eye virus and has been grounded from driving for three weeks now :(

But there has been much excitement:
Son moving back in
Son moving out
Repent three times for each!  sigh ...
So the house got trashed - to the point it exceeded everyones ability to keep up with it!
Daughter going
Thankfully ninja kitty going eventually!

But order eventually has ensued ....

:)

Shades of '67

According to this blog, all through 2016 I was to experience the same series of dreams - which were really memories - over and over and over again!  Well, I have no memory of them now!

And like last time, dreams are memories - reality floating through what is left of my mine.  This time around, it is 1967 and seventh grade I seem to be lock in!  Really?  Seventh grade of all of the memories to now be stuck with!  Good Loird, not the best of memories ...

Awkward.  Yeah, that would be the word.

I was to be moved from my Zweibruchen Canadian school to a NATO school in Ramstein.  Why?  Because mother was blowing a gasket and father wanted to move her to an English speaking environment by relocating us to the NATO base housing in Ramstein.  So German boy uprooted again, stuffed back into a foreign culture again and unfortunately I could not even write in English!

So,  forget making new freiends.
Forget passing classes, except math and multiple choice history questions!
And begin the process of learning all about injustice and inequality.

Yeah, my new memory set is now set to 1967 and memories no one should have to have suffered through, much less be stuck with .....
Thank God 1967 was a year of some great music!