Well, here I am again, posting a day late. Did I forget? Did I play games with my computer again? Was there a blackout? No! But please forgive my late posting - again.
I had a tax return to finish for a client - (USA) deadline for late filing on extension of individual tax returns is October 15. This particular client tends to file on extension every year, but usually I get his information and prepare the return earlier in September. This year he did not contact me until mid September to set up an appointment - which was a week or so later. He lost his wife late last year and has been in and out of the hospital himself - he was going back in the day after he gave me his info. Even now, the return is finished and out to him, but I need to discuss his final estimated tax payment for 2018 which is due in January 2019 before I can fill in and send him that file.
My embroidery guild chapter needed someone to teach some stitches at the October 3 meeting and I got volunteered - I had to do prep for the meeting and try out some stitches to see what I would teach - and have some samples of it for the members to see what they looked like.
I finished same in time for the meeting and was finishing teaching the first stitch when my cell phone rang with my husband’s special ringer. I figured it was a text message - he never calls me as he only has 100 minutes a month (and almost every month ends the month with none of the minutes used) and while they were stitching I opened the message - only to find that it was phone call from husband. I called back (must be important if he called) and he told me that he did not feel well - his arm hurt which pain killer OTC pill should he take. I told him and went back to teaching. In 5 minutes - 10 at the most - he called again, just this side of crying about how bad it was and it was his left arm. That set me panicking. I explained, made my apologies, grabbed as many of my samples as I saw (plus my other stuff, including a piece - the raised work butterfly - that I had brought in for “show and tell” and ran out the door. We live maybe 5 minutes drive from the meeting.
He was upset and in a panic. I looked up the symptoms of a heart attack - yes, pain radiating in the left arm, even without chest pain could be a heart attack. Now, husband and I are the type of people who avoid doctors as much as they can, but we were both worried. Question became which hospital emergency room to go to. We have a large hospital which was owned by the county until it sold it, but it still serves the purpose of the county hospital near us. Further away there is a Catholic Diocese run hospital. I suggested same, despite it being maybe 10 minutes futher away as we had been “happy” with two other hospitals so owned - one for his cataract surgeries and one when his mother had heart surgery - and if he needed same, he would be transferred to that hospital, one of the top in the country, if we went to this hospital, plus our GP is associated with it. Why a question as to which one to go to? Well, his mother died at this hospital and that sticks in his mind. I pointed out that while it was the same building, it was a different hospital now, with new ownership (had been a private hospital owned by doctors before).
He made sure that he had his medical insurance cards (we are both on Medicare - me as of this month, him as of last year) and we were off. He had to drive as he has motion sickness - which is also why an ambulance, which we thought to be overkill any way, was not in question.
When we arrived I remembered a problem with this hospital - most of the parking is at the rear of the building far from the doors - and the emergency room is at the front. We looked in the small lot by the emergency entrance - no spaces. I had him stop the car and get out and I drove it and parked it at the rear of the building - at least the parking was free, at the county hospital they charge - and should not for so many reasons. He actually went in alone without complaining or whimpering. (He does not like to do things alone.) I had figured he would be waiting for me, but he had the good senses to start things going. I parked at the rear of the building, and ran (well as close to running as an overweight, out of shape 65 year old woman can run without having a heart attack herself) around the side of the building, in the entrance (halfway to the front) and started following signs while briskly walking - emergency luckily was a red sign with white writing and easy to spot to see which way to go. I got to the front of the building and it ended? I saw an elevator and pushed the ground floor button and then ran out and followed more signs - arriving at the emergency waiting area just as they were taking him in.
I was impressed with the computers on wheeled stations so that the staff could come to the bed and do the computer work right there. Staff was nice and understanding. While one employee settled him into the bed, the nurse took info from me - she was rather impressed that I had a list of our meds (they only needed his of course) in my cell phone. Based on the errors we made in info while trying to recall things while in panic, I will also enter in additional info, including family history for both of us as we forget when they asked that his mother had heart surgery as well as his cataract surgery and to mention that he is allergic to most raw fruit and many nuts. I did remember that he was allergic to penicillin ,but he insisted no - and that I was allergic to same. He has always said that he was allergic to penicillin to me and I am allergic to sulfa meds. (“Aren’t sulfa meds penicillin” he asked me later when we were discussing this.)
Once he was settled in, it became wait and wait. Staff and the woman accompanying the patient in the curtained area next to husband all were constantly upset that I was standing and tried to get me to sit. I prefer standing as it hurts my bottom to sit for long times (I lost weight there) and we were concerned about -yes - bed bugs. Standing for an afternoon is nothing to me, but it kept bothering everyone - and I was less in the way in the tight quarters of his area standing than sitting and could more easily get out of anyone’s way.
We had explained that he had excruciating pain in his left shoulder radiating down his left arm and that we were concerned if it was a heart attack, as well as what it was if it was not.
They did blood work (something husband fears and it was not done well - there was blood on the sheet). They hooked him up to a machine. A man came and took him to X-ray, not knowing it was around the corner in the same room I asked if I could follow along - husband asked me to stay with him the entire time, which I had expected and planned to do. They did other things in a flurry of tasks. Then it became wait.... wait....wait...
We had arrived around noon. It became 2:30 - our normal lunch time. Neither of us had eaten that day as the 2:30 meal is usually our first of the day. We are both Type 2 Diabetics. I can do passably well not eating, but he needs to eat or his blood sugar drops. He said he was okay. By 3 pm he was heading into trouble. I went to the nurse and explained and asked if they had some orange juice which is what he usually will have if he has a low - and she gave him same and offered turkey sandwich, which they have in a fridge in the unit. So he had a bit of lunch. (I had sort of thought that he could not eat, which is why I asked for the juice, just in case surgery was needed.) I thought of running out and looking for something for me (we have cheese cracker packages in the car - figured some place to eat in the building or at worst, Burger King was 3 buildings over on the road). But I decided I felt okay and waited.
Over the afternoon we were told his blood tests were okay. Later we that he would be moved to an observation section where he would wait until they did a second set of blood tests as they needed to compare them - ok, makes sense. I asked the doctor who told us this, about checking about other reasons for the pain he was in - “We have to rule out a heart attack first and then look at muscular-skeletal reasons.” Okay, makes sense.
It took an hour or so before he was transferred to the observation section. This was a room with larger curtained areas where one could move about (me - not him, he was again hooked up). After he was settled in and we knew that nothing would happen for awhile, I nervously asked him about leaving for about 15 minutes to run back out to car and get cheese crackers to eat. He said it was fine and that I should check for a cafeteria in the hospital. I went back out a little more leisurely and checked the lunchonette type restaurant in the building - $8 for a burger? Did not see if that included fries or something, but would only not want same anyway and $8 a bit high on the budget, so I continued the car. As I had walked through there was a photo exhibit - it reminded me that husband had exhibited his cut paper art works in the hospital (before his mom died) several times. I went out to the car. On a chance, I drove the car around to the front of the building and found an empty space in the small lot in the front near the emergency room to make leaving easier. Problem - only one package of cheese crackers in the car. I guess I did not replace them when we (okay I) ate them in the past.
So I took the package back with me and ate the crackers. They brought him dinner - lunch? at 4 pm - the Diabetic diet - macaroni in tomato sauce, spinach, diet pudding, diet ginger ale, and coffee - artificial sweetener on the side of course. He ate the macaroni and spinach. Eventually they came and took the second blood tests - and had to stick him all over again, I thought the tube they left in his arm would be used, but no they had to stick him again. Those tests came back fine.
So, I started asking what they were going to do next about the pain. No, they were done - he should go to his doctor or an orthopedist about that! So we spent 8.5 hours there and left with a couple of holes in arms, papers, hungry stomachs, and the pain in his arm still there.
He had trouble falling asleep last night - did not do so until 6 am - so when he finally fell asleep I let him sleep since he had not had a full night sleep the night before, hoping when he finally awoke he would feel better. No, it may even be worse. So tomorrow we will go see our regular doctor, who hopefully will be able to help him.
I ran out today and ran the most pressing of the errands I was suppose to do yesterday such as transfer money so I could mail out bill payments due out.
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
1 - Be prepared. (Even if you are not a Boy Scout.)
I know what medications we each take, but was getting confused and the list of same in a memo in my cell phone helped. The personal and family histories in the phone would have been of great help.
If I had remembered to replace cheese cracker packages when we (I) ate them, I would have had more of them to eat as a lunch - and not have been shaking with low blood sugar when we got home. (We ended with me going out and picking up Chinese take out for dinner, as it was too late to cook - and we got foods he did not need to cut.)
Have something on your cell phone (or tablet) to keep you busy - without wifi as there was none. I spent the time in the observation area playing cards on my phone. (The TVs did not work in either room.) While in the observation room he spent his time annoying his sister with text messages telling her where he was and why and NO she should not come or send her husband. (I have not mentioned it to my family yet.)
We thought we were prepared, well I thought I was prepared for both of us, but we were not. If I had been the patient, he would have had even more problems.
2 - Simple things can be complicated and one needs to keep thinking and come up with ideas quickly.
He needed his insurance cards and had to juggle it out of his pocket while being hooked up to machines - I took the wallet from him and shoved it in my pocket for the rest of the time we were there and added his cards back to it for him. (He would not give me his cell phone to hold except during the X- rays.)
When he went to eat the turkey sandwich we asked if he could/should take his pill that he would normally take with lunch - nurse checked and the doctor said yes. He tried to wrangle his pill box out and was getting frustrated. We both take that same medication. I told him to stop and pulled out my box and handed him one of mine - I took one back from his supply later. Much easier than him trying to get it out.
Eating the meal they gave him was a bit hard as the tray table was too far from him no matter how I positioned it. He is a sloppy eater and did not want to drop food on himself. I finally figured out to turn the tray 90 degrees so it could stick off the table and still have enough tray on the table not to fall off. This way the tray stuck out so it covered him lap.
3 - Go with the flow
Yes, it is a trite expression, but there was no other choice. We were there - I could not run the errands I intended. The soda bottles and donation items will wait. The visit to our bank vault to exchange this month’s data backups for last month’s - well, last month’s will work until next month’s goes in. Nothing to do to change the situation - just go along with it and be glad that he did not have a heart attack and hope that the doctor can help (easily) with the pain in his shoulder as he is currently pacing the kitchen as he is trying not to take the next OTC pill until closer to bed time. Oh, I forgot to mention that he found one of our old kitchen chairs the most comfortable thing to sit on and has planted himself on it (I brought it over for him from our studio) at our kitchen table in front of the door to the basement and blocking the path to the pantry closet and the downstairs bathroom. This making doing chores very hard to do as I either have to climb over him or ask him to move. Last night’s laundry is being done tonight.
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