More Vacation Excitement!

Now that I’ve finished my stress breakfast consisting of a slice of scrumptious, to-die-for (probably a poor choice of breakfast food and words considering the topic) chocolate spoon cake and iced diet pepsi, I am ready to tell yesterday’s story.

I am not so sure that I’d call this a "vacation" at this point. Somehow....near comatose diabetics, bloody gaping wounds, paramedics and ambulances just doesn’t fit my idea of fun.

Since we live in a small mountain community, the Department of motor Vehicles graces us with their presence for a few hours once every Friday, at the Veteran’s Hall. Everyone in town, including me-procrastinator that I am-decided that yesterday would be the Friday to take care of business. When I arrived about 1:00 pm, I picked up number eleven and sat down to await my turn. I heard one of the three clerks call "89" and I groaned, realizing that they had to finish off the first hundred folks before they made it through to my measly number.

So, I settled in to the hard metal folding chair for my long wait. I had to stay. At 2:00 pm a clerk announced that if our number wasn’t called by 2:30 when they closed, we were out of luck. We could either come back next Friday, or drive down the mountain to the DMV offices that were open until 5 o’clock, because this "office" closed promptly at 2:30 so they could pack up the computers and make it to their home office by quitting time.

Thanks to whoever had numbers 3 and 8 and gave up the wait. Gratefully, I made it to the window by the skin of my teeth at 25 minutes after 2:00. Heading home about 10 minutes later with a 50 year old bladder that was about to burst, I ran into the house and started up the stairs. I wasn’t about to use Papa’s bathroom until I got it cleaned and that was my next job for the day. I then heard……..

Papa~very sweetly: "Lisa, could you come here and help me for a minute?" (which I interpret to mean he needs help opening a bottle or straightening out the covers on his bed)

Me: "Ok! Just a second…I have to pee!" ::just in time-big sigh of relief::

Me: "Where are you?" as I head down the stairs.

Papa: ::groaning::

I follow the moaning to his bathroom, where he’s nearly unconscious, face up on the tile floor. There’s blood all over the floor, and a pile of something that looks like wavy brains just the side of his bloody left hand. The palm of his hand is split wide open like a watermelon that’s been just had it’s first cut.

Me: "OH MY GOD...WHAT HAPPENED?"

I then recognize the bloody, brain-like material to be the innerds of a Cup of Noodles that are still intact, and the smashed styrofoam cup is over near the toilet. WTH?

Papa’s just barely able to tell me that he fell, as I yell that I am going to call 911 and run to the kitchen phone. He’s protesting, saying he doesn’t need an ambulance and asks me to help him up. Yeah, right! Men can be sooooo stupid. Thank God us women make better decisions in those type of situations!

After dealing with a very calm dispatcher who assures me that help is on the way, I make my way back to Papa and try not to slip in the blood as a try to get into the bathroom. With his Hep C and my open chigger bites, it wouldn’t be a good thing. His breathing is very shallow and his eyes are rolling back in his head. I check for a pulse and notice he’s clammy. I gently cup his head in my hand to see if he’s got a head injury and find that he’s soaking wet. It then clicks….he’s nearly in a diabetic coma. I’ve never seen him with blood sugar that low before, but I’ve learned enough over the years to know what to do.

I run to the fridge and look for some juice or something liquid and sugary. I open a half-filled at bottle of old, flat (pre-vacation) Dr. Pepper and pour him about 4 0unces in a glass and assist him as he’s swallows it. I was amazed that he was able to drink it without choking. It musta have been the lack of carbonation that made it go down so smooth. The sirens are getting closer, so I run and open the front door.

The paramedics and firemen fill up the hallway with their equipment as I tell them what’s happened and all about his medical issues. Jennifer, one of the paramedics that treated him a few months back with a horrible post-surgery bleeding episode, agrees with me that it’s a diabetic emergency. She then takes a blood sample and finds that his sugar is 23! That’s after I gave him the Dr. Pepper! Yikes! A glucose IV is started. Everyone’s amazed that he’s somewhat coherent as most people would be fully comatose at that point. She instructs me to gather up his meds for the trip.

After determining that there’s no apparent head/neck injury and temporarily bandaging up his hand, they load him up on the gurney and then out to the ambulance. I call a few family members, get Ab settled and head to the hospital. I fill out the obligatory paperwork, return it to the desk and they ask me to have a seat until the doctor has stabilized him. Irritated, I try to read a recent Time magazine that’s filled with articles about the serious obesity problem in America, which irritates me even more since I have first hand knowledge of the subject.

Finally, the nurse comes out and informs me that my father is stable, that his hand is being stapled, they are running tests and that I will get to see him in a little while, once the doctor is finished with repairing his hand. I continue to sit and people watch, when a handsome elderly gentleman, who looks to be in his 80s, walks by, looks at me and smiled real big with a wink before he exits the hospital. Silly boy! It made my day!

Once Papa was stable, I was allowed to go to his bedside where he was hooked up to all kinds of monitors and oxygen. His heart rate was irregular and they were having problems keeping his blood sugar up, despite the glucose. He was instructed to eat and they brought him a tuna sandwich and soup. He ate all of the sandwich, drank a small glass of milk and a couple of bites of the vegetable soup. Several hours and blood checks later they feel like he can be released for home, much to my astonishment. And, of course they wanted him to eat again at home, which he wouldn’t do. He just fell right into bed and slept all night.

This morning, we were about to run into the same problem. Papa got up and was pretty sore and unsteady on his feet. I was insistent that he check his blood sugar, but he said he just knew it wasn’t low. Wrong! It was 36! So I sat him in a chair and rounded up some cranberry juice cocktail real quick. It took about 30 minutes or so to get his sugar in the acceptable range. Then I took him to breakfast and he ate most of a bowl of oatmeal.

Right now, his blood sugar is right about where it should be at 119 and we’re awaiting a call from his doctors to see if they think he needs to be checked out down the mountain. I am a little concerned about the fact that they didn’t ex-ray his hand, and his fingers are very bruised and sore. Possibly, he broke something in addition to the cut. Additionally, something’s going on to make these drastic low blood sugar situations, especially when he hasn’t taken any insulin.

Geez….what a vacation!  More later!