Update November 4, 2023

News

Saturday

Saturday was stressful. It started out with having an attack of my sleeping disorder while on the weekly chat with my mother-in-law. I wasn’t really able to participate, and then when it was over I rushed straight to bed. I tried to update Aaron about his mid-day duties in case I wasn’t awake on time, but instead updated him about Sunday’s mid-day duties because I wasn’t awake.

So I was startled awake by a flurry of activity when D13 woke up late, and came hobbling upstairs as fast as her crutches could carry her. She needed a ride to the play, and was late. Because I was too tired to calculate, I told Aaron he needed to take IL4 because I needed to leave to watch the play before he got back to take over IL4 duty. IL4 doesn’t handle transition well without forewarning, so he was uncooperative. But they made it out and everything was ok.

My friend Liz and I went to the play. While on the way there, J19 called to apologize about taking our alcohol – dad had confronted him.

Anyway, M11 and D13 did great in the play. Yay. Afterwards, Liz and I went to dinner with D13 before dropping her off for her second show. (M11 went home with his mom.)

On the way to dinner, my sister Colette called to tell me dad was in the hospital with COVID. (He had been visiting with her when he became sick.) Colette and I have a rocky relationship, so talking to her is always a stressful thing to me. But the conversation went quite well. I was getting my hopes up that we’d be able to handle this situation in an amiable manner. But it didn’t finish up amiable.

Then IL4 wouldn’t go to sleep. We had forgotten to give him a med that morning, so he was jacked up. He was incredibly uncooperative. Finally, at midnight, I told him he could watch youtube on his phone while we slept. Starting about then to 2am, I received a bunch of dad’s test results in MyChart…getting a ding on my phone every time. Finally, at 2am I called to see if he had gotten worse, because some of the results were way off normal range. He was fine, so I asked IL4 if he was tired, and he willingly went to sleep.

Sunday

Sunday, I got up early and visited dad in the hospital for a few hours. Then I picked up M11 at his mom’s house. Later in the afternoon, M11 and D13 had a play. I stayed with IL4 while Aaron attended the play. When they got home from the play, we watched a couple episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and then went to bed.

Monday

Monday I woke with a headache and thought “Oh no, I have COVID,” but it was gone with a bit of Tylenol. Then I took IL4 and D13 to D13’s appointment. J19 made IL4 a waffle when we got back (that was sweet of him). Then I dropped IL4 at school and ran some errands. Afterwards, I dropped by to see dad at the hospital while Aaron took IL4 to swim lessons. Dad was supposed to be released earlier that day because he’s recovered, but he had atrial fibrillation so they held him another night.

I told J19 that he would need to be out of IL4’s room by November 10 so we can start repainting and rearranging the room in hopes of enticing IL4 to sleep in his own bed. I’d like to replace the Venetian blinds with curtains, but I can’t find ones that I like yet.

Tuesday

So dad’s last night in the hospital was awful. He had a heart monitor on, but was sleeping restlessly, so the wires kept coming detached. Then the nurse repeatedly woke him up to put the wires back on. The last time, she accused him of pulling them out on purpose. (I don’t know what tone she used, but even jokingly saying that to a grumpy old man who keeps being awakened in the middle of the night is bad bedside manner.) So he peevishly knocked off the “trash” she dropped on his bed while trying to get his wires attached. She called him rude, and he got up and stomped up and down the hallway – which he can’t do because of the covid. So they called the hospital cops on him. He went back to his room, but couldn’t sleep after that.

I had been called off work that day, so I headed over to calm him down. I was there for 4 hours, and he seemed better when I left. He had an echocardiogram while I was there, and they determined that his heart isn’t pumping enough volume, and they want to monitor it. The doctor said they wanted to make an appointment with the cardiologist.

I asked “Can I make the appointment so it fits in my schedule?” The doc answered: have the nurse call the social worker and she can make it with you in the room. So I told the nurse “Please call the social worker. I’d like them to be with me when they make the appointment because I need it to be in B– and at a time I can take him. (We were currently much farther away from home in E– because it was closer to my sister’s house, which is where he was when he got sick.)

The nurse brought me the number to call myself, so I called the cardiologist, only to be told an appointment had just been made by the social worker. It was on an inconvenient day in E–. 🤦‍♀️

Anyway, good news is that dad was released! He has a heart monitor. We’ll see how long that stays on him before he gets frustrated and takes it off. Colette took him back to her place, so he doesn’t expose my kids. At least, that’s the reason he gave. In reality, I think sometimes he needs a break from the noisiness of our house.

In the evening, we watched Episode 1 of Star Wars – half before trick-or-treating and half after. IL4 was a creeper from Minecraft. He had no peripheral vision and very little straight ahead vision. He fell over several times, and then finally gave up on the mask. M11 was Scorbunny from Pokemon. He couldn’t fit a jacket on under his costume like IL4, so he was very cold. And D13 couldn’t trick-or-treat on the ice with crutches. So she handed out candy. Regardless of all these obstacles, the all loved Halloween and were thrilled with the candy.

Wednesday

Wednesday, I took D13 in for her MRI on her knee. Admittedly, I hadn’t thought anything was wrong other than being bruised or sprained from a fall. But it turns out her kneecap had popped out of socket, bruising the tissue and ripping a tiny piece of cartilage off. She’s been assigned PT to help reduce the chance of it happening again.

In the evening, D13 and M11 had a refresher rehearsal before their final weekend.

Thursday

Thursday I worked, so not much happened during the day. Dad came home. All three kids had parent-teacher conferences, and all three of them are doing great. The older kids have mostly A’s. IL4 is making progress on his IEP goals.

Friday

Friday, after taking IL4 to speech therapy, I took J19 to urgent care. While there, I popped by the orthopedic walk-in to talk to them about the fact that my tailbone still hurts a year after the car accident. The doctor said he didn’t understand why my butt still hurt, nor how the car accident hurt it to begin with. He said physical therapy was unlikely to help, but that he wanted an MRI on Wednesday to see if there was “something else” going on. I had to cancel one appointment and reschedule another to get the MRI scheduled, but they were both easy to deal with – if it had been one of those specialist appointments that are hard to schedule, I wouldn’t have done it.

In the evening, D13 had her play, and M11, Aaron, and I watched a few episodes of Good Omens.

Week’s Photos