Hospitals, Heart Attacks and Hallelujahs

So this is what happened:

August 24th, my birthday, was a pretty good day considering I turned 40. But the entire day Grover complained about heartburn, acid reflux and indigestion. He has had a problem with acid reflux for years now, so a couple of Pepcid later I thought he would be okay. Well, it stayed with him and nothing he did could get rid of it, and instead of getting better it was steadily getting worse.

August 26th, Sunday morning: Grover had spent the last two days dealing with this whole reflux situation and it had gotten so bad that I finally was able to talk him into going to the emergency room. Call it one of those things, but something didn't seem quite right.

So, off he went and several hours later, after getting someone to watch the kids, I managed to get up there to sit with him. I got there just in time to talk to the doctor who was treating him. The doctor tells us that it's not acid reflux....it's blockages around his heart, two of them and he will have to be admitted and have an angioplasty done the next day.

Let the freak out begin.

He's admitted into the hospital and begins the first in a series of tests. By 11 the next morning we have more news. He doesn't have two blockages around his heart...he has SEVEN. They will not be able to do an angioplasty for this...they have to do open heart surgery in the next 3 days.

And the freak out continues.

So over the course of the next 3 days, they run endless tests, take copious amounts of blood, and poke and prod in places a person never wants to be poked and prodded in (unless they're really weird or something;)). And with each new test comes new information.

He has an arterial blockage in his kidneys. Well, we can still do the open heart surgery. Run some more tests.

He has had open heart surgery before. Years ago, when he was a kid and got shot in the chest, they had to crack him open to repair that, and his sternum healed improperly. We'll have to get a Black & Decker blade saw to get through the bone. And we don't know what kind of scar tissue we'll be looking at when we finally get in there. But, he's still on for the surgery. Run more tests.

He has an arterial blockage in his right leg. We can still do the surgery. Run even more tests. And get him ready for surgery on Friday.

Friday morning, the morning of the surgery, we are waiting. They are supposed to be coming to get him at 6:30 a.m. Nobobdy shows up. What's going on now? Well, we soon find out. His cardiologist, his heart surgeon, and the vascular surgeon come to see us. There is another problem. He has an arterial blockage in his intestine. They cannot do the surgery. If they do, the minute that they put him on the heart-lung bypass machine, they will "kill his intestines", which will in turn kill him.

So what are you going to do docs? Well, we're going to do an angioplasty, stent the two most severe blockages and put him on medication for the rest and hopefully they will never get any worse, with diet and lifestyle changes put in effect. Okay, cool. Angioplasty, not that big of a deal, people get those all the time and leave the hospital the next day!

My husband, my dear Grover, love of my life....is not most people.

They came and got him the next morning to do the procedure and his doctor calls me about an hour and a half later. Turns out the first blockage was a lot worse than they thought, instead of being like 85% blocked, it was 99%blocked with a slow flow.So, in hindsight, if I hadn't have made him go to the hospital on Sunday morning, he would have had a heart attack and been dead by Sunday night. Instead, he has his heart attack in the middle of the procedure. Oh what fun!

And the freak out has reached its peak. (When you have doctors use phrases like "Never sen anything like this before" and "This should be in a textbook", it opens up a whole new surreal level of existence for ya.)

24 hours in cardiac ICU and he is back in a room and waiting for another week to have the second angioplasty to stent the second blockage. Imagine the tension in the waiting room that morning! Another 3 days later, after much hemming and hawing and they finally let him come home.

He's home for two days, starts feeling really sick, thinks it's the meds they have him on (all 12 of them) and goes back to the hospital, where they keep him and perform yet ANOTHER angioplasty on the third blockage (the other 4 were pretty minor) and he comes home after a couple of days.

2 weeks later he has day surgery on the blockage in his leg. That was a walk in the park.

So, all in all, Grover spent roughly 3 and a half weeks in the hospital, 6 weeks recuperating and has finally, FINALLY returned to work. Good as new, or at least a reasonable facsimile thereof. I think that rates a hallelujah:)

Poor thing, now he can't even cough without me asking him if he needs to call the doctor;)

Heck of a way to quit smoking huh?

So enough about me......how are you guys doing?

Peace alllllllll................