2 weeks ago Chris and I headed up to the hospital for Chris' Cardioversion procedure. They took him back to the waiting area for outpatient procedures and got his IV started, took blood and got the heart monitors on him before calling me back to sit with him. We were there chatting with the nurse for about an hour before the cardiologist got there. His doctor asked me if I wanted to stay to watch it. Sure. I like medical stuff and I have watched my fair share. I watched my moms laser eye surgery on a close up TV screen while she was having it done. I thought it was really cool when they cut the eye ball and pulled the lens back to access the cornea. This would be no biggie.
They put the pads on him. One on his chest and one on his back. They administered the sedatives through his IV to put him to sleep. They charge up the machine. The machine has a warning saying that his pads are not reading properly. They cant figure out why. The machine was reading his EKG information so they knew it was working. He charged it up again and said "Clear!" and pushed the button and nothing happened. Then they realized the wires were not connected to the pads that do the actual shock. I said "You guys are not making feel very good about this!". They get him plugged in and the doctor charges the machine back up and says "Clear!" and just like you see in the movies, Chris' whole upper body lifts up from the gurney. He opens his eyes and looks around. The doctor tells me that it didn't work. He would have to shock him a second time. Chris was still looking around so they gave him another small dose of drugs. I told them I had to leave. I could not watch that again.
I went out to the waiting room and started to worry when a lot of time passed. The doctor finally came out and said that the second shock did work but now he was concerned because his heart rate was in the 30s at rest. 40s when he asked him to get up and move around a little bit. He felt there was some sort of congenital problem and that the top and bottom chambers were not "talking to each other" properly. He still felt ok with Chris going home that day. Said there was nothing urgent that was of concern but that we would talk about him at the followup appointment the following week. He said he expected that Chris would get dizzy easily and that he would not be surprised if he passed out. It was a Friday so he gave me his cell phone number to contact him if we had any problems or questions over the weekend.
I went back to see Chris. I didn't tell him too much at the time because I did not want to give him more to worry about. We were able to leave fairly soon after. We came home and he took a nice long nap. He felt pretty good the next day other than some soreness in his chest. I could hear the difference in his heart beat when I put my ear to his chest. I have become a novice in distinguishing the different states of his heart beats. The following Monday he had to go in to have his blood levels checked and they checked his pulse and said he was irregular again. Not what we expected, or wanted, to hear! I listened to his heart that night and it did sound a little irregular, but not the same as it did post stroke when he was in Atrial Fibrillation. We had a followup appointment with the cardiologist on Wednesday and he said that Chris was back in A Fib. Atrial Flutter to be exact. He said he uses the terms interchangeably but that the A Flutter was a much more organized rhythm than it had before. Last Thursday at work Chris felt his heart beat pretty hard and he got slightly dizzy. When we got home I listened to it and low and behold, it had converted itself back into a regular rhythm. Today, it converted back. It is a very nerve racking state of unknown right now.
At the last appointment with the cardiologist we talked about options from this point on and when we have more information on how he is going to proceed, we will discuss them with everyone.
Thank you to everyone for your continued thoughts and prayers!
Friday, September 10, 2010
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
As heard...
Hannah: "Mooooom"
Me: "Yes Hannah"
Hannah: "I want a kitty and a doggy and a baby brother"
Zachary: "No baby brother! I not a baby! I'm a big boy!"
Me: "Yes Hannah"
Hannah: "I want a kitty and a doggy and a baby brother"
Zachary: "No baby brother! I not a baby! I'm a big boy!"
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Stroke... Part 2
If you have not read Part 1, start here.
I woke up the next morning hoping it was all a nightmare. Hoping I would roll over and Chris would be next laying there next to me. But of course the other side of the bed was as empty as it was just a few hours earlier when I laid down. I jumped out of bed and called the ICU nurse who said he was awake already and put me through to him. I could hear in his voice how different he was. It was as if his soul had been missing and overnight had returned to his body. His speech was off, but the gibberish was gone. I took a shower and waited for my mom who went to the hospital with me. When we got there the ultrasound technician was doing ultrasounds of his legs and carotid artery checking for clots. She also came back later in the day and did a very long echo cardiogram of his heart. She told us, unofficially of course, that all looked well but she did notice some fluttering in his heart. Chris was starving. He hadn't eaten anything since 2pm Monday when he had a snack at work. They would not let him eat or drink anything until he met with a speech therapist to evaluate him and ensure that he would not choke or aspirate.
We still did not have a lot of answers as to why this happened. Chris is 37 years old. Has never been a smoker, heavy drinker, or drug user. He plays soccer 2-3 times a week and has always been healthy. When talking to the doctors the night before in the ER about his medical history, diet and eating habits I did mention that he drank energy drinks. Generally 2-3 a day. They seemed very interested in this and felt that could have been a factor in causing his stroke.
We met with the cardiologist who explained that the stroke was caused by Atrial Fibrillation. The irregular heart beat will cause a clot and paired with the amount of caffeine in the energy drinks, it was a formula for disaster. Most people who have A Fib have a heart rate that averages in the 130-150 range. Chris' averages around 60-70 so he had no idea that he was experiencing this. When he was in the hospital in February, they did not ever mention that he was in A Fib so it was a relatively new thing.
There was a lot going on throughout the day. Nurses in and out. A visit from Chris' bosses. Chris had an MRI where they officially confirmed he had a stroke. The neurologist said there was some scarring in his brain. Finally around 3pm or so the speech therapist came in and did some tongue exercises with Chris and watched him eat a milkshake. She cleared him to eat and showed us some exercises that he needed to do to strengthen his tongue to help his speech return to normal. He scarfed down a turkey sandwich (the first of many) and was happy to finally get to eat.
Around 4 that afternoon he was able to get up and try to walk. He felt pretty good but he did feel like he was tilting to one side while he walked. In his mind, he thought it should be obvious that he was tilting, but knew that it wasn't. Our fantastic daycare provider dropped the kids off at the hospital so they could visit with Daddy. After a short visit we went home so I could try to maintain some normalcy for the kids. We had dinner and did our nighttime routine. Chris had a good night. Watched TV. Ate dinner. Walked a little bit more with one of the nurses.
Wednesday morning I dropped the kids off at daycare and went back up to see him. There was talks of moving him to the unit that was just a step down from ICU but they were full so they moved him down to the "Med Surg" floor. It was good and bad. Good because that meant he was one step closer to going home. Bad because it was a cramped room where he would possibly have a roommate. When he was moved around noon, he had a roommate who was in his 80's and hard of hearing. So, you can imagine the volume of his TV. The roommate left around 3 and Chris was lucky enough to be alone in his room until Friday morning. Wednesday was more of the same. The speech therapist came and worked with him again, along with an occupational therapist and a physical therapist.
The cardiologist met with us again. We talked with him about treatment going forward. They put him on blood thinners to avoid the possibility of another clot forming. Because of the tPA that he was given upon arrival they had to start slow with new medications. They started giving him shots of Lovenox in his stomach on Wednesday. This is a faster delivered blood thinner until the Warfarin could get to the appropriate levels in his system.
Chris was able to get up and walk a little bit in the halls. Didn't do too much Wednesday but by Thursday he did a few laps up and down the halls. Thursday was about the same as Wednesday. Meeting with the ST, PT, OT and cardiologist. I think the floor doctor also came in to check on him, but we didn't get much out of him in terms of information. He didn't tell us anything we didn't already know from the nurse or the cardio.
Friday morning Chris was itching to go home and we were doing a lot of walking up and down the hallway. The floor doctor came in to check on him and said he would be there until at least Monday. Since he was getting the shots he had to stay there and they wanted his blood at a certain level before he could leave. We met with the cardiologist around 10am who said that if the insurance approved it and I felt ok giving him the shots we could go home. Chris was so ecstatic! We got all the prescriptions, follow up appointments, and instructions and we were out of there! Chris was so excited to be out of bed and out of the hospital that we actually stopped on the way home and had sushi for lunch before picking up all his drugs.
Understandably, it still took some time for him to regain his energy and get back to doing his day to day activities. Even now, a 6 weeks later, he still tires easily. The cardiologist said that after his Cardioversion this coming Friday, he should notice a huge difference in his stamina and energy level. The cardiologist and neurologist have talked and neither of them are in a rush to get him off of the blood thinners so he will stay on those for awhile. He was back to work part time the following week and on the soccer field 3 1/2 weeks post stroke. He has had lots of follow up appointments and has to have his blood levels checked weekly. We also had to pay some guy $300 to come evaluate Chris and watch him drive so that he could fill out the reports for the Neuro and the DMV to clear him to drive. He wasn't able to drive for a couple weeks and I was hating being the sole driver. He is also not the best passenger so he was anxious to get back in the drivers seat.
It has been a hell of an experience that I do not wish on anyone but I am so thankful for how quickly he has recovered.
I woke up the next morning hoping it was all a nightmare. Hoping I would roll over and Chris would be next laying there next to me. But of course the other side of the bed was as empty as it was just a few hours earlier when I laid down. I jumped out of bed and called the ICU nurse who said he was awake already and put me through to him. I could hear in his voice how different he was. It was as if his soul had been missing and overnight had returned to his body. His speech was off, but the gibberish was gone. I took a shower and waited for my mom who went to the hospital with me. When we got there the ultrasound technician was doing ultrasounds of his legs and carotid artery checking for clots. She also came back later in the day and did a very long echo cardiogram of his heart. She told us, unofficially of course, that all looked well but she did notice some fluttering in his heart. Chris was starving. He hadn't eaten anything since 2pm Monday when he had a snack at work. They would not let him eat or drink anything until he met with a speech therapist to evaluate him and ensure that he would not choke or aspirate.
We still did not have a lot of answers as to why this happened. Chris is 37 years old. Has never been a smoker, heavy drinker, or drug user. He plays soccer 2-3 times a week and has always been healthy. When talking to the doctors the night before in the ER about his medical history, diet and eating habits I did mention that he drank energy drinks. Generally 2-3 a day. They seemed very interested in this and felt that could have been a factor in causing his stroke.
We met with the cardiologist who explained that the stroke was caused by Atrial Fibrillation. The irregular heart beat will cause a clot and paired with the amount of caffeine in the energy drinks, it was a formula for disaster. Most people who have A Fib have a heart rate that averages in the 130-150 range. Chris' averages around 60-70 so he had no idea that he was experiencing this. When he was in the hospital in February, they did not ever mention that he was in A Fib so it was a relatively new thing.
There was a lot going on throughout the day. Nurses in and out. A visit from Chris' bosses. Chris had an MRI where they officially confirmed he had a stroke. The neurologist said there was some scarring in his brain. Finally around 3pm or so the speech therapist came in and did some tongue exercises with Chris and watched him eat a milkshake. She cleared him to eat and showed us some exercises that he needed to do to strengthen his tongue to help his speech return to normal. He scarfed down a turkey sandwich (the first of many) and was happy to finally get to eat.
Around 4 that afternoon he was able to get up and try to walk. He felt pretty good but he did feel like he was tilting to one side while he walked. In his mind, he thought it should be obvious that he was tilting, but knew that it wasn't. Our fantastic daycare provider dropped the kids off at the hospital so they could visit with Daddy. After a short visit we went home so I could try to maintain some normalcy for the kids. We had dinner and did our nighttime routine. Chris had a good night. Watched TV. Ate dinner. Walked a little bit more with one of the nurses.
Wednesday morning I dropped the kids off at daycare and went back up to see him. There was talks of moving him to the unit that was just a step down from ICU but they were full so they moved him down to the "Med Surg" floor. It was good and bad. Good because that meant he was one step closer to going home. Bad because it was a cramped room where he would possibly have a roommate. When he was moved around noon, he had a roommate who was in his 80's and hard of hearing. So, you can imagine the volume of his TV. The roommate left around 3 and Chris was lucky enough to be alone in his room until Friday morning. Wednesday was more of the same. The speech therapist came and worked with him again, along with an occupational therapist and a physical therapist.
The cardiologist met with us again. We talked with him about treatment going forward. They put him on blood thinners to avoid the possibility of another clot forming. Because of the tPA that he was given upon arrival they had to start slow with new medications. They started giving him shots of Lovenox in his stomach on Wednesday. This is a faster delivered blood thinner until the Warfarin could get to the appropriate levels in his system.
Chris was able to get up and walk a little bit in the halls. Didn't do too much Wednesday but by Thursday he did a few laps up and down the halls. Thursday was about the same as Wednesday. Meeting with the ST, PT, OT and cardiologist. I think the floor doctor also came in to check on him, but we didn't get much out of him in terms of information. He didn't tell us anything we didn't already know from the nurse or the cardio.
Friday morning Chris was itching to go home and we were doing a lot of walking up and down the hallway. The floor doctor came in to check on him and said he would be there until at least Monday. Since he was getting the shots he had to stay there and they wanted his blood at a certain level before he could leave. We met with the cardiologist around 10am who said that if the insurance approved it and I felt ok giving him the shots we could go home. Chris was so ecstatic! We got all the prescriptions, follow up appointments, and instructions and we were out of there! Chris was so excited to be out of bed and out of the hospital that we actually stopped on the way home and had sushi for lunch before picking up all his drugs.
Understandably, it still took some time for him to regain his energy and get back to doing his day to day activities. Even now, a 6 weeks later, he still tires easily. The cardiologist said that after his Cardioversion this coming Friday, he should notice a huge difference in his stamina and energy level. The cardiologist and neurologist have talked and neither of them are in a rush to get him off of the blood thinners so he will stay on those for awhile. He was back to work part time the following week and on the soccer field 3 1/2 weeks post stroke. He has had lots of follow up appointments and has to have his blood levels checked weekly. We also had to pay some guy $300 to come evaluate Chris and watch him drive so that he could fill out the reports for the Neuro and the DMV to clear him to drive. He wasn't able to drive for a couple weeks and I was hating being the sole driver. He is also not the best passenger so he was anxious to get back in the drivers seat.
It has been a hell of an experience that I do not wish on anyone but I am so thankful for how quickly he has recovered.
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Stroke... Part 1
A month ago Chris suffered a stroke. I am just now having the time to "talk" about it. It is, by far, the scariest thing I have lived through. I hope hearing our story will help others know the signs and trust their instincts if faced with a life and death health situation. I am so thankful I did. Here is our story...
It started like any other Monday. Alarm goes off. Take a shower. Get dressed. Pack my lunch and Zach's lunch. While packing Zach's lunch, make a mental note that we are out of juice boxes. Drop kids off at daycare. Commute in to work together. Work all day. Chris picks me up. We chat about our day on the drive home. Pick up the kids. Come home. Sort mail. Unpack Zach's backpack. Remember we are out of juice boxes. Say to Chris "Honey, check in the garage to see if we have another box of Capri Sun's and put them in the fridge." Chris comes in from the garage and says "we don't have anymore, want me to go to the store? We could use some sour cream for the chili anyway"? (we had made chili on Sunday to have for dinner on Monday and it came out a little spicy so we though sour cream might make it less spicy for the kids). I debated on him going since it was the last week of summer school and I could get by with other drinks for Zach's lunch. But, he decided to go. While he is gone, I start warming up bowls of chili. I call and chat with my mom for a few minutes.
Little did I know my life was about to change forever.
About 20 minutes later, the kids announce "Daddy's home!" and I continue what I am doing. I could see the driveway from the kitchen and noticed the car door was open for a few minutes, but figured that he was gathering his things, turning off his IPod, etc. He walks in carrying boxes of Capri Suns and a grocery bag. I look at his face and he just did not look right. His left eye looked very small, like he was squinting and the left side of his face seemed somewhat droopy. I asked him what was wrong and his response was "I don't know, my vision was just off, I need to lay down for a few minutes". My heart starts racing. That just did not seem like him but he has been mentioning that he needs to see the eye doctor lately to get a new prescription for his vision problems in his left eye that he has had for years.
He lays on the couch and I am drilling him with questions. He has a coy smile on his face, almost like he was mocking me for being concerned. I ask him to smile. Smile was fine, face reacts on both sides of the face. I ask him to stick out his tongue. Both sides of his tongue look like he has been clenching down on it and there are teeth marks running along both sides. Then our conversation goes like this:
Me: "I am calling 911"
Chris: "No you aren't, I am fine, just let me rest and you guys start eating dinner"
Me: "No Chris, I am calling 911"
Chris: "Stop, I am fine, you are not calling 911"
Me: "Fine, I am calling my mom to have her come over and watch the kids in case I need to take you to the hospital for some reason"
Chris: "Fine"
I call my mom and tell her that Chris isn't acting right. I don't know what is wrong but he just doesn't seem right and he is telling me not to worry or call 911. She says "Jennifer, call 911, I am on my way".
I start pacing. Trying to decide if I am overreacting (which I have been known to do), or if there was really something wrong. Then I hear him say "the coach emailed us about the protocol of the defense". I picked up the phone and called 911. He is still looking at me like I am nuts and should not be concerned but he just was not himself. I hang up with the 911 operator and within minutes I hear the sirens of the fire engines. I talk to the kids and let them know that there will be a lot going on in the house in a minute and they are coming to make sure daddy feels OK and they need to stay out of the way. I move all the toys and shoes and make a clear path from the front door to the couch where Chris is.
The firemen walk in a few minutes later and start hooking Chris up to machines and asking him questions. Zach, of course, is trying to help them. Hannah starts panicking and wants nothing but to be held. They ask Chris if he knows where he is and he knew our address perfect. About 5 minutes later, he got one of the numbers wrong. Most questions they asked him were basic and he answered fine. Things like his name, day of the week, his birth date. They asked me to ask him questions that only we would know. I asked him Zach's birthday and he knew the day and month but got the year way off. By this time the EMTs had shown up as well. The wonderful woman driver had pulled Zach to a little corner in the house and talked to him and kept him occupied. They prepare to bring the gurney in and are looking at the tight fit (our house is small). Chris says "No, I can walk out", which he did. He laid on the gurney which they had on the porch. They strap him in and start loading him in the ambulance and the kids say goodbye. They were very excited about the stickers the firemen had just given them. I am standing there in shock and a neighbor walks over and asks if I need anything. One of the firemen says to me "you need to get to the hospital as soon as possible because we have no idea if what he is saying is true." I turned to my neighbor (who I had met in passing but did not even know her name) and said "Can you sit with my kids? My mom should be here within 10 minutes" and I jumped in the front if the ambulance. On the way over I was pretty hysterical and the driver (who had just finished keeping Zach occupied) was trying to keep me engaged in conversation. She asked if I had someone to come to the hospital to sit with me. I hadn't even thought of that. All I was thinking was taking care of Chris and making sure the kids were taken care of. I call our friends Doug and Kelly and ask if they can keep the kids for the night so my mom can come up and be with me. We work out arrangements and they, once again, come through for us and come pick up the kids from my mom. As we are driving over to the hospital in the ambulance, I cant hear much of what is going on the back but I do hear them asking Chris if he did any drugs when he went to the store to which he answered "yes, I smoked some marijuana". I asked the EMTs in the back "What did he say?! He is totally full of it, he did not, there is no way". They all kind of look at me like I am nuts or lying to them to protect Chris. Then they ask him "What is your doctors name?" and he says "Dr McNerney". I said "No, that is our kids pediatrician". They started an IV and that was about all I knew that was happening on the ride over.
We get to the ambulance bay of the ER and they are unloading him. It was quite chaotic so once I knew where he was going to be, they took me to a little waiting room to wait for my mom and so that they could get things going. I waited for what seemed like an eternity and finally went back to his room. The ER doctor explained that they think he is having a stroke (which I already figured by that point) and that they are going to do a CT scan to be sure it isn't a brain bleed and at that point we will talk and I will need to make some choices. By this time, the ICU doctor had come down and was working closely with the ER doctor. Being that they suspected a stroke and he would be moved to the ICU they worked as a team.
By now, Chris had moved past the point of speaking coherently and he was completely talking gibberish. Some things that he said would make sense but it was like it wasn't even him talking. His expressions were nothing that I recognized. He could not squeeze his right hand. One of the doctors asked him to raise his right leg. He raised his right leg. The doctor asked him to raise his right arm. He raised his right leg. The doctor asked him again, to raise his right arm. And again, he raised his right leg. The doctor asked him again to raise his right arm and he looked at the doctor and said "What do you think I am doing?!". He had lost all movement in his right arm and hand. I asked him if he knew who I was and while I could tell that he recognized me, he could not tell me my name. I paced between his room and the hallway outside his room. It was hard for me to be near him because it scared me so much and with every minute that passed, he seemed to be falling further and further away from me.
They took him back for the CT scan while I waited, alone with my thoughts. I wondered how I was going to get through this. I was convinced that he would never be the same person. How would this change our family? Would he still love me the same? Is our marriage strong enough to get through the aftermath that this will cause? Will he survive this? Could I handle being a single parent?
The CT scan was over fairly quickly. The ER doctor confirmed what we all suspected. He was suffering a stroke. He told me that time was of the essence and I have a decision to make and I need to make it quickly. We stood in the ER room talking over Chris. Me to Chris' right and the doctor to Chris' left. Chris asleep between us. He explained that a stroke is a blood clot that has traveled to the brain and he went on to explain my options to me.
Option 1: They will administer a drug called tPA through his IV and it takes an hour. It is a drug that is used to break up the clot. Approximately a third of people who have this treatment will have no residual side effects from the stroke. Approximately two-thirds of people will have some sort of side effect. A speech problem or a limp or something of that sort. And then there is small percentage of people that will die within minutes of administering the tPA and another small percentage of people that will die within the hour. This treatment must be administered within 3 hours of the stroke starting. By this point, we were at about the 2 hour mark.
Option 2: There is a fairly new procedure where they insert a catheter into the brain and break up the clot that way. This allows a 6 hour window of time to administer the treatment. The hospital we were at do not do this procedure, nor does any hospital in our county. He would need to be air lifted to Santa Barbara. And he laid out all the risks associated with that procedure. This one did not really seem to be a feasible option. I am all for new medical breakthroughs, for other people. But if I am even going to consider it for me or my family I would need a lot of time to research and educate myself and obviously there was no time for that now.
Option 3: Do nothing.
My mom got there while they were explaining Option 2. I looked at her and told her to tell me what to do. I mean, I could tell that Option 1 was the typical protocol but those weren't really good odds to me. I wanted another choice. I wanted the choice that would make Chris him again. A third of a chance that he would be 100% again?!? That is not really good odds. But I didn't have much time to think about it and doing nothing didn't seem like an option so, I decided that tPA was going to be my choice. A choice I never wanted to be making. Never did I think at 32 I would be making a choice on how to save my husbands life.
We stood in the hallway talking to the doctors while they started the treatment. It is probably good I wasn't in there because I would be panicking. Panicking that we would be that statistic. That small percentage of people that die within minutes of it starting. The ICU doctor asked me if I had any other questions and I said "yes, but you cant give me those answers! You cant tell me whether or not my husband will be OK so no, I don't have any questions." and he just quietly put his head down. The nurse came out about 10 minutes in to it and said he was doing well. I felt like we passed one hurdle. He didn't die. Let's keep focusing on overcoming more hurdles.
We all went in to talk to him as he was awake now. That quickly, he was able to squeeze his hand again. He still could not lift his right arm. I asked him if he knew who I was. He said "Stop It". I said "No really honey, what is my name?". And he could not tell me. He said "you're my wife" and then said a few different names and finally thought hard about it and said "Jen". He still spoke a lot of gibberish. Lots of stories that did not make a lot of sense. Most were about soccer. One story seemed that he was thinking about work.
At this point, they took him up to the ICU and got him settled up there while the tPA treatment finished. My mom and I sat with him for a couple hours and talked with his doctor and nurse. He was extremely tired and told me to go home and sleep. I debated on staying in the ICU with him for the night but I knew that we had a long road ahead and I needed to get some rest. I had the direct number to the nurses station at the ICU so I was able to call and get updates on him through the night.
I went home to an empty house and sobbed myself to sleep. This could not possibly be happening.
To be continued...... Part 2
It started like any other Monday. Alarm goes off. Take a shower. Get dressed. Pack my lunch and Zach's lunch. While packing Zach's lunch, make a mental note that we are out of juice boxes. Drop kids off at daycare. Commute in to work together. Work all day. Chris picks me up. We chat about our day on the drive home. Pick up the kids. Come home. Sort mail. Unpack Zach's backpack. Remember we are out of juice boxes. Say to Chris "Honey, check in the garage to see if we have another box of Capri Sun's and put them in the fridge." Chris comes in from the garage and says "we don't have anymore, want me to go to the store? We could use some sour cream for the chili anyway"? (we had made chili on Sunday to have for dinner on Monday and it came out a little spicy so we though sour cream might make it less spicy for the kids). I debated on him going since it was the last week of summer school and I could get by with other drinks for Zach's lunch. But, he decided to go. While he is gone, I start warming up bowls of chili. I call and chat with my mom for a few minutes.
Little did I know my life was about to change forever.
About 20 minutes later, the kids announce "Daddy's home!" and I continue what I am doing. I could see the driveway from the kitchen and noticed the car door was open for a few minutes, but figured that he was gathering his things, turning off his IPod, etc. He walks in carrying boxes of Capri Suns and a grocery bag. I look at his face and he just did not look right. His left eye looked very small, like he was squinting and the left side of his face seemed somewhat droopy. I asked him what was wrong and his response was "I don't know, my vision was just off, I need to lay down for a few minutes". My heart starts racing. That just did not seem like him but he has been mentioning that he needs to see the eye doctor lately to get a new prescription for his vision problems in his left eye that he has had for years.
He lays on the couch and I am drilling him with questions. He has a coy smile on his face, almost like he was mocking me for being concerned. I ask him to smile. Smile was fine, face reacts on both sides of the face. I ask him to stick out his tongue. Both sides of his tongue look like he has been clenching down on it and there are teeth marks running along both sides. Then our conversation goes like this:
Me: "I am calling 911"
Chris: "No you aren't, I am fine, just let me rest and you guys start eating dinner"
Me: "No Chris, I am calling 911"
Chris: "Stop, I am fine, you are not calling 911"
Me: "Fine, I am calling my mom to have her come over and watch the kids in case I need to take you to the hospital for some reason"
Chris: "Fine"
I call my mom and tell her that Chris isn't acting right. I don't know what is wrong but he just doesn't seem right and he is telling me not to worry or call 911. She says "Jennifer, call 911, I am on my way".
I start pacing. Trying to decide if I am overreacting (which I have been known to do), or if there was really something wrong. Then I hear him say "the coach emailed us about the protocol of the defense". I picked up the phone and called 911. He is still looking at me like I am nuts and should not be concerned but he just was not himself. I hang up with the 911 operator and within minutes I hear the sirens of the fire engines. I talk to the kids and let them know that there will be a lot going on in the house in a minute and they are coming to make sure daddy feels OK and they need to stay out of the way. I move all the toys and shoes and make a clear path from the front door to the couch where Chris is.
The firemen walk in a few minutes later and start hooking Chris up to machines and asking him questions. Zach, of course, is trying to help them. Hannah starts panicking and wants nothing but to be held. They ask Chris if he knows where he is and he knew our address perfect. About 5 minutes later, he got one of the numbers wrong. Most questions they asked him were basic and he answered fine. Things like his name, day of the week, his birth date. They asked me to ask him questions that only we would know. I asked him Zach's birthday and he knew the day and month but got the year way off. By this time the EMTs had shown up as well. The wonderful woman driver had pulled Zach to a little corner in the house and talked to him and kept him occupied. They prepare to bring the gurney in and are looking at the tight fit (our house is small). Chris says "No, I can walk out", which he did. He laid on the gurney which they had on the porch. They strap him in and start loading him in the ambulance and the kids say goodbye. They were very excited about the stickers the firemen had just given them. I am standing there in shock and a neighbor walks over and asks if I need anything. One of the firemen says to me "you need to get to the hospital as soon as possible because we have no idea if what he is saying is true." I turned to my neighbor (who I had met in passing but did not even know her name) and said "Can you sit with my kids? My mom should be here within 10 minutes" and I jumped in the front if the ambulance. On the way over I was pretty hysterical and the driver (who had just finished keeping Zach occupied) was trying to keep me engaged in conversation. She asked if I had someone to come to the hospital to sit with me. I hadn't even thought of that. All I was thinking was taking care of Chris and making sure the kids were taken care of. I call our friends Doug and Kelly and ask if they can keep the kids for the night so my mom can come up and be with me. We work out arrangements and they, once again, come through for us and come pick up the kids from my mom. As we are driving over to the hospital in the ambulance, I cant hear much of what is going on the back but I do hear them asking Chris if he did any drugs when he went to the store to which he answered "yes, I smoked some marijuana". I asked the EMTs in the back "What did he say?! He is totally full of it, he did not, there is no way". They all kind of look at me like I am nuts or lying to them to protect Chris. Then they ask him "What is your doctors name?" and he says "Dr McNerney". I said "No, that is our kids pediatrician". They started an IV and that was about all I knew that was happening on the ride over.
We get to the ambulance bay of the ER and they are unloading him. It was quite chaotic so once I knew where he was going to be, they took me to a little waiting room to wait for my mom and so that they could get things going. I waited for what seemed like an eternity and finally went back to his room. The ER doctor explained that they think he is having a stroke (which I already figured by that point) and that they are going to do a CT scan to be sure it isn't a brain bleed and at that point we will talk and I will need to make some choices. By this time, the ICU doctor had come down and was working closely with the ER doctor. Being that they suspected a stroke and he would be moved to the ICU they worked as a team.
By now, Chris had moved past the point of speaking coherently and he was completely talking gibberish. Some things that he said would make sense but it was like it wasn't even him talking. His expressions were nothing that I recognized. He could not squeeze his right hand. One of the doctors asked him to raise his right leg. He raised his right leg. The doctor asked him to raise his right arm. He raised his right leg. The doctor asked him again, to raise his right arm. And again, he raised his right leg. The doctor asked him again to raise his right arm and he looked at the doctor and said "What do you think I am doing?!". He had lost all movement in his right arm and hand. I asked him if he knew who I was and while I could tell that he recognized me, he could not tell me my name. I paced between his room and the hallway outside his room. It was hard for me to be near him because it scared me so much and with every minute that passed, he seemed to be falling further and further away from me.
They took him back for the CT scan while I waited, alone with my thoughts. I wondered how I was going to get through this. I was convinced that he would never be the same person. How would this change our family? Would he still love me the same? Is our marriage strong enough to get through the aftermath that this will cause? Will he survive this? Could I handle being a single parent?
The CT scan was over fairly quickly. The ER doctor confirmed what we all suspected. He was suffering a stroke. He told me that time was of the essence and I have a decision to make and I need to make it quickly. We stood in the ER room talking over Chris. Me to Chris' right and the doctor to Chris' left. Chris asleep between us. He explained that a stroke is a blood clot that has traveled to the brain and he went on to explain my options to me.
Option 1: They will administer a drug called tPA through his IV and it takes an hour. It is a drug that is used to break up the clot. Approximately a third of people who have this treatment will have no residual side effects from the stroke. Approximately two-thirds of people will have some sort of side effect. A speech problem or a limp or something of that sort. And then there is small percentage of people that will die within minutes of administering the tPA and another small percentage of people that will die within the hour. This treatment must be administered within 3 hours of the stroke starting. By this point, we were at about the 2 hour mark.
Option 2: There is a fairly new procedure where they insert a catheter into the brain and break up the clot that way. This allows a 6 hour window of time to administer the treatment. The hospital we were at do not do this procedure, nor does any hospital in our county. He would need to be air lifted to Santa Barbara. And he laid out all the risks associated with that procedure. This one did not really seem to be a feasible option. I am all for new medical breakthroughs, for other people. But if I am even going to consider it for me or my family I would need a lot of time to research and educate myself and obviously there was no time for that now.
Option 3: Do nothing.
My mom got there while they were explaining Option 2. I looked at her and told her to tell me what to do. I mean, I could tell that Option 1 was the typical protocol but those weren't really good odds to me. I wanted another choice. I wanted the choice that would make Chris him again. A third of a chance that he would be 100% again?!? That is not really good odds. But I didn't have much time to think about it and doing nothing didn't seem like an option so, I decided that tPA was going to be my choice. A choice I never wanted to be making. Never did I think at 32 I would be making a choice on how to save my husbands life.
We stood in the hallway talking to the doctors while they started the treatment. It is probably good I wasn't in there because I would be panicking. Panicking that we would be that statistic. That small percentage of people that die within minutes of it starting. The ICU doctor asked me if I had any other questions and I said "yes, but you cant give me those answers! You cant tell me whether or not my husband will be OK so no, I don't have any questions." and he just quietly put his head down. The nurse came out about 10 minutes in to it and said he was doing well. I felt like we passed one hurdle. He didn't die. Let's keep focusing on overcoming more hurdles.
We all went in to talk to him as he was awake now. That quickly, he was able to squeeze his hand again. He still could not lift his right arm. I asked him if he knew who I was. He said "Stop It". I said "No really honey, what is my name?". And he could not tell me. He said "you're my wife" and then said a few different names and finally thought hard about it and said "Jen". He still spoke a lot of gibberish. Lots of stories that did not make a lot of sense. Most were about soccer. One story seemed that he was thinking about work.
At this point, they took him up to the ICU and got him settled up there while the tPA treatment finished. My mom and I sat with him for a couple hours and talked with his doctor and nurse. He was extremely tired and told me to go home and sleep. I debated on staying in the ICU with him for the night but I knew that we had a long road ahead and I needed to get some rest. I had the direct number to the nurses station at the ICU so I was able to call and get updates on him through the night.
I went home to an empty house and sobbed myself to sleep. This could not possibly be happening.
To be continued...... Part 2
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
The hits just keep on coming....
We are all getting over a stomach virus. It started with the kids both puking last Wednesday night. It was super quick and they were both fine the next day. Come to find out that it spread through their daycare. 7 of the kids had it and a couple of the parents.
Saturday afternoon/evening I had *ahem* tummy issues. Thought I was going to puke, but had other things going on. I thought maybe it was just something I ate since I had a burrito from a gas station on Saturday for lunch. (Chapala in Morro Bay. I know everyone raves about them but still... It's a burrito. From a gas station. And since I had never eaten there before I thought it could be that).
Then Hannah puked all over me Sunday. A lot. While we had company dropping off a meal for us. I actually don't think she was sick. She had chugged 2 cups of cranberry juice which is very unlike her and I think it didn't sit well. She was feeling fine right after she got sick.
So last night Chris has the runs. Zach comes in this morning at 5:30 and tells me that he pooped his pants. (Yes I have a 6 year old not fully potty trained. Don't judge) He had diarrhea. I clean him up and have him go more in the bathroom. Chris gets out of bed, goes in the bathroom and does his business and then comes out and collapses on the floor on his stomach in the living room (I thought he was just laying down) but he is totally passed out and starts puking. Face down in it. So I am trying to lift his head up so he isn't breathing it in and he is just dead weight. Zach is trying to "help". Chris finally comes to and he gets cleaned up. It was horrible. Scared the crap outta me. Like having a stroke on me WASN'T ENOUGH?!?
Saturday afternoon/evening I had *ahem* tummy issues. Thought I was going to puke, but had other things going on. I thought maybe it was just something I ate since I had a burrito from a gas station on Saturday for lunch. (Chapala in Morro Bay. I know everyone raves about them but still... It's a burrito. From a gas station. And since I had never eaten there before I thought it could be that).
Then Hannah puked all over me Sunday. A lot. While we had company dropping off a meal for us. I actually don't think she was sick. She had chugged 2 cups of cranberry juice which is very unlike her and I think it didn't sit well. She was feeling fine right after she got sick.
So last night Chris has the runs. Zach comes in this morning at 5:30 and tells me that he pooped his pants. (Yes I have a 6 year old not fully potty trained. Don't judge) He had diarrhea. I clean him up and have him go more in the bathroom. Chris gets out of bed, goes in the bathroom and does his business and then comes out and collapses on the floor on his stomach in the living room (I thought he was just laying down) but he is totally passed out and starts puking. Face down in it. So I am trying to lift his head up so he isn't breathing it in and he is just dead weight. Zach is trying to "help". Chris finally comes to and he gets cleaned up. It was horrible. Scared the crap outta me. Like having a stroke on me WASN'T ENOUGH?!?
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
A day at the lake
A couple weeks ago some friends of ours invited us to join them on the lake for a day. We had a fantastic time. Zach wasn't too sure about the boat at first but once he got over his fear he enjoyed it. Chris got up on a wake board which he hasn't done in several years. The kids had a blast swimming in the lake. Hannah amazed me. We got her a Puddle Jumper floatie. I was amazed at how well she could swim on her own with this thing. I just wish they had them in Zach's size because I have never seen any kind of floaty devise work so well! Hannah was not happy to have to get out of the water at the end of the day and cried when we left. That lasted all of 2 minutes until she fell asleep. After a long hot day we went home sunburned, tired and happy.
"But I don't WANT TO LEAVE!!!!"
Aaaaaaand.... she's out...
"But I don't WANT TO LEAVE!!!!"
Aaaaaaand.... she's out...
Birthday Boy!!!
Zachary is 6. I can't believe it. The time has gone by way too fast. We celebrated in normal birthday fashion. With cake. And presents. And this year with some beach fun.
A busy June....
We have had a very busy month! The beginning of June brought a long overdue visit from Chris' folks. The kids had a great time spending time with them and getting to know them better. Here are some pictures from our visit.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
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