A Very Memorable Weekend

Well, this weekend did not go according to plan.  I was looking forward to an easygoing weekend in Tulsa, since I'm headed to see the fam tonight for Carter Lee's 6th Grade Graduation - (get excited, yay Carter)!  

...I was here on Friday night, then I joined Elizabeth for her live century + birthday Peloton ride with Alex on Saturday.  We were on competing teams, and it was fun and good times! ❤

That afternoon was Chet's client appreciation event, an outdoor gathering at the Wilson home filled with good friends and happy flower bouquets and tasty kettle corn!  I'll do a full Memory Monday for that soon because it deserves its own post, but here's a lil' photo preview...

My plan was a relaxing movie night, followed by a delightful Sunday brunch at Red Rock with the Wilsons and Fultons to celebrate Karli Marie's birthday on Sunday, then catching up on cleaning and laundry.  ...As I was getting ready to leave Chet's around 4:00, I got a call from Rachael telling me Dad was at the ER.  It's all been a bit of a whirlwind from there, but here are some things I want to remember:

• Dad had been weak and sick on Friday, but he rested a lot and no one was overly concerned.  He went downhill fast on Saturday and was becoming incoherent and could barely hold his head up.  Rach said it was audibly very labored breathing and gasping for breath, (but somehow he was still insisting he didn't need to go to the hospital), so Rach and Mom worked together to get him in the car so Mom could take him to the ER. 
• He was in the MWC St. Anthony ER from 3:15-ish to 8:00 on Saturday.  It was surprisingly uncrowded when they arrived (thanks, God), so they got him right in.  His oxygen levels were dangerously low, and they asked why he had waited so long to come in.  
• His oxygen was at 82 when he arrived, and they got it up to 87 over the next four hours but needed it to reach 92-93 to keep him off a ventilator.  When Mom texted me about that, it all felt MUCH more serious.
• He tested negative for Covid but positive for pneumonia and sepsis.  They transferred him to St. Anthony’s downtown that night, where he is still currently in their ICU.
• The nurse there Sunday morning told Mom and I that his heart rhythm started jumping around pretty seriously around 8am, so they were giving him medicine for the A-Fib.  You could see it moving up and down a lot on the monitor.  I'm sure that's exhausting and taking a lot of his energy too.  
• While Mom and I were there Sunday, Dad was very tired.  He chatted with us a little, then we were just on our phones trying to stay quiet, but he told us 3x in an hour to leave, so we did.  
• Sunday afternoon, the doctor talked with Rach about the risk of silent aspiration and doing the swallow test to check for that.  She broke down crying while telling Mom and I about it later, saying they told her if he didn't do well, they may have to put in a permanent feeding tube, which Google told me has a 50% death rate within one year.  Not exactly a helpful thing to know.
• The doctor said it could still go either way (life or death), but that he didn't see anything especially troubling right then.  They gave us a 72-hour window, saying he would probably rapidly improve or digress in that period, and then we would know more.  But they were still mentioning ventilators as a possibility on Sunday too.  It was all surreal and scary, and it's hard to be in limbo on stuff like that when you have zero control over the outcome.
• Sepsis is apparently caused by his body trying to fight infection, and it causes rapid heart rate and mental confusion, and we’re seeing that in several ways.  I need to learn more about how sepsis affects the brain - we’ve seen that with Babah and now with Dad, and they both go back and forth a lot... saying some things that are right on point then some things that are way out of left field, having vivid dreams and then believing themselves to be somewhere else entirely.  In all honesty, as long as the antibiotics do their job and he keeps getting better, I think it's kinda nice that he's able to imagine things that are happier and more exciting than being stuck in a hospital bed all week.
• I helped Mom watch all the kids while Rachael was up there for several hours on Sunday.  We played sardines, Kyndal gave Carter a makeover while J did eye therapy, and I helped T-man study for his finals!  Jace cried about Grandpa being in the hospital, and we had a short but good talk about that.
• Dad does A LOT around the house, so I tried to help out with as much of the practical stuff as possible (food, trash, groceries, gas, taking care of the dogs, etc.)  JoBug offered to watch Oreo this week, and I encouraged Mom to take her up on that, and I'm thankful she did!  It's a win-win all around because Oreo will have fun there and Mom will have one less stressor right now.
• The Lemieux’s have been incredibly helpful as usual - friends of the year!  Bill was ready to come over and help get dad to the hospital, they were the first non-family visitors, they’ve called several times to check in and offer Mom help, they stopped others from visiting when what Dad needed most was rest, they helped watch Parrish kids while Rach and Mom were both in there with Dad, and Bill and Alan have both offered to come get them at 6am since Dad can’t do that for a while now.️
• Bob Rutherford (our former pastor who baptized me, current neighbor of my parents) is another of my favorites - he visited Mom in the hospital every time she's been there, and he's been checking in with us and offering help and prayers since all this happened, ready to visit Dad when he's feeling better. LifeChurch Pastors Sam and Stefan came to the hospital and prayed over Dad while Rach was there.
• So many family friends have been checking in and texting and saying they’re praying, including Kristin Whitaker and Ashley Ingersol, my closest cousins, and multiple Tulsa friends have reached out and offered to make the drive or to help in other practical ways... my family and I appreciate the love and support and prayers more than I can say!
• We're praising God that Dad has improved a lot yesterday and this morning!!  His heart rate and A-Fib have calmed down, they've talked about tapering him off of oxygen, he has finally ordered something to eat, and he is more coherent and seems to at least be aware that the sepsis is causing him some confusion.
• I wrote this down because I genuinely didn't know if it might be the last time I saw my Dad on Sunday --  and I guess none of us ever really know for sure.  Anyway, he was weak and tired and confused about some things, and he couldn't talk much without losing precious energy.  His heart was still jumping around a lot, and he had oxygen (not a full mask but going into his nose) + multiple IVs and a BP cuff and other monitors on, but the last thing I saw and heard was Dad blowing me a kiss and saying "I’ll be lovin' you" (our signature family phrase) to me and Mom as we were leaving the hospital that morning.  And the last thing I said was "I'll be lovin' you, Dad."  That made me happy.  It makes me much happier to know things have improved and seem to be on an uphill swing now, so I should get to see him again fairly soon!
• Mom and I held hands and prayed together in her kitchen just before I left to head back to Tulsa - that’s a moment I want to remember too. 💙

In waaaay different news, before any of this happened, I signed up to buy a box of peaches from the peach truck.  I had no idea how many peaches that would be, and I definitely underestimated it - WOW!  So if you're a friend of mine and a fan of peaches, let me know and I'll be happy to share. lol

Okay guys, that's all.  I had to write this fast and now I'm about to leave for Carter's graduation ceremony.  Hope you're having a lovely week!