Mom was expected to stay in the hospital for 5 days but she had a harder time recovering this time and ended up staying just over a week in Winnipeg and almost 2 weeks in Steinbach hospital.\u00a0 Her confusion had been taken care of but her incision wasn\u2019t healing as quickly as it had the last time and her strength wasn\u2019t what it had been.\u00a0 She was up and walking but not quite as far and a little slower.\u00a0 But she was determined that she could do everything she had done before and she was going to prove it to everyone.\u00a0 Especially someone who said she couldn\u2019t.\u00a0 She fought the decline of her body at every turn.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Food was her greatest issue.\u00a0 Her intestines had to get used to working again after the colostomy and reversal.\u00a0 So they had to ease her into eating solid foods very slowly.\u00a0 One misstep and she would be back to ice chips and the tube down her nose that she hated so much.\u00a0 And when she got to Steinbach hospital she had a setback do to the food that was given.\u00a0 There had been miscommunication between the hospitals as to what she needed.\u00a0 They didn\u2019t have to put the tube down but she was back to broth and jello for a while.\u00a0 So she was there longer than the expected few days of \u201cstep down\u201d.\u00a0 And it affected her strength once again.\u00a0 Her body had been knocked down again.\u00a0 The discussion concerning whether she needed a walker or a cane came up but she fought hard to prove that neither was needed.\u00a0 She would walk on her own.\u00a0 And she did.<\/p>\n
Mom finally went home in the first week of February and she was so happy to be home.\u00a0 She lived on the upper floor of a four plex so she had about 4 steps to get up to her apartment.\u00a0 The front door had the steps on the outside of the house so we put up a sign requesting that everyone go to the front door so Mom didn\u2019t have to go down the stairs to let them in.\u00a0 She was very weak when she came home and Auntie A was staying with her to be sure she was all right.\u00a0 Home care was stepped up with a nurse coming at least once a day to check on her incision.\u00a0 Mom was determined that she was going to do what she wanted.\u00a0 Her life would return to what it had been.\u00a0 She wanted to go for breakfast with her friends.\u00a0 Auntie A obliged one morning that week.\u00a0 But Mom wasn\u2019t returning to her normal.\u00a0 She wasn\u2019t able to eat much, she had to be very careful to not be sick.\u00a0 She wasn\u2019t getting stronger.\u00a0 Auntie A, along with the rest of us, was very concerned.<\/p>\n
At the end of that week Mom had a chemo appointment.\u00a0 The Oncologist had made the tentative appointment with the condition that Mom was up to it.\u00a0 But the communication didn\u2019t get to the Oncologist that she had been in the Steinbach hospital as long as she had.\u00a0 Or that her condition was definitely not up to having chemo.\u00a0 But Auntie took her to the chemo appointment thinking that they would take one look at her and send her home.\u00a0 Mom was determined that if they had made the appointment she was ready.\u00a0 She would not accept the fact that she was not well enough.<\/p>\n
Auntie drove her across the street, Mom went up the elevator and she was almost too tired to sit.\u00a0 They laid her down for her treatment and did some preliminary checks and Auntie A went to get some coffee thinking that she would be taking her home when she got back.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t think there was any way that they would deem that Mom was fit for the treatment.\u00a0 But when she got back the treatment had started.\u00a0 Now, I want to be clear that none of us hold the nurses or anyone else responsible for what happened.\u00a0 They were following the orders that they had been given by Oncology in Winnipeg.\u00a0 And Mom could be very convincing.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure she told them how wonderful she felt and how great everything was going.<\/p>\n
My sister called me that night to tell me what happened and how upset my Aunt was.\u00a0 My Mom had gone home and basically stayed in bed the rest of the day and couldn\u2019t eat.\u00a0 And Mom staying in bed was a bad sign.\u00a0 Before the last 2 months of illness there were very few times that she laid down during the day.\u00a0 She was always up, even if it was in her recliner.\u00a0 But she felt it was a sign of weakness to lie down so all of us took this very seriously.\u00a0 But it would get worse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mom was expected to stay in the hospital for 5 days but she had a harder time recovering this time and ended up staying just over a week in Winnipeg and almost 2 weeks in Steinbach hospital.\u00a0 Her confusion had … Continue reading