Yesterday evening dad began experiencing abdominal pain, by 8:00 pm it was so severe that Kehlen and I packed him into the car for another late night dash to Virginia Mason Hospital in Seattle. Unfortunately, we didn’t make it that far and turned around and aimed for Saint Peter’s in Olympia instead. The ER was busy for a Tuesday night, victims of the latest flu virus, due to his condition the triage nurse marked him as ‘urgent’, meaning we only had to wait one hour instead of two.
The pain was staggering and it was hard to be patient as each new nurse asked the same questions; finally, relief came when he got some medicine to control the pain. After that, it was hours of sitting on stiff plastic chairs waiting under the glare of the florescent lights as they rolled dad back and forth on a gurney with a broken rail, first to x-ray, then for a CAT scan. What we discovered by almost 4:00 am was that he was suffering from a urinary tract infection as well as an obstructed bowel.
They decided to transfer him up to Virginia Mason this morning so he could be around his docs and his old friend the nose tube. So far, they’ve loaded him up on antibiotics to fight the infection and are keeping a steady flow of pain meds going to help him wait it out to see if the obstruction will pass on its own. If not, he’ll have to undergo surgery again, which will take him back quite a few steps. So here’s hoping that he can relief from the pain and strength to help his body heal!
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