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Wednesday, November 12, 2014

The worse thing happens to my family

I have not blogged since August. I was in Canada for a bit till the end of summer, then I was in Trinidad for most of September. I returned to Toronto just before October, and then my dad got sick.

It all started October 2nd.

At first we thought it was the mosquito-borne virus - chikungunya. But the tests came back negative. He had fever and stomach pain. He did an ultrasound and CT scans and it was confirmed he had a gallstone and his gallbladder was infected and needed to come out. He checked into a private hospital on Thursday, October 9th, because we honestly thought it was a simple surgery and he'd be out by Monday.

We were wrong.

His surgery went well the following day, although his gallbladder ruptured spreading sepsis throughout his body, and on Saturday, October 11th he started hallucinating, late that night he began having trouble breathing. I flew back that night to Trinidad, only to arrive to find my sister in a panic - dad needed to be moved to the ICU.

At 9am on October 12th, dad was moved to the ICU, where he was diagnosed with ARDS (Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome). He was on a full ventilator. He was sedated as there was a tube down his throat into his lungs helping him to breathe. He was stable, but his lungs were full of fluid. Added to this was the fact that he only had one functioning kidney at 40%, which could complicate matters. The next few days were critical.

My sister and I would go visit him about three-four times daily. He was awake but sleepy. His lung xrays were not looking any better, but he was breathing more on his own. However, any attempt to take him off the machine was futile as he started getting bronchial spasms. The ICU doctor couldn't understand why.

In the meantime we were amassing a huge medical bill. We desperately tried to move him to a public hospital, but there were no beds available in the ICU. We waited. On October 21st, my dad underwent a tracheotomy because the tube was in lungs too long now - eleven days and his throat was inflamed. His surgery was delayed till the evening. It went well and he was resting.

October 22nd - we transfer him to the ICU at Mt. Hope public hospital. We wait hours to see him, the doctors there give us a grim outlook, but we hope that with his new trachea tube that he will recover. Because the hospital is a good distance from where we live we take turns going to visit him. Mom is also not able to visit as she's suffering with chronic pain. It is hard for her to be away from him, to not see him, he's her main emotional and physical support.

On Sunday October 26th, dad is very alert and bright. He was breathing up to nine hours on his own. There is hope that he will be out of the ICU by end of this week.

Monday takes a turn for the worst - a new infection causes his blood pressure to plummet, he goes into cardiac arrest. I wait an hour and a half to see him, he looks terrible. His eyes aren't focusing. The doctors have stabilized him but his blood pressure is very high.

We get the prognosis late Monday night and it really doesn't look good, too many complications.

My mother, sister and I don't sleep a wink that night. Finally at 7am the next day, I get the call from the hospital - dad is slipping, please come as soon as possible. It is at that point that I break down. The sound of hopelessness is a terrible wail, and beyond painful to endure. But it's the only sound I can make.

My sister stays with mom - she needs help walking anywhere in the house. A friend drives me to the hospital. Dad is slipping away, quietly. His blood pressure is decreasing, but the doctors tell me that he is comfortable, he's not aware of what's happening. His kidney is not producing urine, his heart is not pumping blood throughout his body. The machines are keeping him alive, but he's unaware of what's happening. Perhaps that is the best way to go? To slip quietly away?

I pray over him, cry over him, anoint him with holy oil and tell him, the hardest thing anyone will ever say to a loved one, that 'it's ok to go, go home to Jesus, we'll be ok. We love you dad'.

I leave the hospital, and no sooner I reach back home do I get a call from the ICU doctor - dad has passed. October 28th, 2014 at 82 years of age.

We're in shock, family start pouring into our house. How did this happen? What went wrong? We would have to wait a few days to get the answer.

The surgical team has requested at autopsy and after a miscommunication between myself and the doctors about what's the proper procedure, the post mortem gets done on Friday, October 31st. Dad died from a recent heart attack, hypertension, sepsis shock, organ failure (kidneys mainly), fluid in the lungs and severe coronary artery disease. All these things wrong with him and we never knew. He never made a fuss. He was the happiest man alive.

No wonder he was having a hard time recovering from ARDS, his body wasn't able to cope. It was hard to see him with all those tubes and needles in him. This was his first surgery and he didn't survive.

It's been two weeks now since his passing. We're in shock still, but every day we find something to laugh about, something dad said or did, and that eases the pain for just a little bit.

Losing a loved one is never easy and we take solace in knowing that this sort of thing happens to everyone at one time or another. We're also holding on the fact that he's not suffering or in pain anymore.

Time supposedly heals every wound. But we will always miss you dad.

In the wake of his passing, we still owe the private hospital a fair bit of money and we are sorting out dad's affairs, and suddenly life is a rush, suddenly we are dealing with death and life without my father.

And I know, it will never be the same again. I wake up first thing in the morning with the thought 'Dad's not here'

I wonder when that will ever change.

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