family, health »

My heart is somewhere about 7 hours away right now in a billion tiny pieces surrounding the bed in which my dad lays in the ICU.

As most of you know my dad was in the hospital in my hometown after he was diagnosed with Gram Positive streptococci pneumonia. He got sick about three days before his initial hospitalization and then it came to the point where he finally caved and told my mom it was time to head to the ER because he knew it wasn’t getting better like most colds typically do. After the ER visit he was admitted into the care of the hospital and needed oxygen and antibiotics. Seemed like an easy enough fix but it just wasn’t so. Antibiotic after antibiotic and test after test left nothing but confused doctors. Blood tests showed that the antibiotics should be killing the bacteria but inside my dad’s body it just wasn’t doing what it was supposed to. After 8 days in the hospital my dads oxygen levels dropped dangerously low and within hours he was transferred by ambulance to the ICU of a much larger hospital about 3 hours away and he was placed under the care of at least 3 different specialists.

I’ve spent much of the last week sleeping in a hotel room and staring at the walls of the ICU family waiting area. There are good days and bad days in the ICU.. we’ve had so many ups and downs it’s like our hearts are on a never-ending roller coaster. Some days it seemed as if my dad might just be heading in the right direction and other days it’s like for every 1 step forward he was taking he’d take another 2 steps back. After days of this, things got worse when my dad somehow managed to get out of bed, pulled off his oxygen mask and instantly his stats all began to drop. He experienced memory loss at which point the doctor immediately decided it was time to intubate my dad. As of right now my dad is heavily sedated, chemically paralyzed, and a machine is doing the breathing for him.

At this point in time my dad is in critical condition and not showing much improvement if any. My dad is hurting and my heart is hurting for him. We want him to get better.. we need him to get better.. but we also realize that he may not get better. I wish I could say the odds are in his favor but they’re just not and everything about this has been so terrifying and painful. We’re all confused and not sure how to carry on at this point. Our hearts are broken and having to leave my dad like that and my mom and younger siblings may just be the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I feel so lost right now.