My Dad Had A Stroke

I'm going to update this one over time.

I took the Friday before Memorial Day weekend off, and visited some friends and family. It was a rather rushed weekend, despite it being four-days long, because I was juggling a few places.

I visited my friend Rudy who was in Illinois from Colorado. We had dinner in Plainfield. That's about 100 miles north of where I live. It was really good to visit him, as we hadn't seen one another since November.

I was originally planning to visit family Saturday morning, so that I could see my nephew play on his baseball team, but I woke up with a migraine and chose not to drive. It would have been quite a long amount of driving to see a sports match I don't really care about, but the presence of one's niblings really imbues value in such things.

Sunday I went to church and visited an older gentleman as part of my Befriender ministry. It was my first meeting, and I was reluctant to reschedule. As soon as my meeting was over, I headed down to see my family at the home of my aunt and uncle. My family regularly has big potlucks at holidays, but couldn't on Memorial Day due to my dad's older sister having a knee replacement surgery on Memorial Day itself. Surgery went tremendously well for her.

So I didn't make it down to see family until around 7:30 pm Sunday. I had a nice visit with my parents, saw each grandmother, and headed home Monday evening after dinner. I was pretty tired, but I had survived the long weekend.

Tuesday afternoon, I got a call from my sister around 1:30 pm. My dad had suffered a stroke.

What? How? I just saw him the previous day and he seemed fine.

Those first few minutes of denial and disbelief set in and then I realized I needed to see family again.

It's probably a good idea before driving several hundred miles to see someone in the hospital to pack an overnight bag, but I wasn't really thinking too much about my needs.

I hit the road and began praying and thinking about what was going on. Would my dad make it? Would he be able to walk? Would he need to live in a home? Does he have a living will? If he doesn't, am I ready for that conversation? How are my mom and sister doing?

The mind races. (So does one's car in a time of need.)

After about 90 minutes on the road, I get a call from my sister, they're taking dad to Evansville by ambulance. They would have flown a helicopter, but due to the weather, there was uncertainty as to if a landing would be safe.

Evansville is another 100 miles from my original destination. I am not prepared for this moment.

Around 6:30 pm I finally arrive at the hospital and find my mom, sister, and father in the ICU. As I arrive, a doctor is telling my mom to expect the absolute worst: expect no voice, expect a feeding tube, expect a paralyzed husband on a ventilator. Expect to decide if he wanted to continue if that's what living looked like.

Life feels sluggish and in slow motion. I can't make sense of anything.

My sister is a capable lady. She responds to Dr. Bedside Manner's prognosis with an attitude of "we'll show you." My mom's response is denial and disbelief: she repeats over and over, "I can't believe this is happening."

The look on my dad's face when he is awake is one of terror.

Dad sleeps a lot, my mom holds his hand. I start mentally writing a eulogy. The opening line is going to be, "I have larger feet than Charlie Peters, but I can never fill his shoes." Then I would continue on talking about the things I admire in my dad, and how it was a lot to live up to. Then I'd pivot into a brief encouragement that reassured (me mainly) that I wasn't meant to fill Dad's shoes, he'd want me to wear my own.

My oldest niece and her fiance arrive at the hospital. They live in the area, and they drive my sister and I out to get some food. Before we go we buy mom some dinner. I am not sure she ate much of it, but keeping her fed is high on my priorities this week.

I book a hotel for a night while we eat. My sister will stay at her daughter's apartment. The offer was open to me too, but I needed to decompress on my own.

Just the week prior I found myself thinking two thoughts: "I really haven't cried in a while" and "I sure would love to spend some quality time with my niblings." Both would be on my docket this week.

After buying supplies at Target and checking into my hotel, I start to decompress. I have been telling myself it's going to be okay, because there are no other options. Acceptance is the goal of whatever may come. I'm asking God for help in accepting this; help me offer support to my mom and family; help me know what to do next; help me have the hard conversation if it comes to it.

I sleep fitfully. Wake up a few times overwhelmed with emotion.

The next day, I go back to the hospital. Dad is doing better than before, but he's not very lucid. My mom didn't sleep. The next three to five days will be critical for any hopes of recovery. Today I try to be supportive of my mom and do what I can to look after her and my sister. We talk with a different neurologist, who gives us a lot more hopeful picture. He describes the stroke to us, a clot in his carotid artery cut off blood supply to the left-brain, which governs things like speech and movement on the right side. The doctor tells us dad's brain may continue to swell, but the skull is too rigid and there's no place for the swelling to go. Our best hope is that the body can process the fluids, and they can use medication to help, but only so much at a time.

Wednesday and Thursday sort of blur together for me. My grandma came to visit with my dad's older brother. They were overwhelmed and weren't able to stay for very long. Three of her four kids were all in the hospital in the same week. My grandma is a strong lady, and it broke my heart to see her so sad.

Other family came by, mostly on my mom's side. My mom's side of the family has too much experience with brain injuries thanks to various cancers. I try and keep the conversation away from subjects that I think are too hard to talk about right now. It's good to have family support though.

Dad is starting to improve. He keeps crossing his legs, and moving his left arm. I try and tap on his right side after therapists said that can help sometimes to restore the associations in the brain to motor control. I rub dad's feet some too. There's a chance he can recover from this, but it's not a big one.

Thursday I sat with Dad as the Speech Therapist visited. She evaluated his ability to swallow, and prescribed a diet of thickened, pureed foods. Dad was quite hungry, as he's not eaten since Tuesday.

We meet with represenatives from the Rehabilitation Hospital and learn about what rehab can do. We can take a tour if we want and they give us a book about strokes. It's hard to concentrate on a book but I do read some, quickly learning to skip the first two parts of the book to the chapters on recovery. It's encouraging to read about the processes and some stories of men and women of various ages who have had different experiences with stroke. I think it was Friday when we took the tour.