Fait psperer q n’eft a croire vain
(making successful that which would have been in vain)

As anyone who ever reads this thing is probably aware, I generally avoid posting personal words here. But a lot has happened lately to put me out of range, and it's just too much to go over with all of those who want to or should know. And so, this post is going to be an aberration. A little personal. Because I much prefer something editorial to a mass email.

But details and personal content will be much limited nonetheless, and the story quite abridged.

A few weeks ago, on a Saturday in the middle of September, my father was hospitalized with a terrible case of pneumonia. His system was septic from legionella bacteria that he contracted from an event he attended in Pennsylvania during the previous weekend, and he was transferred into the ICU within a few short hours of entry. Once at the hospital, he continued to get worse. Some of his systems began failing. Upon approaching his first hospital doctor that first night (the awesome Dr. Mendellson) with a bit of optimism about his ability to recover, she looked me in the eye and told me he was "sick as shit". My heart sank into my stomach and the room may have spun a bit, but I completely respected her directness. I'm used to talking to doctors, and this was a rarity.

Later that night, my father's respiratory system was failing. The medical staff had to intubate him and while doing so his heart stopped temporarily. After they got it beating again, he was completely unconscious.

The doctors began to tell us that there was a good chance that he wouldn't survive, and in the case that he did become conscious again, he would probably have sustained a lot of brain damage. While trying to remain hopeful, my mother, sister and I also tried to prepare ourselves for either a funeral, or a situation with similarities to the recently public Terry Shiavo case. It was grim.

Striving to be encouraging and optimistic, we spent almost all of our time in the hospital. Despite our fathers unconscious state, my sister read the New York Times to him. I held his hand, talked about anything, and did my best to remain funny and light-hearted. He was hooked up to more machines than I have ever seen anyone hooked up to in my life, and I've seen a lot of this shit. I got very attached to the stuffed animal crawfish (my pal, Mudbug) which I had originally brought for my father's amusement.

After 7 days, he began to become conscious, but was still very ill. For days after that, although semi-conscious, it was impossible to tell almost anything about his level of function. All we knew then was that we were not dealing with a situation where he was just going to die. He would either make a reasonable recovery, or we would have to pursue his demise. During that time, one of the hardest things for me was trying to be optimistic while also realistic, since the reality was potentially so bad. Like having a sensible and healthy variety of schizophrenia.

It's been a week and a half now since my father started becoming conscious again, and his recovery is going remarkably well. He is still currently in the ICU and is still too weak to talk or move much, but he is completely mentally present and is expected to make a good recovery, if not complete. The doctors are completely shocked and elated. Of course we're all thrilled. There is a long road of rehabilitation ahead, but compared to before, things are great.

One thing that has been troublesome lately is the combination of my father's consciousness with his inability to communicate or do almost anything at all (can't talk, write, move, read, use the TV remote control...) during this time period. For him I'm sure it's been a living hell. For me it's been terrible to witness someone I care about in such a state. But knowing that those abilities will return kinda soon makes it tolerable. My advice to everyone is: try not to take your physical independence and ability to communicate for granted. Really.

Another troublesome aspect of situations like this is having to deal with the way things work in this here society of ours. "The System", I mean. Having to deal with doctors and insurance companies during such a consuming situation (and in this case lawyers, banks, government health departments, and the social security administration too) is just a mega-bitch.

Things are much steadier now, but not over.

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and a little flavor of normal posts...
Yahoo Health explores the most important of issues: "Bettys" and tongues.

and lately I've gotten a lot into understanding and really studying color, but these people take it to the extreme.

Sunday, October 01, 2006