Not A Creature Was Stirring

I find myself, strangely, home alone tonight. Completely alone. With the possible exception of the dog, 3 goldfish and an elf who has taken up temporary residence here until Santa takes him back on Christmas Eve. Which is tomorrow. Wow, it's already Christmas and I can't say that I'm sad to see 2008 go away. This year has been filled with a lot of trials and tribulations for my family. Here's a synopsis of life for us this year:

You might remember that as January began we were dealing with Pal having MRSA. That was one of the most disgusting things I've ever dealt with (see posts from last February, there are pictures...). The last flare-up he had was in July, and I am hoping that we are MRSA free, forever.
February brought many changes to my immediate family. My Father, after several close calls with my Mom wandering out of the house, and at all hours of the night, finally made the decision to move my Mom into an Assisted Living Facility. Our original plan was to move both of them into this one place we had already picked out, but my Dad decided that he wanted to stay at their house and just move my Mom. It was one of the hardest things we, as a family, and I, as an individual, have EVER had to do. Of course, all of us had assumed that once the "burden" of my Mom was off of my Dad's shoulders, he would regain his former life and continue on in freedom. However, this was NOT the case at all. My Dad became almost reclusive, drinking to drown the sorrow over the loss of the life he once shared with my Mom. It was something none of us saw coming, and we began the process of talking about selling the house and moving him elsewhere. He has always wanted to go to this one retirement community which is an excellent place for active seniors, but my Mom never wanted to go. I am thankful that I can say that we have SOLD his house and he will be going to that retirement community in January!

March brought on another problem my Hubby and I were dealing with, and that was Pal. His inability to pay attention or control his impulses had reached a boiling point at school, and he was ending up in trouble with the Principal, a LOT. Our suspicions had been suspicions long enough, and with the encouragement of Pal's teacher and lots of "discussions" between Hubby and I, we decided to have him evaluated by a team of professionals. Of course, we were not surprised in the least to have them tell us that he was "classic case" ADHD. He is not hyperactive, and there are other signs and symptoms of ADHD that he does NOT display, but the impulse control (or lack thereof) and inability to pay attention were the symptoms he displayed greatly. I felt so scared, but reassured that we were not crazy, and Pal's problems were not due to bad parenting or lack of discipline. Funny, how your own words can come back to bite you -- I had said many, many times previous to having my own child that I thought ADHD was a copout for those parents who didn't discipline their kids!!! Open mouth, insert foot. Thankfully, since he was diagnosed and put on a very low dose of medicine, his behavior at school and his grades are definitely MUCH better! He even commented to me yesterday that "he is so glad that the medicine helps him to act better because he hasn't been to the Principal's office once this whole year!". Thank God for small favors!!!

In April my father-in-law had a knee replacement surgery and everything went really well. That was until they looked at some blood-test results and his Ph levels were sky high. He ended up needing a transfusion in the hospital, and they sent him for a bone-marrow test. It turns out that he has leukemia. CML to be exact - Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia. It is highly treatable and is not fatal, but it does explain the chronic fatigue he suffers from, as well as some other minor complications. He has been taking an oral chemo drug for 6 months and his Ph levels have evened out. He still has bad days but overall is feeling well.

May was fairly uneventful, with the exception of Pal's allergies. This poor kid looked like someone punched him repeatedly in the eyes! They were so swollen, and we were back and forth to the Pedi several times before they found a medication that worked. Another major event in our life was that Hubby went back to being self-employed. This was what he has wanted for a long time and now that I carry our health insurance it was the perfect time.

June brought dental problems for me, a nasty fall for a close friend of mine in which she was hospitalized and in rehab for almost a month. She ended up with the same injury as Christopher Reeve, except she didn't sever her spinal chord. Then the Assisted Living Facility (ALF) where my Mom was called us and said she needed to go to the hospital Psych ward and be evaluated because they "just can't handle her". Basically what was happening was she needed to use the bathroom (urgently most times) and because of her Alzheimer's she couldn't find the bathroom and would end up having an accident on the floor. And it was usually in someone else's room, or in the director's office. It was obviously embarrassing for my Mom, who was always an extremely proud and independent person, and she began refusing their help. She wouldn't allow them to help her clean herself, and she wouldn't allow them to put a "Depends" on her either. In my opinion, and hindsight, this was mainly because they just didn't WANT to deal with her. She was evaluated and in the Psych ward for 2 weeks, where they had her on a toilet schedule and she was allowing them to help her with her hygiene. As soon as she went back to the ALF, the same behavior started (and they didn't stick to the toilet schedule, either!).

In July, we got another phone call that my Mom had fallen and they sent her back to the hospital; our opinion is that she had not fallen, but they were shorthanded and didn't have the staff to deal with her. In all of this, we were adjusting her medications to see if that would help. When she went back to the ALF, the dosages they had her on made her catatonic and very lethargic. Funnily enough we stopped receiving complaint calls from the ALF while she was so doped up.

July also brought about my niece K's surgery, which I posted about a few times. This was an extremely stressful time for my sister, and obviously our whole family. K came through the operation fine, but hit a few bumps on the road to recovery and didn't end up going back to college like she had planned. Her healing has taken much longer than she expected and because she is such a "go-getter" she has had a hard time adjusting to a slower pace. Right now, she is improving every day and is hoping to return to college in January.

August. This was our emotional roller-coaster month. My Mother-in-law was laid off from her job of 10 years and this was especially hard on her, mostly because it bruised her ego a bit. I don't mean to imply that she has an ego, but that getting laid off was a tough pill to swallow for her.

On August 5th, my Dad and I went to my Mom's ALF for her 6-month evaluation. The director sat with us and told us that although my Mom gets agitated, they can handle whatever she throws at them. She reassured us, several times, that my Mom's behavior was 100% normal and typical of someone with Alzheimer's. We left there feeling pretty good about where Mom was. Then the end of the month rolls around and we get a call that they were sending her back to the hospital because they had seen blood in her stool. We knew this already, because it had been discovered previously that she was severely anemic and her doctor felt that she was most likely bleeding internally. Because my Mom would refuse most tests needed to determine where the bleeding was coming from, the doctor put her on iron pills and told us to consider a colonoscopy. My Mom would never, ever, have agreed to a colonoscopy in her RIGHT mind, so we said no.

Well, when the ALF sent her back to the hospital this time, the doctors at the hospital agreed to keep her in the hospital to do the colonoscopy, and that we should find out what was wrong with Mom for our own health history, if nothing else. My sister, C, had a very hard time making this decision but we all reassured her it was the right thing to do. They prepped her for 2 days before and did the colonoscopy on Tuesday. The preliminary results came back the next day: huge, bleeding polyp, most likely malignant. Colon cancer. Wow. I hadn't even given cancer a second thought, but with our recent family issues with colons, I shouldn't be surprised. The doctor told us that my Mom has probably had this for some time, and she could live a long time with it. It was, however, inoperable. She was released back to the ALF and we contemplated what to do about this new diagnosis.
This was now the end of August. The ALF called me to complain that nobody had notified them of my Mom's return and they were not prepared to care for her, so we would have to hire a 24-hour assistant for her. HUH? Isn't that what we are paying YOU for??? Someone even mentioned to my sister that we should probably start looking for another "place" for my Mom, because they were just unable to care for her there. This threw us into a tizzy, because most places have waiting lists. My sister and I went to a few different ALF's but didn't find one that seemed capable of handling my Mom. We finally found a Nursing Home (NH) that had a bed available, and my sister's sister-in-law was also a nurse at this NH. They took her with no questions asked, and we could not have been more grateful to get my Mom out of that godforsaken ALF.

September has arrived at this point, and Mom settled in nicely at the new NH. School has begun, I am back to work, and things are actually calm for once.

October, though, brought us to the death of a close family friend. You can read my full post dedication to Mrs. D. in August of this year.
Another friend formerly of our campground also passed away, 7 weeks to the day of being diagnosed with cancer.
Toward the end of the month, Hubby's Nana, who turned 90 in September, took a turn for the worse. We had a family trip to Disney planned and were obviously worried about Nana. All we could do was pray that the two didn't interfere. I know it's not nice to think about someone's death affecting your vacation, but let's be serious and think of all the money that would be lost - there were 13 of us going on this trip.

Sadly, Nana passed away on November 1. We buried her 2 days before our big trip. (Thanks, Nana!!) The Disney trip was definitely the highlight of our year. Of course, there are always highlights to go with the lowlights in life, but unfortunately it seems like we can only remember the low.

As we enter into this Christmas season, I know it will be difficult not having my Mom by our side during our annual traditions. But I rest easy knowing she is safe, cared for, and comfortable where she is. I visited her today and will say a prayer for her on Christmas. I will miss her deeply, too.

I can only hope that happier times are ahead for my family. The end of December 2008will bring about a lot of change for my Dad as he prepares to move out of the house he's lived in for 46 years. My prayer, and I hope you all will join me in praying for this: 2009 will begin a fresh start to those who need it, and a new outlook on life for my Dad.

I'm sorry for the Bah-Humbug post! I really do wish all of you a Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, and Happy New Year.

-G

School Vacation - time to be sick, right?

***Disclaimer - do not look at last pic if you have a weak stomach!!!***

So it's the final vacation until Summer gets here, and Pal and I could not be any happier! The weather today was great...except that I was on the couch all day with a cold. I managed to escape all of the Winter sicknesses that went around, and of course because I am also on vacation from work - it's time to be sick! This can just be added to the saga of the last 2 school vacations....let me explain:

Christmas vacation - the Dean of our division at work gave us the day before and the day after Christmas off and I was pumped. This meant hubby only had to take 2 vaca days to stay home with Pal. See, I cannot take vacation during December and January since it is our prime college application processing season. (I hate those High School Seniors who wait until midnight on December 31st to hit the "submit" button on their applications...aren't they supposed to out getting sh*tfaced???? It's New Year's Eve - That's what I was doing at their age!!!) I digress...

Pal wakes up on the day after Christmas and says "Mama, I have an itchy spot on my hip and my leg..." We had seen some weird skin "pimples" appear on some unmentionable areas of his backside a few weeks earlier, but they went away with some Desitin. Now these little pimples on his hip and leg looked more like a horrible spider bite. So off to the Pedi, not our usual Doc but he had to be seen. Fill in Doc tries to scrape the "bite" but gets nothing, so he prescribes an antibiotic to kill whatever skin infection this is. Finishes antibiotic and skin gets better. Here's what it looked like at this point:






4 weeks goes by, and it is my birthday weekend and we decide to go to a nice hotel for the weekend where Pal can swim and we can relax. When you have an only child, who loves to swim, this is key to being able to relax. So, Friday night and Saturday morning are blissful as Pal and Dad lazily swim while Mama gets to read by the pool. A book - I read a book - and only had to look up every 30 seconds or so for the requisite "Mama, LOOK". Pal gets out of pool for lunch and is immediately itchy from head to toe. We shower him off and go get some lunch...or try to, seeing as Pal is now exhausted from swimming, itchy all over, and falls asleep in the bench at lunch place! He's 8, so naps are looooong gone. He wakes up miserable, and we head back to the hotel for some R & R. I decide to cover his body in Desitin to stop the itching, and see the blooming "pimple" on his leg - same as before. BACK to the Pedi - this time OUR Pedi. He says it doesn't look like a chlorine/bromine reaction (our initial thought seeing as he swam for hours in a strange pool). Nor does it look like a spider bite to him. Of course in the meantime I've scoured the internet for pictures of spider bites and skin infections (DON"T ever Google images of Spider bites unless you want to BARF!) and am convinced he has some rare disease by now because I can't find anything similar, and the Pedi seems stumped. More antibiotics, and we're through with this skin "thing" again.

Another 4 weeks goes by and it is now February vacation, and Pal says on Tuesday "Mama, I've got another one of those itchy things on my leg!" ARGHHHH!!! What the heck is going on?????
This time I am not going back to the Pedi, so I call and tell the Nurse that we need to see a dermatologist (they wanted us to come back in to see the Pedi - NOPE!). She gives me a couple of numbers for referrals, and of course I have no luck. One place told me 6 months waiting list!!!
So I call Pedi Nurse back and tell HER that SHE is going to get MY SON an appointment with a DERMATOLOGIST TODAY. She says, "Oh, okay, let me see what I can do". She calls back in 20 minutes and says "Is tomorrow at 11:00 acceptable? That's the best they could do for us." Okay, now we're getting somewhere. So, Pal and I go off and visit with my best friend and her kids, and another friend we hadn't seen in a long time stopped by for a visit with her 2 boys.

Wednesday dawns and we head to the Dermatologist. They take one look - ONE look, and say "Oh, we have to do a nasal swab test to see if this is a certain kind of bacteria that can live in your nose and cause skin eruptions like this." WOW - someone actually KNOWS what this could be? No way. It's only been 2 and half MONTHS! They tell me to call on Friday for the results and if his leg gets any worse he needs to be seen again by them. So, because I still have NO idea what this is, I head up to my sister's house - 100 miles from home. Stupid idiot. Of course, Pal has no idea that my brother-in-law got him a snowboarding lesson at the ski mountain he works at for Friday morning. Thank God I didn't tell Pal that! Because in true fashion, he wakes up Thursday and his leg looks like this:



YUCK!!!! I can barely look at this. It is SO nasty. But, the realist in me says "Well, the new antibiotics haven't had a chance to work yet, so let's see how this afternoon goes." DUH. Idiot, again. We go out for dinner with my sister, and Pal tells me (while I'm eating) "Mama, something warm is running down my leg". Off to the bathroom and it is not only pussing but bleeding too. BLECH!!!! YUCK!!!! I cannot handle this. We call Dermatologist and they tell me to bring him in first thing in the morning. Well, since we are 100 miles from home, and there is a HUGE snowstorm forecasted for Friday afternoon, I head back first thing Friday morning and bring him to the Dermatologist. They take one look - ONE. Look at results of nasal swab, and turns to me and says "You're going to the hospital. It's MRSA."

HUH????????????? What the &^%$ is MRSA (pronounced MERSA)????

Well, it turns out that MRSA stands for Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus. It is THE worst type of staph infection to get, because it is resistant to MOST common antibiotics. Contagious only if someone touches the puss/ooze/blood. Thank goodness, considering all the visiting we'd been doing!!!! My first question, after the contagious one, was WHERE THE FRIG DOES SOMEONE GET MRSA FROM???? Apparently, there is a new type of MRSA called CA-MRSA, or Community-Associated MRSA. He could have gotten it at school, at the hotel pool, anywhere that kids tend to expel bodily fluids......YUCK. I am so totally grossed out at this point, because this "super bug" as they call it, has been living in my sons body for 2+ months!!! Why the heck didn't the Pedi's know what it was? The number 1 mistaken diagnosis of MRSA is a SPIDER BITE!!!! ARGHHHH!!!! I told BOTH Pedi's we thought it could be spider bites. SO aggravating. So off the the ER where we were treated like lepers (which turned out not to be so bad, we never sat in the waiting room, but ushered right into the pediatric ER and sat through 7 hours of IV antibiotics and Benadryl and hours of Spongebob. Shoot me. The snowstorm raged all around us and we finally left at 9 p.m. to drive home in un-plowed snow. It was pretty, but treacherous and just what I did NOT need at the end of a loooonnnnng day.

So, you can see why I am not surprised that this cold presented itself yesterday morning...because WHY would we have a school vacation without some drama????
I guess I should just be happy that Pal just tested negative for MRSA!!!

Happy vacation....good health to you and yours!

G