WebKittyn Warbles
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
What Happened with My Dad
I need to get this out while I've got the mental strength to do it, let's see if i make it through it.
It was actually a pretty good week. I sat out there with him all day watching the inauguration and he seemed alright. Tired but alright. He had problems getting back into the bedroom at night but he made it. Wednesday and Thursday were pretty good days as well, he laughed at me when I ran out to feed the rooster, he bitched about the lunch my mother left for him and we talked about the Koontz books he was reading.
Thursday night he had a rough night. A lot of coughing and he couldn't sleep so my mother crawled into the bed with him and I think they talked most of the night, I could hear soft voices.
Friday he seemed really tired when I went out there but we laughed about the rooster and I gave him his lunch which he hardly ate any of. He fell asleep in his chair pretty early, I chalked it up to his being up the night before so I let him sleep and came in here.
I poked my head in there to see him about 7-ish when he was in the den with my mother and he gave me a pretty big 'hello, kiddo' (he's been calling me kiddo forever) and he seemed alright.
Close to midnight I heard them walking into the bedroom, he had to stop halfway there with the walker to catch his breath and my mother had to help him lift his other leg into bed but none of that was unusual. I was sitting in here waiting for her to get him settled into bed so I could go say the nightly goodnight and I love you and hear my 'goodnight, kiddo.'
Instead I got my mother looking all panicked saying something was wrong and she was calling 911.
I jumped up and ran in there, his lips were turning blue but he was breathing. It was shallow and unsteady but he was breathing. He looked like a stranger and about five minutes before the ambulance came I was on the phone with the 911 operator and looking out the window and my mother yelled out 'he's not breathing!' I think in my heart right then I knew.
The ambulance got there fast, they were here within 12 minutes and there were three of them. They went right to work and they were in there trying but it was taking too long. One of them came out and looked at my mother and said "I'm sorry" and she broke down.
By then there was a nurse at the house, she's one of the EMTs and a friend of my mother who recognised the address and a third police officer who is also a friend who recognised my mother. There was a house full of strangers and my father lying there in the bedroom.
His lips were blue, his feet at swelled, he looked like anyone but my father.
This was somewhere between 12 and 12:30, I think I ICQ'd Darkstar around 12:30 to tell him.
The funeral home owner showed up next, he's also a customer/friend of my mother's and he had taken care of all the arrangements back when he first got sick so he was a comfort to her.
It took the M.E. close to two hours to get to the house, I don't know what the delay was but it was beyond horrid. The three police officers and the man from the funeral home stayed and they tried to talk to use, to keep us from going into the bedroom where my dad was.
Finally the M.E. showed up and said that with all his problems, his heart just gave out. His pacemaker was (and still is) still beating but his heart was not.
I took a few minutes to say goodbye and hug him one last time and then they made us go into another room while they took him out.
The suddenness, the unexpectedness, the out of nowhereness is too much for me to try and begin to deal with right now.
The loss is too much for me to try and deal with right now.
Accepting it? Fuck that. Not even close.
I have a lot more but I can't do it right now. My friends, the people I care about and the people who knew and had good times with my dad in the past all have a right know what happened so there it is. Probably the only reason I can write this is because the doctor was worried about my blood pressure spiking and my 20% kidney function becoming 10% so he gave me Klonopin. I've never tried them before but I took one tonight, I needed one tonight. That damn military flag is torture.
Fuck I miss my dad.
<-- Steal me!
