My mom had surgery on Friday December 12, 2008 to have rods put into her back to help her with her chronic pain. It was an outpatient procedure and all seemed to go well. Until Saturday when she began behaving strangely. Doing things like counting to 50 and then backwards. Dick, my stepfather, called the doctor who said it was probably the after effects of the anesthesia and to wait a day and see how she is.
On Sunday things were worse so Dick took her to the hospital where they did a scan and found that one of the rods was up too high and had ruptured the membrane in her head causing a brain hemorrhage.
This touches me very deeply because my father died from a brain hemorrhage 15 years ago on December 3rd!
They rushed her in for surgery to drain the fluid off her brain and she was in a coma. As the evening went on I tried to figure out what to do. I went online to see about getting a plane ticket. There are 2 airports in the area they live in Texas and there are only 2 airlines that fly into the area. Continental Airlines had tickets available for $968 each! (We needed 2 because Sammie was going too). Southwest Airlines flies into Harligen, TX but not from Buffalo, NY. They do fly from Ohio so I thought we could drive to OH then fly to TX. Great! But then I realized we couldn't get a flight back out of Texas to OH!
I went to Amtrak but that would be $800 per person. It's 11 days before Christmas there was no way we could do this.
After talking it over with Sammie we decided we would drive. According to Mapquest it is 1900 miles and will take 30 hours. Crazy me talking to a crazier Sammie thought "oh we can do that in 2 days!"
Then we thought we should do the "right thing" and call Gram Z (My mom's mom) and see if she wanted to go be with her daughter in her time of need. She decided after some prodding she would also go.
OK we can do this. We set off at 7am on Monday. First stop Gram Z's house. She cannot leave until 8 after she gets Norbert on the bus. When we get there his aid is there to put him on the bus and Ray stayed home from work to put him on the bus. That is 3 adults to put 1 man on the bus. Then Gram says we can't leave until 9 so she can go to the bank. We tell her she doesn't need to and we can stop at a bank on the way. This causes an argument that lasts until 8:45. At that point we should just wait and go to the bank but I am frustrated and want to get on our way. This was not a good way to start this trip.
So off we go. The first day weather was fine but we stopped for bathroom breaks and gas and didn't make very good time. I went to bed that night thinking there is no way we are getting there in 2 days.
Tuesday we woke up at 4am and got on the road early only to be met with an ice storm in Tennessee which carried through most of Arkansas.
Arkansas is officially the "death trap" state as far and Sam & I are concerned. I have never in my life seen so many accidents. They were everywhere thought the entire state. We watched some happen right if front of us. We were brought to a complete stop 4 times which turned into a slow crawl while they cleaned the highway in front of us up. Even after it warmed up enough that the roads were not ice people were still crashing their cars. I really am not sure the weather had anything to do with it; they may just be crazy drivers! We couldn't get out of Arkansas fast enough.
As if the crazyness wasn't enough... I recieved a phone call around Noon from my friend Dorene. She says I have an strange question to ask you. "what is the name of Alden's Litte Loop cheer coordinator? I said her name and Dorene just said OH MY GOD! Her husband killer her last night!! WHAT? that can't be right. I made some calls & after some research it was verified that her husband had actually shot her and then shot himself. How right before christmas and with two children at home; ages 11 & 13, who now have no parents. Lisa was a great person; she was always smiling and friendly and the first one to do anything for any of us. She only became a cheer coordiantor earlier this year but we had become friends and the whole thing was so sad. I just cannot stop thinking about it. I am sure Sam & Gram are tired of hearing me say "I can't beleive it and why would he do this" but it's all I can say. It is just awful!
We made it to Texas on Tuesday and a few hours in; my parents live in Brownsville; which is right in the bottom tip of Texas; right on the Mexican border. Our drive through TX was a good 9 hours.
It got to be 10pm and I was becoming very emotional and was questioning everything. I felt bad that my mom was still in a coma & I wasn't' there, I felt guilty for leaving my kids without being ready for Christmas and the drive was really taking it's toll on me.
I just couldn't go any further and we needed to get a hotel.
We finally made it to the hospital around Noon Wednesday, but I was not ready for what I would see.
My mom is one of the strongest women I know and she looks so weak and fragile. There are machines everywhere and it makes me so sad.
All we can do is pray and hope for this to be over soon.
