This last spring our family had a frightening experience. The month leading up to this family crisis, my mother had gotten kidney stones; she was prescribed a medication to help with the pain. Within two weeks from recovering from that my mother went in to the hospital with a serious case of pneumonia. The doctors gave her some medication and sent her home. What we later learned was that she had an Oxygen percentage of about 70%. According to other doctors I’ve spoken to, it is the policy of that hospital to admit anyone under 88% because a healthy woman her age should have had at least 95%. To have a percentage under 70 is considered life threatening.
The next day, I had come home from high school and found the house empty and eerily quiet, not paying much attention to it I got dressed for work. As I was driving to work I got a phone call from my sister. She told me my mother was in the hospital there in Sparta and she was going to be sent by ambulance to Gunderson Lutheran in La Crosse. I remember hanging up and taking a sharp left turn towards the Sparta Clinic which was just a few blocks away. I got there within minutes and I entered the Emergency entrance and saw my sister in the lobby. She led me to the hallway to the Ambulance and I saw my mom hooked up to an oxygen tank as she was being put on a gurney. I had learned that my sister in law went home and saw that my mother could barely move and her lips were blue. She convinced my mother to go to the hospital and by the time she got there my mom could barely walk.
My mother assured me that she would be alright and that they’re just transporting her to a better equipped hospital, though in reality I had already learned that the doctors were not sure she would survive the ride there. I tried calling my friend so he could take my shift for me but I was not able to get a hold of him. I called in to work telling them I was not coming but they asked me to come in because they didn’t have someone to take the shift for me. My mother at the time worked at the same place I did and I remember her saying “It’s alright I understand that they don’t have anyone to replace him”. Being upset I went into work without thinking about it, which I regret doing. If I encounter another situation where I have to work and a family member is in that condition I’ll call into work and tell them it’s not my problem if they have a replacement or not.
So I spent about three hours at work, I was nervous, frustrated and upset. Two hours into it I had learned that the General Manager of the restaurant I worked at was visiting my mom because she was in La Crosse. That made me furious that she was there when I should have been, and within a few minutes I decided to leave and go see my mother. The thought that she might die while I’m nowhere near was what upset me the most. Just before I was about to walk out I got another call from the GM and she told me that my brother was coming to pick me up and take me to the ICU to see my mom.
When we got to Gunderson Lutheran in La Crosse, the first thing I did was enter the ICU waiting room where my whole family was, because only two people could visit my mom at the time. My four siblings and their families were there, as well as many of my aunts and uncles. My family has always been very close and it was very comforting to have them there and learn about my mother’s condition. The first chance to visit her was about twenty minutes after I got there. I went down the hall to her room and found my dad speaking to her while she was lying in a hospital bed. I had never seen her that weak before, she was hooked up to oxygen and other machines to monitor her health, but she was awake and completely coherent.
It was a relief to speak to her and see she was alright at the moment, although her condition was still very high risk. We didn’t have a specifically special conversation, I remember asking about what the doctors said and telling her I loved her. It was simply seeing her, making sure she was all right and letting her know I cared that mattered to me at that point. I had to leave because the nurses were going to medicate her and run a few tests. I returned to the waiting room in better spirits and spent most of the night with my family. There were many discussions, some about random things, others about my mother’s condition. We were all worried that the doctors said that the test results for my mother wouldn’t be ran till tomorrow morning and we’d get them later that night. One nurse told us my mother had Adult Respiratory distress. When we looked it up on the internet it said most that got that died a few days later. When we talked to a doctor he apologized and said the nurse must have mixed up what disorder she thought it was. He explained that that was merely what she thought it was and they wouldn’t know till the test results came in. At about 11pm I went back home with my brother.
Two days later my mother came home, soon after they took a sleep study and we had learned that she had a case of severe sleep apnea and the reason her lungs got so weak was that she wasn’t breathing in her sleep. The medication she was prescribed for her kidney stones relaxed her throat, but it was not supposed to be used by someone with sleep apnea, which we didn’t know she had. When she vomited from the kidney stones fluid was getting in her lungs which coupled with the fact that her breathing was restricted when she slept was very dangerous and high risk. Since then she has had to sleep with an oxygen machine next to her bed, she had this for a month or two. She got rid of that oxygen machine after her lungs healed and switched to a pressurized mask she has to wear in her sleep that forces her to breathe. She has to wear that indefinitely, but she is currently hoping to find an alternative that isn’t so uncomfortable. Her health is much better and she hasn’t been hospitalized since then. We were able to almost immediately get the hospital to pay for much of the medical costs. She was sent home with a low oxygen percentage in her lungs when she should have had tests run. If that had not happened she may not have needed to go to the ICU.
As I said she is doing much better since this last spring, but unfortunately this last week I got a text message from her saying she had been diagnosed with Pneumonia again. The doctors gave her medication and are running tests. She should be fine when she gets better but I worry if she could have chronic lung issues and if it could be a problem when she gets older.
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