At 12:30am Tuesday morning my sister called and said that my Daddy had been taken to Memorial Herman in the Woodlands by ambulance. We had just gotten the middle of the night phone call that no one wants. Josh called his brother to come stay with the boys and we drove to the Woodlands. When we arrived Daddy was having a lot of head pain and not making complete sense. He was taken for a CT scan and it was discovered that he had bleeding on the brain. Immediately Life flight was called to take him to Memorial Herman in the Medical center. They have a neuro something ICU and it is the best place for him to be treated. The staff in the Woodlands was great. If you have to go to the ER in the Woodlands go to Memorial Herman.
Let me back track for a little bit. Just before midnight Monday evening my Daddy developed a very bad headache on the top of his head and down the neck. He went to bed, he had been up on the computer doing lesson plans for school (he is a middle school science teacher), but the pain was extreme and then he began to vomit a lot! My Mom called 911 and within 10 mins. they were there loading him up.
OK back to earlier Tuesday morning. We then caravaned down to the medical center. My sister and husband were in their car, Josh was in his truck and I drove my mom in her van. We had been told in the Woodlands where a parking garage was and how to get to the Jones building were Daddy would be. We learned a lesson in the wee hours of Tuesday morning always go straight to the ER if it is after 9pm and before 6am. We walked around the Jones building for what seemed like forever. It was erri how we saw no one. I did finally find a nurses station and talked with one lady who was nice, but not helpful. I then found a phone and talked to an operator who told us to go to the ER. A wonderful nice helpful lady in the ER got us where we needed to be. This all was about 4:30am. Other family members began to arrive around 5am. My mom, sister and I talked to many doctors, nurse, PA and such Tuesday morning. Then a very young lady, not sure what she is, told us she would be drilling a hole in Daddy's head to insert a tube (there is some technical term) into his brain to release the CSF and blood from his brain. This was done around 7am at his bedside in the ICU no OR needed. At that point I last complete track of time. So, sometime later we were able to see Daddy and he looked so much better. He had color in his face and his blood pressure was lower not great, but lower. He was medicated so we were unable to talk with him. He just grunted some and he did tell the nurse it was 1944, but he did know his name. Then the long wait began. Dr. Ashely (I think) would be doing a cerebral angiogram to look at Daddy's arteries and hopefully discover the reason for the brain bleed. Daddy was third in line for the day. So, we all waited. We talked, we walked around the hospital, we meet some other families, we complained about the large family who brought all the kids from infants to teenagers who were loud and out of control. We had lunch in the cafe downstairs at some point--great salad bar. Around 3:30pm Momma and Daddy's pastor arrived and said so Brett is having his test done now. We immediately said o good, wait how do you know. Being clergy he was able to go back to the ICU and was told what was going on, which we were so thankful for since no one had told us. There was differently a lack of communication all afternoon and evening. The pastor was told that Daddy should be done in about an hour in a half. After many more hours of waiting and more visitors coming and going we finally talked with Dr. Ashely around 10pm Tuesday night. The angiogram had taken about six hours because Daddy's arteries and veins are a mess. All of his arteries are weak and have atherosclerosis (hardening of arties). This is cause by genetics, age and a fatty diet. Daddy's arteries that go up the sides of his neck to his brain were clear. In the back of the neck one was completely blocked and no blood was going through. The other one was very weak and the doctor put in a stint. Once the stint was in he continued to looking at the arteries from that point going into the brain and found a very very large aneurysm that had bleed. A coil was then place into the aneurysm to stop and prevent more bleeding.
We now wait and see how Daddy does. He has the tube down his throat for breathing. Hopefully that will come out today. When I called the nurse around 8:30am this morning she said he had a good night, which means he is stable and nothing worst happened, and he was answering yes and no questions and if he continued to do well the doctor would ok the tube to come out today. Once the tube is removed and he is taken out some of the meds we will know how much brain damage was done by the bleed. He could have lose of motor skills, speech, difficulty understanding, all kinds of scary things. Because of family history, age and other risk factors Daddy is at high risk for a stroke, another bleed, brain damage and what I will choose not to think about.
Please pray for Daddy, the doctors and nurses, Mom and the our whole family. Thus far the boys have not asked to many questions. They know Granddad is sick and mommy was with him all day yesterday. I don't want to tell them to much now because Jackson is having his tonsils removed at TC on Friday. After Jackson has recovered we will have to get special permission for the the boys to see Granddad in the ICU and at that point I will explain more to the boys. This maybe weird, but what is most upsetting to me is that the boys could possible not see Granddad for three weeks and if there is brain damage they may not be able to to do all the fun things they love to do with Grandad like planting bean stalks so they can climb them once they grow really big.
I will keep everyone updated as I know more info. What we need the most right now is prayer.
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