Being the caregiver of a loved one is a tough job. As I have posted before, it’s a true roller coaster of emotions from tears to anger and every other emotion you can think of or even imagine.
You all may have noticed that I haven’t been writing as many posts as I usually do. Well Wednesday night, Mom had a horrible (scary) spell. It all began with chest pains.
I wasn’t home, but my husband was. I had gone into town to get groceries and was checking out when he called the cell phone to tell me Mom was having chest pains. I told my husband I was checking out and paying and was coming straight home, I told him the usual. Give her a nitro-pill under her tongue, watch her, wait 5 minutes and repeat. That if he had to give her a 2nd one to call an ambulance as he was giving it to her. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the series of events that took place.
I will tell you, that if you choose to read any farther, I will be rather graphic. So please proceed with caution, and fair warning of such.
As I got out of the store, I was probably 1/4 of a mile from the store when the cell phone rang again, my niece screaming in the phone. I really can’t remember exactly what she was saying. I didn’t need to hear or make sense of the words. Her crying frantically … I knew something was wrong. Very, very wrong.
As I was in the checkout line I called my niece and asked her to go straight to my house, she was closer than me since I was at the store, she only lives 6 miles away. I asked her to go to my house and get Mom’s blood pressure and pulse. So she was headed straight here. When she got here, my husband was about to give Mom the 2nd nitro-pill for chest pains, as my niece and future daughter-in-law took her blood pressure, and were looking for a pulse point. It’s always a little tricky to find on Mom. As they were searching, Mom passed out. Her head fell over onto her shoulder, her eyes open and set. Her mouth quickly filled with foam, and she lost her bowels and urine. She was picked up and moved to the floor, my husband wiping her with a wet cloth, my 11 year old daughter saying “Grandma, talk to me.”, my daughter-in-law saying “Barb, breathe, breathe in through your nose, and out through your mouth, breathe Barb.”, My niece had began crying, saying “Grandma, you can’t leave us! Talk me to Grandma!”.
As they were tilting Mom’s head back to begin CPR, she had woke up and told them to just leave her alone, she only wanted to sleep. Whereas then they told her no, you stay with us, keep talking to us ….
Momentarily, yes – she was dead.
I wasn’t here. This is a run down of events from everyone mentioned here. I was praying out loud while driving as quick and safely as I possibly could. Asking God to please give my husband, my niece and Amy the strength, knowledge and guidance they needed to help Mom. I told God I was selfish, I’m not ready to let her go. I asked him repeatedly to please give Mom the strength to pull through this, to be ok. I repeated my prayers several times during my 24 mile trip from the grocery store.
When I arrived, the ambulance was already here, picking Mom up from the floor and putting her onto a gurney. The ambulance is very seldom quick to arrive. It usually takes around 20 minutes for them to get to us. We live in a rather rural area. I didn’t have a chance to think, to sort through what was happening. I knew I had to get her medicine list, make sure they took her to the right hospital. Make sure they understood every detail of what I was trying to absorb.
My husband later told me that he even thought that was it. That Mom was gone at that point. We almost lost her.
I’m struggling right now, with so much on my plate and to be brutally honest, I want to scream at someone, anyone, for anything.
If you have read or learned anything about me … about us, Winter Witch and myself it’s that family is going to come first. Period. If you don’t like it, don’t work with us.
We are people. Two people. Not machines, not large companies with 100 employees to help us. We do what we do because we enjoy it. It helps us, our families and often times our communities as we donate a lot of review items locally. And to be bold and frank I’m fed up with some “companies”, be it large or small inundating my email about where their post is for a $5 product.
Perhaps I’m just overly emotional right now, I’m certainly overly tired and stressed more than anyone should ever have to be and I’m not even going to answer you’re hateful email saying you need/want that post up right now.
I don’t plan my family emergencies, and I sure wish I didn’t have so many - however it obviously comes with the territory. If you chose to work with me, and I’m behind maybe, just maybe you should have taken the whole 2 minutes to read our “About Me” page and you would have learned that I am an in-home caregiver and my family will always come before your post and your product.
In regards to those who have emailed about winner’s being posted. A brief explanation. If you understand, thank you. If you are mad, you’ll need to get over it.
We had to update our site, the software. The stuff behind the scenes that makes the entire situation work. In that process it moved some things, it disabled somethings. Long story short, please be a little patient. We put this together for you too, we love our readers. You are what makes us want the stuff behind the scenes to work. You are the reason we have sat up until 3AM beating our faces on our keyboards because there was a glitch or a foul code.
This whole thing brings me to an old saying, that I heard my sister say a lot when she was a teenager. *Warning* Again.
“Those who know me, know me well. Those that don’t, can go to hell.”
With All My Love,
Rose
RedNeck Witch
ILY and I’m so sorry about your mom. All companies be them big or small get the same service from us but some people are kinder than others.
I’m so sorry about your mom. I hope she is doing okay. I just wanted to say good for you for setting your priorities where they should be. Nothing is more important than family.
I am so sorry to hear you had to experience this with your mother. I hope she is doing well.
Is your Mom home again yet? I had been trying to follow on FB but didnt want to tweet and bother you cause I know how stressful all this is.
*hugs* from here is all I can do and my thoughts are with you and your family….
oh my gosh! I can’t imagine how scary that must of been! ((hug))
I pray for you and your mom during this tough time.
I hope everyone understands that family *must* come first.
I also want to thank you for creating your wonderful blog and for all the hard work that you put into it.
Thank you all, very much for your kind words. I sincerly love our readers, and I am so glad you guys “get it”, get what I mean. We were back in the hospital the other night, this time they adjusted some medicine, so let’s hope and pray that it helps!
Love,
Your Favorite RedNeck Witch
Rose