Jan's Journal

January 14, 2011

IT"S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!

This has been one crazy week!

Let me start on last Saturday. Dave got up at oh-dark-thirty met a friend in Astoria. They drove up to Seattle for a steam meeting and then drove back that evening. It was a long day of driving; Dave left at 5:30 and got home at 7:00. Since it was close to dinnertime, we decided to rendezvous at the Pizza Garden in Nehalem for a bite to eat. I got there first, so I ordered our usual pepperoni pizza. He joined me a few minutes later at the table and I started to carry on a conversation. He was confused and wasn't making any sense with his words. I asked him if he was having another stroke because I recognized a lot of the symptoms from last time. He said he didn't feel very well and wanted to leave. I had started to have the waitress pack up our pizza when I turned around to see him flat on the floor! He had passed out. I immediately called 911 and had an ambulance take him to the Tillamook hospital. I followed in my car, leaving his car in the parking lot. The paramedics started slowly, but after a few minutes, they grew a little more concerned and hit the lights and siren. That was it for me and I didn't catch up with them again until I arrived at the emergency room. He was already checked in and was hooked up to a monitor and oxygen. Since he has had a stroke before, the doctor wanted him to spend the night so they could monitor him. He was pretty uncomfortable for most of the night until they decided they could disconnect a lot of the monitoring stuff - after that, he was able to get some sleep. The next morning, I returned and we had him back home by early afternoon. On Monday morning, we made an appointment with a neurologist in Hillsboro and so we spent most of Tuesday getting examined, having an MRI and MRA and lots of blood drawings. We don't know the results of the tests yet and have another doctor's appointment scheduled for next week. He will also see a cardiologist in another week because they are trying to figure out what has been causing these problems. Dave is a little frustrated because it is taking him a longer to recover from this stroke than from the last one 6 years ago. He is improving each day and his speech has returned to close too normal but he still is having quite a bit of trouble reading and writing. He has been using his cane because his balance is a little off and I have been helping him with his emails and telephone messages. I will keep you updated on his progress.

Dave OK, there's a problem with that audio clip, but it's the last one in the sequence - on the right.

We did get a kick out of this photo. After he got home, he took a shower and discovered a ton of adhesive monitor tabs all over his body, and there were nearly as many on the other side of his body too. I guess they just added another sticky tab each time the put a new monitor lead on him! I hear they weren't a whole lot of fun to peel off either!

Dave did miss two games during this episode. I think that bothered him more than anything else! It was very nice that the broadcast crew told him "hello" during that first game. You can hear it here.

On another note, on Tuesday morning I had the orientation for the Master Gardener's class that I am taking. We will meet in Tillamook at the community college every Tuesday until April 5th. There are about 15 apprentices in the class and about 10 perennials (people who have taken the course before and want a refresher course) and they will also be our mentors during this training. It is a pretty intensive course and there is a lot to learn. Our first assignment was to read a couple of chapters on "botany basics" and "plant identification". After reading about botany basics, I think I will never look at a plant in the same way! My oh my, there sure is a lot of "sex" going on out their in the garden! In the plant identification chapter, I can't even begin to pronounce the botanical names let along remember them! That is another language to me!

The rest of this week has been comparably event-free. It did start snowing while we were at the doctor's office for the tests, but it turned to rain while we were at dinner. By Thursday, the temperature was 50, but we have been watching the wild weather we have been having with lots of rain and winds. It looks like we will have a little flooding along with it, but we won't be affected here.

We had Dawn and Taylor over for dinner again on Wednesday. Des and Donna are still on vacation, so we're helping them get a decent meal every once in a while. Dave was very tired, so it wasn't much of a social event - but everyone got fed!

We have also had a problem with the computer. It just got to the point where it didn't want to run at all anymore. Dave had arranged for a friend who does computer repairs to take a look at it, but then his health issues put things on hold. Anyway, after we went to the doctor on Tuesday, we were finally able to get the computer over to the guy's place. By Thursday, he had the thing completely overhauled and has added a lot of extras to it as well, so we're hoping we're going to be in good shape computer-wise for a while!