I have been processing a whole lot internally, and I decided to write out my thoughts tonight as I sit here with my dad.
Yesterday, I raced out of school to get to Wesley. The paramedics had come to transfer my dad from the ICU (where he was for 4 weeks, after 3 weeks in 6 different ICU and normal rooms at Wesley). I rode with him in the ambulance to Select Hospitals, a private long term acute care facility within St. Francis downtown. Last night, I kind of lost it. I let myself feel sorry for everything that has happened, and just wept and wept.
My family has now been walking this road of sickness, hospitals, and pain for seven weeks. That number for some reason really got to me this weekend. In the seven weeks, my dad was in 8 different rooms within Wesley. He had an abscess surgery, open heart surgery to replace his mitral and aortic valves, was sedated and ventilated for 2 and a half weeks (the scariest weeks of my life), and now has a trachea tube and feeding tube. I will back up a little for those of you who don’t know the messy, long details of the last 2 months.
It feels like another lifetime that all of this started. My family went on an incredible vacation this summer. My sweet dad planned it over a year in advance, and it was magical. We went to Estes Park, CO, the Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, Glacier National Park, and up to Banff Canada to Lake Louise. I have never seen such beauty or felt the majesty of creation before. On that trip, I got tonsillitis and was very sick for the first week. Just as I was getting better, my dad began to get sick. We were up near the border to Canada in the middle of Montana. He wanted us to continue on the trip up to Lake Louise, despite him not being well. He was incredibly weak, not eating, could barely walk, having horrible fevers and just really sick. If only we had known, then, what we know now. While in Lake Louise, we stayed at the Fairmont Chateau, the nicest and most incredible hotel I have even been in. My dad truly outdid himself planning this trip. He did not leave the hotel room except for one time in those three days there. We were supposed to be there for 6 days, but left on the 4th morning for our 1,700 mile drive home. That drive and those three days were long and hard. I think we all knew something more was going on, and my dad wanted to get home so we could take care of things in Wichita, not in the middle of Montana or Wyoming.
July 24th my dad was admitted into Wesley for what we thought was a hernia. It turned out the hernia was an abscess, and the infection from the abscess spread to his blood stream. Because infected blood was pumping through his body, vegetations grew on his mitral and aortic heart valves, and on August 6th my dad had open heart surgery. He had been in the ICU for two weeks before his surgery, so his body was very weak going into a major surgery. The thoracic surgeon said his valves were way more deteriorated and damaged than he thought, so the timing of the surgery was vital. The surgery went great, and the road to recovery began. While in recovery, he took a very sharp turn and was moved to the ICU at 3 in the morning on Saturday August 16th. His body went into multi-organ failure as well as respiratory distress. They sedated him and ventilated him that next morning. His kidneys were failing, his lungs were failing (he has pneumonia), and his blood was essentially attacking itself. We were so confused what happened, because he was doing so well after surgery. While recovering from heart surgery, they gave him a blood transfusion, but his body had developed an antibody to donor blood. This antibody began attacking his blood, and caused his whole body to go into sepsis. They had him on dialysis to do the work of his kidneys, daily lung treatments for his pneumonia, and so much monitoring. I had come by that Monday (August 17th) morning before making my way to my classroom to prep for the first day of school the next day. The ICU closes from 7-8 daily, so I came around 6 to be with him. My mom and I were both there and about to leave for school when the hospitalist came by and told us he was extremely critical, and it was unknown about his progress or potential to overcome his multi-organ failure. I remember that day so well, and even writing this hurts my heart all over again. I was on the hallway floor bawling, having to call my sister in St. Louis (on her first day with her students) to tell her to come home as soon as she could. I have never cried so hard in my life as I did that entire day. I missed my entire first week of teaching of my first year being a teacher. My school and principal were unbelievably supportive and took care of everything. I remember sitting next to my dad while he lay there, so critical and sick, feeling so empty and pained that this was our reality. None of what happened was how I had planned it to be or wanted. I am forever grateful for that week with my dad. He was sedated and unaware of what was going on, but I know he knew we were there for him. The second week, we all went back to work (and had my first day with my students). Overwhelmed, exhausted, aching, and anxious I went into my first week of teaching. It was so great to meet my kiddos, and despite my own doubts of myself, my students seem to like Ms. Klunder. J
After many rounds of dialysis, his kidneys began to bounce back. The day I walked into his room and saw urine in his catheter bag, I was yelling at the nurse about how cool it was. He looked at me like I was a little crazy (and I am not even sure he was actually my dad’s nurse that day), but it was a victory. After two and a half weeks being sedated and ventilated, they took him off sedation medication. Those next couple days were even more terrifying that the days he was sedated because he was completely unresponsive. What happened was that his kidneys were taking longer to filter out fluids, so the medicine was still in his body. 3 days later, my dad woke up. And what a sweet, needed thing that was. I wept all day seeing him look at me, and was so so grateful to know he was there. Even with all the tubes, wires, and ICU things, he was still his sassy self.
They ended up having to put the trachea tube in because he wasn’t quite ready to breathe on his own, and it is less damaging to his vocal chords and throat. Once the tube was in his neck instead of his throat, my dad seemed so much more himself. He could now kiss us, talk (with no sound…and trust me, lip reading is a nightmare), and somewhat communicate what he needed. There was one night shortly after he woke up that Erica and I explained to him what all had happened in the previous 2 and a half weeks. That was a hard night.
His kidneys are functioning again, and he is no longer in the ICU. For some reason, the move really got to me this weekend. My dad has now been in the hospital for 7 weeks. SEVEN WEEKS. It aches me so deeply that he has to go through all of this. I wanted so badly to talk to him about everything , especially those weeks he was sedated. We can talk to him now, but it is important that we are strong and encouraging for him. The move was extremely hard on his body, and just change in general is hard. I found myself so agitated by everything last night. The hospital is further from home, the parking is more difficult and getting to his room takes 4 times longer than at Wesley. We don’t know any of the staff yet, and saying goodbye to our ICU family at Wesley was heart wrenching.
It is hard to explain how I have been feeling through all of this (moving, starting my career, and dealing with my dad). We have had so many friends come sit with us at the hospital, bring coffee or a meal, listen to me weep and vent all of life on them, etc. Some days I am so utterly overwhelmed with learning everything at school and trying to make sure I am doing my job as a teacher that I can focus solely on school. Other times, times I think and process everything that has happened and is going on, I feel like my insides are turning out and my whole body will just turn into a ball. I ache and ache for my dad. Some days I feel completely overwhelmed with life and just sob in my car. If you are reading this and are a teacher, you know what kind of intense stress comes with your first year. I have been waking up at 5:30, getting to Wesley by 6am so I can spend an hour with my dad before they shut it down until 8am, going to work, then coming back as soon as school is over. Most nights, I come again after shift change and stay until 10 or so. After school, I love getting to share with my dad what happened. He always told me I would be a great teacher. I show him pictures of my kids and important things like my newly organized cabinets.
My whole world has been consumed and affected by this. It affects me every day, and not a minute goes by I am not thinking about my dad. I feel tired every day. I hate that I haven’t been a good friend to all of my incredible friends. I am bad about responding to texts or calls. I get home and go right into bed. The tiniest of things can annoy me and I find myself getting short with my mom and sisters. The times I go do something for myself (like run to Target for groceries or work in my classroom on the weekends), I feel guilty that I am not at the hospital. When doctors or nurses tell us “your dad is very sick,” I want to punch them in the face, (but I still love them). When a person you love so deeply it hurts is suffering, it doesn’t matter if you are tired, or overwhelmed with a new career, or feel stressed about the little things like how far you now have to park. Being there for my dad is the most important thing to me. There is no place I would rather be than with him, showing him how much we love him and how undeniably incredible he is. The nurses in the ICU all came to his room the day he woke up, and many cried tears of joy alongside us. Man oh man, I miss my people in the ICU. Love you all.
I guess I just wanted to get it out there that I am hurting for my dad. That life has been a bit of a hot mess. When I see him in his bed and think about everything he has gone through, it physically aches my body. I feel so completely helpless and wish I could do more for him. I had a friend, shout out to Mary Ashton, who walked through her own dad being very ill, and she sent me an article about how God never says he wouldn’t give us more than we can handle, but he will BE THERE when we are going through more than we can handle. I can say that I have about filled my cup of “things I can handle without losing my cool completely”, and then some. But through this, I have seen God’s faithfulness in little things. Just last week I was deeply moved while leading worship at church, and was reminded that the Lord has been in this process the whole time, even when it has seemed unbearable. And even though seven weeks seems long, my dad is slowly improving. The fight is not over, but I know my dad. He is a fighter, a doer, a champion who never complains. I love him so much.
Thanks for sticking with me. This was very cathartic for me, and might help some of you understand a little better where I have been coming from, especially all of the unanswered texts…I am the worst. But on a serious note, please pray for my daddio.
