Lifting Up Dad From Our Knees.....: 02/10/07

Saturday, February 10, 2007

A TENTATIVE PLAN AND HEARTFELT THANKS!

The pulmonary Dr. came by yesterday and said he will try to wean Jim off the ventilator. He backed off a little yesterday, but today he said he would leave it as is. The plan is to try to get him off next week. Jim has responded to a couple of commands but has slept most of today. It is so hard to be in the "waiting room". We want everything to speed up and get on with improving....but we have also learned a powerful lesson on how precious it is to have one more hour, one more minute....

I have never studied every breath and every muscle movement, as I have since Jim's fall. So many things I took for granted, so many moments I passed by as insignificant. His eye's move and my heart beats faster...his hand moves and I run for the nurse. Why do we think we will always have that. All the energy I've put into everyday chores that are now gone from my life and I could care less.

I know these are not "new" thoughts for anyone who has experienced a trauma, I have had a few of those in my life, also. We lost our son, Donnie, 4 years ago this past week. The loss was huge. But each tragedy or trauma, leaves its own mark and brings its own unique change forever. This is one I have never known or know how to walk. But I have an alter of God's faithfulness in past events to cling to and family and loved ones praying and being God's servants in our lives. How do people survive without this?

There is no way we will ever be able to express our thanks and love to all of you who have walked thru this with us. I am so humbled by it all. But I am going to try. Just know this, from all the Maley family, we are forever grateful for all the prayers, notes, cards, calls, visits, food, and many, many other signs of support and love.

Keep praying and we will keep you updated.

Sue

The story as we know it...

On Friday morning (Jan. 19th) around 10:50am, i recieved a call from my brother Joe telling me that he needed me at the house. I asked him what for and he told me that dad had hurt himself somehow...he had a black eye, his nose was bleeding and was "a little beat up". I immediatly got into my car and started heading that way. I called Joe back and asked him for more details and he told me that he was having a hard time getting dad up. I told him to call the EMS and he said that he thought Jason had already done that and he was on his way. When i pulled up, i saw the EMS was already there. I walked in and i saw Jason, Anna, Joe and several EMS people along with dad sitting on a gurney. They imediately took dad out in the EMS...not knowing what was wrong...just that something really wasnt right. We followed the EMS to parkview ER and had to go wait. Mom met us there as she flew across town to get there. We had to wait a long time (it seemed like days!) before we were told what was going on. The chaplain kept coming out to "brief"us...but thats all it was, a "brief". Finally, the ER doctor called the family together and told us the news...dad has a broken neck and he is bleeding in and on his brain on both sides....this is very serious. "Its a bad deal" the ER doc kept on saying, but we had to wait until the surgeon would come in and take a look at the CT scan before we could find out for certian what was wrong. Dr. Young finally came in and said that he had looked at dad and his scan. Dr. Young was very "matter of fact" with us which was good. We needed that! He told us very similar things to what the ER doctor told us. He said that dad had broke his neck, C2 to be exact. He also said that he was bleeding in several areas in his brain. He needed brain surgury immediatly. On a scale of one to ten...with ten being the worst...dad was a "plus 10". Dad went into surgury and was there for 3.5 hours or so...he came out of surgury fine but we found out the damage was worse than they had thought. They had to remove some of the damaged area and he would be on life support. We were told that the next 3-10 days are life and death...or very critical. What we think what happend is something as follows: Dad was sleeping down in the basement which is a normal thing. Between 8:30am and 10:30am, he tried going upstairs. This info is a little sketchy because we werent there, but based on some of the info that we have seen, we think that he tripped on the stair going up and fell...hitting his right eye on the stereo and then hitting face first on the ground. This created the damage that we are aware of. We spoke with the cardiologist today and found out that dad has also had a heart attack with in the last eight days, but they have not figured out exactly when. There is a thought that this might have caused the fall be we are uncertain. Dad is in stable but "second to second" condition. If and when dad comes out of the "coma" state, there will likely be many months of therapy that needs to be done, plus until the brain issues are resolved, they can not even think about looking at his broken neck. To sum it all up...dad is in very bad condition. We thank you all for all of your prayers and support and all of the food and gifts. Your love for my dad and our family is amazing and we are extremely grateful. We will continue to update you as we know more. Please continue to pray!! Pray for dad (jim) for healing. Pray for mom (sue) that she can continue to be strong. We do know that we most likely havent seen the worst yet. This is when we need your prayers the most. Please feel free to enter your thoughts on this blogspot as we will update you as we know more. We are very thankful for the love you all have shown.

Lifting Up Dad From Our Knees.....

Saturday, February 10, 2007

A TENTATIVE PLAN AND HEARTFELT THANKS!

Dad with Alena at Christmas

The story as we know it...

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