All's Quiet...

It's been an unsettling evening, after hearing that my father's heart nearly stopped completely during his routine gall bladder surgery this afternoon. While under anaesthesia his heart rate had dropped to about forty, I think, and the anesthesiologist -- who admittedly was young and had only been practicing for about six years -- kind of freaked out, having never seen or dealt with anything like that before in his relatively short career. They managed to get the heart rate back up again, but he was describing to my mother how they were all watching the heart monitor, nervously... and I'm sitting here thinking, they're telling my mother this? Are most doctors this forthcoming about the honest-to-goodness goings-on behind the scenes during a loved one's surgery? I was enough of a basket case several years ago when the doctors told me that Joe had a hard time breathing when he was coming out of his anaesthesia. But Mother said that the doctors were calm and optimistic, and my father is currently resting comfortably in the "heart wing" of the Sentara Leigh with round-the-clock heart monitors and his CPAP mask strapped to his face (for his sleep apnea, which he sleeps with at home too) and he was out of it enough to where he didn't even remove it when I called to talk to him so he was sounding very Darth-Vader-on-quaaludes -- then again none of this sounds like he's resting comfortably, does it? But I do know what he's going through. I had my gall bladder removed in 1993 and I was pretty darn grumpy in the hospital to be sure. Nothing like being woken up every hour in the middle of the night with a nurse prodding your abdomen with an ice-cold stethoscope and exclaiming "Myyyy... your bowels are sounding simply wonderful this evening!" Mmmhm yeah, good to know, sister.

Still, what can I say? It's my daddy. My heart breaks every time he's in pain. And my heart sinks every time I hear that his heart stopped beating, for whatever reason (flashing back to his heart attack about seven years ago). Anyway, he sounded too tired and groggy to visit tonight so I'm going to try and see him at home tomorrow if they decide to discharge him in the morning, after the cardiologist gives him a clean bill 'o health. If they let him go home tomorrow.

It is unsettling, watching our parents grow old right before our eyes.