Dad's 77th Birthday

Well, 2 days after George and Mandy got married I was on my way to Texas to check on dad and mom. Dad had been in the hospital since Aug. 19th. They moved him to a phys. therapy facility, and then to a rehab./nursing home. While I was there we were able to go and celebrate his 77th birthday with him. I made him his favorite cake, German Chocolate (tried to give him a tiny lick of icing since he can't eat, but he refused it)

In the hospital they finally discovered that he had a fractured 1st lumbar vertebrae, thus all the extreme pain he has been in. They also diagnosed him with leucocytosis. After several weeks they moved him to a phys. rehab. facility, but since he was unable to do up to 3hrs. of therapy, he was moved to the rehab./nursing home. Upon his arrival there, he advised he could not swallow anything without it going into his lungs and decided to have a feeding tube put in and since he had been barely eating for some time and had lost a considerable amount of weight, they did so. He had returned to the nursing home from having that done the day before I arrived on Sept. 19th. Dad was still in constant pain and unable to do more than a few minutes of therapy, before it was too much for him. Before I left, it was decided that the therapy would be temp. stopped and the pain treated more intensely to try to give him some constant relief from it and hopefully stop him from anticipating pain and thus causing it to be worse by tensing up.

Dad and Mom with the kids.

(Me, Melanie, Gary)

Dad with Melanie and her DH, Jimmy.

Dad with Grandkids

Jennifer, Tiffany, Brandon and Christopher

Now more of the story. It was finally discovered when he went into the hospital for the 3rd time that he had a fractured 1st lumbar vertebrae and that was the cause of his intense pain. He stayed in the hospital for several weeks as he also had other problems and was then moved to a phys. rehab. facility, but since after a week he could not do up to 3 hrs of phys. therapy (could only manage a few minutes, before the pain was too much) they moved him to the rehab./nursing home. Upon his arrrival there, he advised them again that when he swallowed (even though he was eating/drinking very little) that it went into his lungs when he did so. He was diagnosed with Dysphasia and went back to the hospital to have a feeding tube put directly into his stomach. He returned to the nursing home on Sept. 18th and I arrived on the 19th. He was extremely thin due to the lack of nourishment and had lost a lot of weight from when I had last seen him in July. He seemed to fill out in the face for a few days and then seemed to thin out again. Over the 3 wks. he only gained 3 lbs. back. He was unable to do more than a few min. therapy still and was in constant pain, unless completely drugged. They decided just before I left to temporarily stop the therapy and concentrate on the pain and reevaluate him every 10 days or so for therapy. He would anticipate the pain so much when they came in to work on him for any reason that he would tense up, only making it worse. So they are hoping that if they can eliminate it for awhile that will stop and he won't be so sensitive. But this also means he will be out of it more of the time and sleep more than he already was. All we can do at this time is wait to see what happens. The dr. is going to talk to some ortho. surgeons to see if he can get anyone to consider surgery on his back as it is still not healed and we have a feeling it happen many, many months ago when he fell and refused to go to the dr. and then aggravated it golfing and then sequestered himself to his bed for months until the pain got so unbearable he finally agreed to go to the hospital. Anyway, the chances of them agreeing to do surgery on his back is unlikely due to his overal condition, but I don't think he will be free of the pain until it is done, so we are in that vicious circle mode - no surgery because of poor health, no chance of relief from the pain if no surgery. Ugh! Well, all we can do at this time is pray and keep the faith that things will work out one way or the other to free him from his pain. Please keep him and the family in your prayers.