There are times in life when you have a "plan". It's your plan and it runs according to how you imagine it and then one day you realize that you are not the one in control. There is a Higher Being in charge and things will go according to HIS plan. This is pretty much how my mom's surgery recovery is going. We are struggling to come to terms with the knowledge that it's the Lord's Will as to how things will go and now Our will.
My mom went in on April 23 for a hernia operation. A while back she found a lump on her side and as time has progressed it has begun to bother her. After visiting with the surgeon it was decided that it probably is a hernia or maybe scar tissue from prior surgeries years ago but a determination could not be made until he was actually doing the surgery. So, April 23 was the day. It was out patient surgery. She'd be "out of commission" for 5-7 days and then would be on her way to recovery and back to normal as long as she didn't lift anything over 20 pounds for three weeks.
On April 28 my mom went to the doctor for a routine check up on her incision and everything looked great. My mom is not a shower person so not being able to soak in a bath has been killer for her. At this appointment, the doctor said it was alright for her to take a bath and soak. This was the Wednesday night after her surgery. She took a bath and felt great. Thursday night as she was getting undressed for the bath she realized that she was bleeding a bit from her incision. I didn't hear my phone ring when she called because I had accidentally set it to silent. She contacted my uncle and he and his wife ran down to make sure she was alright. It was decided that she was having some drainage from her incision but that is normal and they left.
Thursday night/Friday morning at 12:30 a.m. my mom called me in a panic that she woke up and was drenched in blood/drainage and she was needing to go to the ER. It would have taken me 30 minutes to get to her and her nice neighbor that lives across the street was right there for the service to drive her over after she made a quick phone call. I waited one of the LONGEST hours of my life before she called me back at 1:30 a.m. to let me know that she was back home. She was told at the ER that she had lots of "liquid pockets" that were needing to be drained so they went in with a needle and cleaned things out.
My mom followed up the next day with her regular doctor who insisted she come for an office visit ASAP. A drain was inserted in my mom's incision so that the liquid could drain easily and she didn't start with an infection. They were also sending a home nurse in once a day to change her drain and bandage.
The nurse started coming in on Saturday, May 1. We are now at May 12 and we are up to my mom's incision still not healing. The nurse is now coming in 2 times per day. We had a bout of fevers, which indicate infection. A dose of antibiotics have been prescribed. Multiple trips have been taken to the doctor due to bleeders, infection, etc.
It was decided to finally put my mom on a vac pump, which is inserted in the incision and pumps out the fluid/infection so that her incision can start to heal. The pump came via UPS this morning and my mom headed to the doctor this afternoon at 4 pm. My Grandma was willing to take my mom to the doctor where it was later in the afternoon and I had to pick the girls up from daycare and Dave is still training in Ogden.
At 5:30, I still hadn't heard from my mom so the girls and I sat in the Budge Clinic parking lot waiting for them to come out to the car. They finally emerged at 5:45 and I could see the discouragement on my mom's face. They couldn't insert the pump for two reasons. First....the part of the incision that is not healing is underneath a part of the incision that has healed. Needless to say, they need to reopen her incision to insert the pump. It wasn't her original doctor that she saw today and this doctor wants her original doctor to open her back up. Second....with all of the drainage, tape, bandages, etc. that have been on my mom's skin she now has come down with a "major" yeast infection. Her skin is so raw and she says it hurts extremely bad. They need to get the yeast infection under control for a week and then they can insert the pump. If they do it now, the yeast infection will spread all over her torso and rather quickly.
I know how frustrated, discouraged, and tired I am of the current situation. I cannot even imagine how frustrated, discouraged, and tired my mom is. Her "plan" to be up and going again in less than a week is just not working out. She will have another week of the nurse two times a day. They can hopefully put the pump in next Wednesday and then it's another 2-3 weeks of recovery.
I found this quote on a LDS blog I check and it seemed fitting. It's not our will to be done. It's the Lord's.
"Humbly submitting our will to the Father brings us the empowerment of God-the power of humility. It is the power to meet life's adversities, the power of peace, the power of hope, the power of a heart throbbing with love for and testimony of the Savior Jesus Christ, even the power of redemption." Bishop Richard C. Edgley
I keep telling myself and my mom that the Lord does not give us more than we can handle. Obviously there is a lesson here to be learned. I hope she can remain strong and endure. This too shall pass.
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1 comment:
Oh my goodness, poor Connie!!
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