Trying to Be Healthy...

Haven't posted to my Blog for a bit. That was deliberate. I have been working on a PowerPoint of our 50 years of marriage in pictures for our Family Reunion in June. I just didn't do anything but that until I got it finished. Yeah me!! It is ready and Claude approved. We watched it Sunday evening. I am going to add any pictures that fit between now and June. In addition I want to create a first slide using the t-shirt design we create. That isn't created yet so it will have to be added later. Now I can Blog a bit and catch up.

Several of the things that have happened since I last posted on January 20th have to do with health, mine and my father's. So I will just begin with a post about health. 

At 4:15am Thursday, January 23rd, I received a phone call from the nursing home. For once I was in a very deep sleep and it took me a bit to realize my cell phone was ringing and then to get it answered. I am quite sure I sounded like I had been on a bender the night before to the nurse on the other end of the line. The problem...They went to Papa's room checking on residents and he was not in his bed. They found him on the floor of his bathroom with a big gash in his head. They called the emergency room at Georgetown Community Hospital and the ambulance came and took him to the ER. Papa remembers nothing of the fall at all and only remembers one ride in the ambulance. Not sure if he passed out or what but am eternally grateful they found him and got him to the ER. I was told by the nurse not to go to the ER. They would just stitch him up and do some tests and then bring him right back to the nursing home. She assured me they would call when he got back. 

I got out of bed and took my cell phone to the living room. I called Georgetown Hospital ER. They connected me with the ER doctor caring for Papa. She assured me they had done a scan of his head and nothing was a concern with his head. He had complained of neck pain and so they did a scan of his neck and were waiting on the results of that scan. He had stitches in his head. As soon as they were sure of the results of the neck scan they would take him back to the nursing home for the remainder of his care. Papa takes a blood thinner and they had that under control. The doctor in the ER said not to come there from Sadieville, they would have Papa back at the nursing home before I could get to the hospital. 


Claude and I attend a Religion Class every Thursday morning. I got ready and went to visit Papa. Claude would come and pick me up on his way to the class. I found Papa in good spirits with this lovely bandage around his head and on top of the stitches. I have to say the gauze band around his head seemed to serve no purpose whatsoever. Clearly he bled a lot which is to be expected. He often wasn't sure why his head was hurting. I would tell him the story as I knew it. 

By Saturday, January 25th, Papa was sporting a black eye.This to me was a sign of healing. I also loved how the nurses were labeling his bandage so that any shift could tell immediately when he was last re-bandaged. Sort of like a 'freshness label'.  This day I told Papa he had to be very careful and stay healthy. I was having oral surgery on Monday and would not be able to visit him for two days. I assured him it would be my turn to need some health care. We shared a laugh.

Monday, January 27th, Claude drove me to Dr. King's office. He would implant the two posts that would serve as the base for my implant bridge to replace the teeth I had to have pulled from the August 2019 fall. I was so very grateful to have Claude there. I felt myself going to sleep as soon as they put the medication in my arm. I don't remember anything about the surgery. I don't remember anything about the post-op instructions. I do remember getting in the Jeep and Claude driving me home. He made sure I had what meds I needed and I curled up in the bed. Claude had a meeting at Sadieville City Hall while I slept. I woke up before he got home. I found the post-op instructions on his dresser and read them. Then I started to move around a little. Claude purchased me a puzzle so I would stay still while my body got through the first day. I put it out on the dining room table the night before the surgery. Now I went to play with it a little.

When we were in Michael's picking out the puzzle, there was one with 500 pieces. I knew I could do that in one day. Then I noticed the ones with 1000 pieces. These are the puzzles I would really love doing. I realized that the 500 piece and the 1000 piece puzzles cost exactly the same. I just looked at Claude and said, "I can't in good conscience pay the same prices for half the puzzle that I would for one with a 1000 pieces." He chuckle and I picked a 1000 piece puzzle.  

I got the edge pieces put together and had two extra edge pieces. I couldn't tell for the life of me where they should go. Everything fit together just fine with the two extra edge pieces not being put in the edge. I decided to leave these two pieces to the side and begin to put the inside of the puzzle together. At some point the placement of those pieces would be made known by the other pieces not fitting correctly. It was a joy to work on the puzzle and know I couldn't leave the house. That I could stop whenever I wanted and rest and come back to the puzzle. I didn't stay up through the night like I normally would. I got great sleep each night but that could have been medically induced. I managed to finish the puzzle on Wednesday morning before I would go into visit with Papa. I just loved being able to do a hard puzzle all by myself.

Michael, our son-in-law, loves to make puzzles as well. He received one for Christmas that was a play on football (soccer). He was actually working on it in the evenings while I was making my puzzle. I shared this picture of my successful completion and on January 30th Michael shared a picture of his completed puzzle.

After finishing my puzzle on Wednesday, I sent a message to my children that I must be healed because the puzzle was complete!

By Saturday, February 1st, I found Papa with only steri-strips over his stitches. They tried to remove them and some came but others needed a bit longer. Yes, he was healing!

On Thursday, February 6th, I found Papa with no bandage. He will have a distinguishing scar. Just think of it...in three weeks this 91 year old man in frail health had a wound heal on his head with at least 6 stitches as healed. Amazing. I'm not sure how many more cuts and bumps that head of his can take. 

Monday, Feb 10th, I spent the morning getting chores done in my home. As I prepared to go see Papa, I picked up the plastic case with my flipper, my cell phone and my Kindle in my hand. With my other hand I reached for my cup full of water. I could feel something sliding out of my grip and thought it was my cell phone. I was in my bedroom which has a nice thick carpet with nice padding. I have a good phone cover on my phone so I wasn't worried. That cover is red. Imagine my surprise when the item that falls to the floor is white plastic. It was the case with my flipper in it. The case popped open as it hit the ground and the flipper fell out onto the carpet and promptly broke right in half. I started to call out for Claude with lots of "Oh No!!" words coming out of my mouth. Claude came quickly from the office to see my dilemma. What would I do now?

I called Dr. King's office and told them what happened. I asked if the flipper could be glued. Adam said he would do some research and call me back that day. I went ahead into Georgetown and visited Papa, sans flipper. I called Dr. King's office at 4:45 to see if they found any solution to my little problem. They told me they were having another flipper made and I would be able to pick it up Tuesday. They would call me when it was delivered to their office. Yippee!!

Tuesday morning February 11th, was my semi-annual ophthalmology appointment. My goal here is to not need glasses. To be able to keep my readers. This time they dilated my eyes. Ugh!! I also got to take that little test with the flashing dots that checks your peripheral vision. Claude and I both hate this test. The end result was my vision is still fine for the readers but I can get the 2.75 or the 3.00 version when I purchase them again. I have used 2.5 for years now. Yeah me!!

I then went to sit with Papa. After which I hurried home. Claude and I were to go to the temple that evening. I still hadn't heard from Dr. King about the flipper yet. We wanted to be on the road to Louisville at 3:30pm. I got the call just before 3pm. We would go to Dr. King's office on our way to Louisville.

Dr. King had two flippers made this time. Just in case they broke again. They filed them down so the fit was perfect. I asked them to look at my stitches from the implant surgery. I was to come in the next Monday and have them removed. They said they were looking great and if it was okay they would take them out then. I assured them this would be great. They took out my stitches and pronounced the healing process was going well. They didn't charge me for the flippers either. I was amazed and very happy with all of this.

I have always been happy that I didn't need lots of medications and didn't have lots of medical issues. As I got to this point with all this care I had to admit I do have medical things I have to take care of. I found myself painting my toe nails morning and night to treat them. I had to swish my mouth morning and night with a special mouthwash to prevent infection. I was taking pain meds and an antibiotic. I was taking my normal three pills each morning. I was putting eye drops in each evening. Yep, I had a few medical things to take care of. But we are all good. Papa is healed. I am on my way to my mouth healing for the next step with the implant bridge. Six weeks for this surgery to heal. Then a cap will be placed on the posts. Wait for 4 more weeks. Then the process to get the crowns on the posts. It is all good. I am blessed.