I See You!

My goodness! As I look back I see that it has been 8 months since I shared anything with you...and LOTS has been going on (more blog entries later, I suppose). In February we signed a contract to get our pool area redone. In March I had hand surgery. In May we bought a new RV. In June we took the two oldest grands to Colorado. Here we are in August...and I am sitting beside my dad's hospital bed in ICU. This time the problem started about 2 weeks ago with pneumonia. I had been with Daddy earlier in the day and he seemed okay. In the evening I got a phone call that his nurse had been called because they could not get him awake or keep him awake. The nurse called an ambulance and round one began at Texas Regional Hospital Sunnyvale. He went in the hospital on Thursday, made rapid improvement and was released on Monday. I took him back to the Lodge and all seemed fine. Three days later, Thursday again, I got a phone call that an ambulance had been called because Daddy was vomiting blood. LOTS of blood and blood clots. We raced to Texas Presbyterian in Rockwall and arrived at the ER before he arrived in the ambulance. As soon as he was transfered from the gurney to the table they called us back. I have to say that time shifted into slow motion when I entered that room. My dad lay on the table virtually naked. There was a sheet covering his private parts but above the waist was completely exposed...and covered in blood. Blood stained his mouth, his lips, his chin, his neck and his chest. Apparently he had been stripped because there was so much blood. He lay motionless and barely responsive. I admit, I thought that I would lose him that day. But I didn't. He got better. he was moved out of ICU. There was talk of sending him home...or to a physical rehab facility. We were literally a few hours away from that transfer when Daddy started vomiting blood again. Now, they had done an EGD scope after the first incident and found nothing. Now here we are again. Doctors (3 of them) rushed to his bedside and had him moved back into ICU. I rushed back to the hospital and sat by his bedside as late as I dared. Finally I went home and attempted to sleep. That didn't really happen so I got up at 4:45am and was back at the hospital at 6:00am. The main doctor, Dr. Patel, came by to talk to me about 9:30am. A different gastroenterologist haD scheduled Daddy for another EGD today. So, we sit and wait. Well, I wait. He sleeps. He wakes for short periods of time and talks and then falls right back asleep. He is tired and weak. I am worried. As I sit here I have had the opportunity to play back a lifetime with my dad in my mind. I see him running behind my bicycle teaching me how to ride it. I see him sitting in the garage with us while we fed the baby raccoons he brought home after their mom abandoned them in the field behind his workplace. I see him when he hobbled home covered in dirt with his pants and shirt torn from riding bikes with my brother and deciding "watch me" was a good idea. I see him walking down the aisle with me at my wedding. His tux came without a tie so he ran to M.E. Moses and bought a bow tie which I swear was for a child! I still see how excited he was when he learned he was going to be a Papaw. I see him telling me, with a smirk on his face, "I thought so!" when we told him about baby number 2. I see him on crutches when he fell and broke his ankle. I see him as he goes through the emotional rollercoaster of saying goodbye to his wife of 56 years when Alzheimers finally claimed her body...her mind was taken a full two years before that. I see him struggling with his emotions as he buried his 56 year old son. I see him deteriorating (seemingly over night) to the point where he can't walk...and sometimes can't even stand. And now, I see him with his health compromised more than I thought possible. I see him wrapping up his affairs because, at 87, he knows there isn't a lot of time left. I see him preparing to let go and helping me prepare to let him go. I see a lifetime of precious memories through the eyes of Daddy's little girl. I see my heart, with a hole in it, once he has left us. I see YOU, Daddy...a man I am proud to have loved and experienced life with. Thank you...for so very many things.