02-15-2021, 12:46 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-15-2021, 12:51 PM by Russ Bellinis.)
It started with my wife needing surgery on her left foot. The podiatrist thought her foot did not have enough blood circulation to go through with the surgery and refferred her to a vascular surgeon. On Tuesday Feb. 2, I took her to the hospital to have an angiogram done on her left leg by a vascular surgeon. 2 hours after I dropped her off the "fun" began.
I received a call from my brother's best friend's wife telling me that he had left his trailer in Lake Havasu City, Az. to go to the grocery store. He is a widower suffering from dementia, and is diabetic. On his way back home, he got lost and drove to New Mexico where he ran out of fuel. A policeman found him trying to hitch hike on Interstate 40. He was incoherent, so the police called the fire dept, and an ambulance to take him to a hospital in Gallup.
We contacted his son who does computer generated special effects for movies in Hollywood. We were going to need 2 drivers, one to drive to New Mexico, and one to drive his truck back while the other one followed. Meanwhile, when my wife woke up from her angiogram, the dr. told her not to drive or go for any long car rides for 3 days. Oh, I forgot to mention that the hospital in Gallup wanted us to come up immediately to pick him up on the afternoon of Feb.2. We live near Long Beach, Ca and my nephew lives in Westwood, near UCLA. I don't fly and can't drive that fast!
My nephew drove immediately to Lake Havasu City to take care of the trailer and my brother's cat. Did I mention dementia? I helped him move from Oklahoma to Lake Havasu about 2 years ago, and I don't think he has cleaned anything since! He's also stubborn and determined to live on his own.
My nephew spent the time waiting for my wife and I to be able to come to Arizona cleaning his house trailer and unpacking the boxes from his move 2 years ago.
Meanwhile we are receiving 9-12 phone messages per day from the hospital asking when we will get there to get him!
My wife's dr finally grudgingly permitted her to ride with me to Gallup on Friday morning, Feb 5. My wife is an RN, so she wanted to go to try to set up some in home help for him once we got him back to Az.
We got to Lake Havasu Friday evening and called my nephew to make arrangements to drive to Gallup on Saturday, Feb.6. Three of us got to Gallup on Saturday evening Feb. 6, and got him out of the hospital, but we could not get his pick-up out of impound until Monday morning! The 4 of us checked out of the hotel on Monday morning, picked up a gas can from a Wall Mart, and filled it with 2 gallons of diesel fuel. We got his truck "out of hock" on Monday and headed back to Arizona with my nephew driving the truck and my wife and I following in our van.
Once back in Arizona, my nephew got to work straightening out my brother's finances, and my wife got busy getting him a dr. appointment and arranging someone to come in to help with meals, and to take him to appointments, shopping, etc., once we were back in So Cal. He is now on insulin in addition to the metforman that he was supposed to be taking, but forgot about. He is still stubbornly determined to live at home My wife also made up 2 instruction sheets that I had printed and laminated at a nearby Staples. One form is how to test for and monitor his blood sugar. The other is how to administer his insulin after he checks his blood sugar. He has 2 types of insulin, one fast acting if the insulin needs adjustment during the day, the other slow acting for use overnight. She also arranged for a visiting nurse to come in, but could only get a nurse 3 days per week, and then not all day!
My wife and nephew spent the rest of the week going over the 2 "cheat sheets" she made up to get him to take care of his insulin monitoring and injections. We came home on Sunday Feb. 14. My nephew is heading home today. My nephew also hid his car keys before leaving!
We are not real confident that he is capable of taking care of himself even with the assistance that my wife arranged. We have told him that if he has another episode and needs to go to the hospital, that he will probably end up needing to go into a nursing home! One major problem for him is that none of us live anywhere near him so we are looking at a 5 hour drive to get to him if he stays home.
I received a call from my brother's best friend's wife telling me that he had left his trailer in Lake Havasu City, Az. to go to the grocery store. He is a widower suffering from dementia, and is diabetic. On his way back home, he got lost and drove to New Mexico where he ran out of fuel. A policeman found him trying to hitch hike on Interstate 40. He was incoherent, so the police called the fire dept, and an ambulance to take him to a hospital in Gallup.
We contacted his son who does computer generated special effects for movies in Hollywood. We were going to need 2 drivers, one to drive to New Mexico, and one to drive his truck back while the other one followed. Meanwhile, when my wife woke up from her angiogram, the dr. told her not to drive or go for any long car rides for 3 days. Oh, I forgot to mention that the hospital in Gallup wanted us to come up immediately to pick him up on the afternoon of Feb.2. We live near Long Beach, Ca and my nephew lives in Westwood, near UCLA. I don't fly and can't drive that fast!
My nephew drove immediately to Lake Havasu City to take care of the trailer and my brother's cat. Did I mention dementia? I helped him move from Oklahoma to Lake Havasu about 2 years ago, and I don't think he has cleaned anything since! He's also stubborn and determined to live on his own.
My nephew spent the time waiting for my wife and I to be able to come to Arizona cleaning his house trailer and unpacking the boxes from his move 2 years ago.
Meanwhile we are receiving 9-12 phone messages per day from the hospital asking when we will get there to get him!
My wife's dr finally grudgingly permitted her to ride with me to Gallup on Friday morning, Feb 5. My wife is an RN, so she wanted to go to try to set up some in home help for him once we got him back to Az.
We got to Lake Havasu Friday evening and called my nephew to make arrangements to drive to Gallup on Saturday, Feb.6. Three of us got to Gallup on Saturday evening Feb. 6, and got him out of the hospital, but we could not get his pick-up out of impound until Monday morning! The 4 of us checked out of the hotel on Monday morning, picked up a gas can from a Wall Mart, and filled it with 2 gallons of diesel fuel. We got his truck "out of hock" on Monday and headed back to Arizona with my nephew driving the truck and my wife and I following in our van.
Once back in Arizona, my nephew got to work straightening out my brother's finances, and my wife got busy getting him a dr. appointment and arranging someone to come in to help with meals, and to take him to appointments, shopping, etc., once we were back in So Cal. He is now on insulin in addition to the metforman that he was supposed to be taking, but forgot about. He is still stubbornly determined to live at home My wife also made up 2 instruction sheets that I had printed and laminated at a nearby Staples. One form is how to test for and monitor his blood sugar. The other is how to administer his insulin after he checks his blood sugar. He has 2 types of insulin, one fast acting if the insulin needs adjustment during the day, the other slow acting for use overnight. She also arranged for a visiting nurse to come in, but could only get a nurse 3 days per week, and then not all day!
My wife and nephew spent the rest of the week going over the 2 "cheat sheets" she made up to get him to take care of his insulin monitoring and injections. We came home on Sunday Feb. 14. My nephew is heading home today. My nephew also hid his car keys before leaving!
We are not real confident that he is capable of taking care of himself even with the assistance that my wife arranged. We have told him that if he has another episode and needs to go to the hospital, that he will probably end up needing to go into a nursing home! One major problem for him is that none of us live anywhere near him so we are looking at a 5 hour drive to get to him if he stays home.