Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Today was Mom's turn to go to the doctor. The assistant checked the pressure in her right eye, had her read from the eye chart and asked her a lot of questions. Mom feels that overall her eye is better. She keeps it closed a lot because she is sensitive to light. The doctor checked out the eye and seemed to think that is was looking pretty good given her age and the shingles diagnosis. She can discontinue using the ointment at night and cut back the steroid eye drops from 4 times a day to two times a day, morning and night.

On the way home I stopped at the grocery store for some items they needed. I decided to pick up some fresh vegetables and make them dinner ahead while I was there this morning. Once we got home, we found that Dad was able to come to the door to let us in. I had brought Krispy Kreme donuts over earlier in the morning, so I made them a snack of donuts and coffee. They both seemed to enjoy the donuts. Afterwards, they went into the living room to take naps while I cooked up lunch and dinner. I made spaghetti, broccoli and dinner rolls for lunch. Dinner is stuffed green peppers. They may save these for lunch tomorrow as the spaghetti lunch was kind of filling for both of them. After lunch I cleaned up the kitchen, changed the bandage on Dad's foot, and gave Mom her eyedrops.

Dad and I talked for awhile before I left. He hates not knowing what is going on with his body. He said he wasn't in any pain today and hadn't taken his afternoon vicodin. He is dreading the 75 minute MRI tomorrow evening. His faith in God is as strong as ever. I finalized all the information for the test tomorrow...where we are going, how long we will be there, what time we will leave the apartment ....and what time we should return.

I decided that I would come home for the afternoon today rather than go to work. The dogs all got a chance to lay around outside on the back lawn and I got a chance to get the bills paid. I am planning a lowkey evening.

I just got a callback from my Dad's oncologist. The CT Scan showed a lot of stuff that doesn't look good. The doctor is most concerned about what looks to be a tumor on Dad's pancreas. We discuss this and ways I could get Dad prepared for this news. I tried to remain calm, but I was starting to get really upset. I focused on what the doctor was saying. The first step will probably be to biospy the tumor. They can't treat the tumor until they know what kind of tumor they are dealing with. I asked if Dad would need to go into the hospital for this procedure. The doctor said it could be done on an outpatient basis, but that we will need to figure out those details a little later. I talked with a good friend about all of this...she was great...supportive but realistic. I got some of the emotion out before I called and talked to Dad. He took the information really well. He said that if he needed a biopsy he would have one. I asked him if he wanted me to keep giving him information about what is going on..and he said that was fine. I told him that he needed to do some thinking about the biopsy and that we would talk more tomorrow.

I am feeling pretty overcome with all of this information and what could lie ahead. I think I will take Dad's advice. He is just taking it one day at a time...so I will try and do the same.

Tomorrow I work from the early morning until I leave for Mom and Dad's around 3pm.