Falling

Mom fell on February 12th, which was a Sunday. I arrived at my usual time, 8:30am, with bags of groceries. When I opened the door I saw that Mom as laying on her right side in the middle of the living room floor.

After quickly putting down all the bags of groceries, I went and tried to figure out what was going on. She did not answer me when I yelled her name. Her face was kind of puffy and over her eyes she had flaps of skin that were filled with fluid. Eventually, she stirred a little bit. I asked her if she hurt anywhere...and she said "everywhere". Not knowing if she had broken anything, I covered her up with a blanket and called 911.

I went down to the lobby to let them in and tell them what was going on as we rode up the elevator. They went into action and examined her. They did not think she had any broken bones, but they were concerned about whether or not she had had a mild heart attack or some kind of mild seizure. Mom told me that she had tripped on the rug...but she if often not the best source of information when she falls. The decision was made to transport her to Swedish Hospital - the Cherry Hill campus.

After they left, I closed up the apartment and went to my house to get her Health Care Directive, which is basically a "Do No Resusitate" order. When I got to the hospital ER Mom's Doctor was looking for me. It turned out that Mom's blood pressure had plummeted and they did not know if she had a DNR. The had to put the paddles on her to restore her blood pressure. Eventually, after a couple of hours, a CAT scan and some other procedures, Mom was sent to the Cardiac ICU.

She stayed there for a couple of days but would not allow them to put in a PIC line. Her doctor wanted to know what was going on in her heart. Technically, this could be considered a violaton of her DNR, but we let it go once she was transferred to another floor. She stayed there for another couple of days and then despite all that her doctor and the social worker were saying about her needing to be in a skilled nursing facility, I took her home. That is what she wanted ...so that is what I did for her. I honestly did not have the energy to find someplace and then fight her to get there.