Stoke. Angioplasty. Party.

Stroke.
16 July 2015, in the evening.  Grandma (Aaron's grandma) was at home, and suddenly got very dizzy.  So much so that she couldn't stand, or walk, and started throwing up.  We (all the family) were concerned, but assumed it was an inner ear issue (Aaron thought it might be the flu).
I went to work Friday morning, and got a call from Sophie (Aaron's cousin) that the ambulance had come and taken Grandma to Good Sam.  Janet (my MiL) was watching Bertie (as she does whenever I go to work), but left him with my FiL.  Not knowing what was going on, or if things were dire, I left work and went to the ER.  Aaron met me there, and Sophie met us as well, with Bertie in tow.  Bertie was tired, so after a bit, I took him home.  Aaron stayed all day, except to come home and pick up lunch.  Through a CT scan and MRI, they were able to see that she'd had a stroke (a clot).  It was small and in the back, center of her head.  (None of us knew that severe and sudden dizziness was a sign of a stroke.  It's not on mentioned in FAST).  She was admitted and treatment began.  She was still funny though.  She said "See?  And you thought it was all in my head.  And you were right!"  She was really thirsty but was NPO until she could be evaluated for swallowing (which anyone could tell wasn't an issue).  But day 3 she was doing much better.  She was eating like normal, walking around, and back to her old self.
On Wednesday she was moved to the Mission Oaks Good Sam campus for rehab.  This is a better set up than the hospital.  Much quieter, no shared rooms, better sleep, and no age restrictions on visitors.  (So Bertram and the other great-grand kids can visit.  The hospital is 13+ only).  She does three therapy sessions a day OT, PT, and sometimes ST.  She's doing really well.  If I didn't know she'd had a stroke, I'd never have guessed.  Which is amazing and a huge blessing.  We need our 91 year old matriarch.  She's slated to come home on Tuesday.

Angioplasty.
22 July 2015, early in the morning.  My dad went into Good Sam to have his 2nd angioplasty procedure.  After his heart attack, he had one.  At that time they were only able to clear one artery and left the "widow maker" blocked.  (I should mention that my dad is the type that should not have a heart attack.  He's always treated his body well, maintained a healthy weight, and before Crohns was an issue; he was, in general, in good health).  A few weeks back, his cardiologist, Dr Kao, suggested they try a second angioplasty to see if the blockage could be removed.  The previous procedure used a vein in the wrist, this one would be done in the groin (femoral artery).  I was nervous, because I know the femoral artery is more risky, and it is messing with the heart.  I took the day off work, and picked him up at 5.45am.  They took him back fairly soon, and told me it would be a couple hours.  I sat in the waiting room for a while, and then went to a walk.  I checked in after a couple hours, they said it was going fine, but they'd started a little late.  I waited, worked on my crossword puzzles.  A little after 3 hours, I checked again.  They said everything was fine, it was just taking longer than usual.  I was starting to get very anxious at that point.  I think around 3.5 hours the nurse came and said he was in recovery, everything went well, and Dr Kao would be out to talk to me soon.  He told me everything went well.  They tried to go after the clot the back way, but were unable, and had to back out, and go the front way.  Because of this, they had to open the femoral artery in the left and right legs.  There were actually two clots (blocked 99%), but he was able to clear both, and put in 2 stents in one blockage, and one in the other.  He checked the original stent, which was still doing its job.  His heart should be good to go for a while. He was feeling ok after the procedure, except he couldn't pee.  So he ended up needing to be catheterized.  He stayed in the hospital for 24 hours after the procedure and then I drove him home.  He has a follow up with Dr Kao later this week.

Party.
26 July 2015, today.  Sophie threw Janet a tea party for her 70th birthday.  I was kind of surprised she went ahead with the party (due to grandma's stroke), but the show must go on.  I went over yesterday to help with set up a little, mainly I watched Sophie's two little ones (and Bertie) while she and her hubby picked up tables.  I made cucumber tea sandwiches, and sugar cookies.

Everything was beautiful.  The food was good, people had fun.  Well, except Bertie.  He was really tired, and refused to nap in someone else's crib.  We left before a lot of the guests, though not appreciably early.  Baby fell asleep after 4 minutes in the car.

Dreams

Two nights ago, I dreamed of the farm.  It was the last day there, the last morning there.  The sun hadn't yet risen, and the house was mostly empty.  There was an empty china hutch in the dining room, and one chair in the kitchen (Nanny was sitting there).  And there was a small candy rack (like in a grocery store), with three boxes of candy (like Hot Tamales, and Mike and Ikes); one for me and one for each of my sisters.  And there was some money taped to each box.  A gift from my departed grandpa.

Last night I dreamed of the farm.  Nanny had hired a lawn-mowing airplane.  And it would come really close to the house (scarily close).

Wednesday I over slept.  Bertie woke up a lot that night.  And I hit the snooze too many times, and woke up at 6.  I usually leave at 6, so I did a lot of running around.  But Bertie took a good nap, so I got to nap too.

And last night Bertram slept all night!  It's been months since that happen.  He slept 8p-8a!  Woo hoo!  He was just a wonderful happy boy today.  Like the kind of perfect mommy day.  He played, we ran errands, I got stuff done, and made dinner.  And we had a nice day.

I found out my dad is going to have another angiogram on Wednesday.  I'm very nervous.  They'll be going through the groin this time, and taking a round-about way to get to the blockage.

A good couple of days

The past two days have been really good.

Yesterday I decided Bertie and I were going to have an adventure.  I needed to go to Ikea to get clothes pins (they have the best and cheapest ones).  I looked up parks in Palo Alto, and parks with water features in Sunnyvale.  It was still fairly early when we left (before 10), so I thought maybe we could hit the water feature on the way back.  But I read about this cool park in Palo Alto called the Magical Bridge. We drove over there.  And I was disappointed.  

As you can see, it was fine.  But certainly not magically.  And while helping him on the slide, I socked him in the eye with my ring.  After we played there for a bit, we walked around.  It was a big park, and they were setting up for 4th of July festivities.  At the far end of the park, we found it: the Magical Bridge.

Slides, swings, spinning things, a little kid area, it was great!  Bertie took a tumble and bumped his head (on one of the few un-padded surfaces).  But he recovered quickly.  He loved the slides!  Two of the three are in the picture above.  The other one was made of a bunch of rollers.  He thought they were all fun.  And he went down the blue one by himself!  (That was the fastest slide).  We had so much fun.  He probably could have played longer, but I was sweaty.

You can see where I hit his right eye, and if you look close you can see the bump on his left forehead.

We continued on to Ikea.  We got lunch: Swedish meatballs.  And then Bertie fell asleep.  I got my clothes pins (and nothing else (a first!)). I was able to transfer him to the car and have him stay asleep.  I was going to take him to the water feature park on the way home, but opted not to wake him. We drove back, and went to the grocery store.  At the grocery store, he pulled a jar off the shelf when I wasn't looking, and broke it.

I made burgers, with corn and watermelon for dinner.  We had a nice night.

Today Aaron had the day off, so we decided to go to the boy scout camp for the day.  I could not wake up, so we left around 7:30, instead of 7.  We didn't hit any traffic (amazingly).  Bertie did pretty well.  I sat in the back with him off and on.  He napped on the way up.  We got to camp without incident.  Met up with a lot of people from the year Aaron worked up there.  We also had lunch there.

Now we always have to take a picture with the sign.

We stayed about two hours, and then drove up the road a little further to Pinecrest Lake.  It was really crowded.  But we lucked upon a good parking spot.  Bertie and I changed (Aaron didn't think to bring a suit).  It was hot there, and the water was chilly, but we got in and waded around for a while.  

 
We got dressed, Bertie had a little nurse, and then headed back.  We got some McDonald's (ice cream and soda).  We got behind a car whose roof carrier was open.  They were losing clothes, towels and pillows.  So we got close enough to honk, and flash the lights and wave.  Eventually they got it.  But I was bummed they lost a bunch of their stuff.  Bertie slept for a while. We stopped at a fruit stand, not knowing it was one of the lamer ones (oh well). Later, we stopped in Tracey for gas (and got 31.4 mpg!)  We only hit a little traffic on the way home.  And we saw license plates from 16 different states!

We had a quick dinner, and took the dogs for a walk.  I wish we could have bathed Bertram, but he was too tired.  It's getting late, and I'm tired.  Fortunately, there haven't been many fireworks tonight.  (We medicated Yoie, so she is calm and sleeping).