Audrey's Lung Cancer Story

13 days after Audrey went to the nursing home

This has been quite an experience. I should have filled in more before this. The days have just melted into each other. I was able to rest a couple days knowing that Steve and Roxie were at Dad's. Monday, the 12th was the first night Dad had spent alone in the house. He said he did pretty good with that. Donnie and I went to see him on Tuesday the 13th. I brought down a picture to place outside of mom's room at the nursing home. She just laid there most of the time we were there. Fill in here.

On Sunday afternoon at 1 p.m., Dad called and he started crying and said that he needed us there. Donnie and I fed the animals and packed a bag. We were in Galesburg in less than 2 hours. I had called Aunt Barb Perry to see if she could go over and see how Dad was doing. Buster went instead. Dad told Buster he was going to start the depression pills. Buster apparently didn't hear Dad and asked him why he wasn't taking the depression pills. Dad got a little upset and Buster went home. Dad was sitting on his back porch when we got there. He was glad to see us. Steve had called at 1:30. I had to call him back. He asked me if the pills had kicked in yet. I told him that these kinds of pills take at least 2 weeks to work. He argued with me and said, "No, they should work in 2 hours." I told him how my ex-husband had taken depression medicine and even though you want it to work right away, it doesn't. And sometimes after 2 weeks it might not be the right stuff. But anyway, there are other things out there that do give instant relief, so Dad was going to call his doctor in the morning and ask for Vallium. Dad had also decided he was not going to go visit Mom 3 and 4 times a day. He decided once a day would be plenty. It was weighing on him because once he got home, he just had time to soak in what had happened and then he had to go back out again. Mom keeps asking Dad if she can go home and she wants to go with him when he leaves. At about suppertime, Donnie and I went out to see Mom. She was sitting in a recliner out by the nurses station. The chair was right next to the TV where she couldn't see it. She doesn't watch TV much anymore anyway. She asked about Dad. She says he never comes to see her anymore. I just assured her that he would be in to see her soon. The helpers came to take her to supper. I suggested they move her back to her room. They came back later with jello and onion soup. Dad has requested that family members not be obligated to feed her. I tried to get her to eat some jello but she didn't want any. The helper came back in a few minutes later and was feeding her big spoonsful of jello and she was eating it. I told mom that we were leaving and we left. We went back to Dad's. We just sat around talking. I called Sherry at her work at Dick Blick's and told her we were in town. I told her we would meet her at her trailer at 10 when she got off work. Her boyfriend, Daniel, and his friend, Demond had been busy getting it ready. We didn't stay long and we went back to Dad's at about 10:45. Dad decided that he wanted to sleep in the side bedroom so he could get up and work out in the morning. We had washed the sheets on his bed and we slept in his bed. It was strange to be sleeping in my parent's bedroom. All the things around that reminded me of Mom. I didn't get much sleep and then at 2 a.m. a storm started brewing. It lightninged a lot then the rain came down in sheets. Donnie and I got up at 3 am and had watermelon and musk melon. We laid back down around 3:30. I woke up at 7 and dad wasn't in the kitchen yet so I laid awake until I heard him walk to the kitchen. We sat and drank coffee until Donnie woke up at 8. Dad called the Doctor's office and the doctor ordered him some valium. I made pancakes and sausage links for breakfast and we put the left over pancakes in a bag. We went out to see Mom about 10:00. I stopped to talk to Joyce Dowell as I entered the ward and then I heard someone say, "Cindy". It was mom. She was sitting in her wheelchair, with no cap on holding a cup of water. I went over to her and she asked if I had seen Dad. She said they had wheeled her up there and she was waiting for him to come get her to take her home. I just told her that Dad would be by soon and then I just started talking with her. Since she was in her wheelchair, I pushed her out of the ward. At the doorway they have a cute bunny in a cage. I asked her if she knew what it was and she said a cute bunny. I asked her what color it was and she frowned and thought and said brown, and I said it was a blackish brown color. We proceeded out toward the dining room and there are big pictures of flowers on the wall. I asked mom what kind of flowers they were and she looked but didn't say anything. One picture was of tulips and the other was of daffodils. We went back into the nurse's station area and talked a little more then Mom said she had to go to the bathroom. A male helper was there and he said that he could take her. So I told Mom I was going to go look for something and that I would see her later and I got out of there. Donnie and I went back to Dad's and he was already back from the Galesburg Clinic and he had already taken his vallium. We took him to the old Markham's restaurant for dinner. Dad had some kind of breaded fish, Donnie had a 1 lb. catfish and I had a large taco salad in the shell.
When we got back home, we sat around for a little while then Donnie and I left to come home. Let's see.... that would have been Monday. We decided that we could pack up Tuesday and do the same thing so we did. I will write more about that in Part 2 of this long boring story.

posted by Cindy @ 10:47 PM