- Joined
- Oct 6, 2007
- Messages
- 7,753
Hey everybody, I haven't been on the boards lately....Once in the last month which was about a week ago and I was going to post this then but I got a phone call and had to go asap. So, the least of everything was that I had an uncle with alzheimers which we had to ship off to a facility in Arizona where his daughter (my cousin) is (he's in California and I am as well)....Nice place, he's happy, she can visit him, whole thing worked out great! The following week, I finally realize that his son (my cousin) who lives with my girlfriend and I, is suffering from mental illness. He and I are the same age (41) and we were raised like brothers. I had to talk to my aunt and let her know and she had to see some bad things but has handled most of it well. He was gone for a few days, so while he was gone we went into his room and uncovered quite a bit of garbage and about 200 bottles of urine....That's no misprint! We did an intervention and he is currently getting help....He is a really good guy which made this very hard. Outside of his living conditions you would never suspect that there was anything wrong with him. So, that is slowly working out as well or at least headed in the right direction so far. A week after that....This was the big one.....I got a call from my ex girlfriends sister letting me know that my ex was in the hospital with congestive heart failure. My ex and I are still friends and I helped raise her two sons for 10 years and consider them my step sons. My current girlfriend is wonderful and we have had my ex and the boys over to our house for dinner. Anyway, she was in bad, bad shape and had to be flown to Stanford. She was beginning to have systemic failure....Kidneys stopped functioning, liver stopped and the heart transplant team was on stand by. They thought they were going to have to use some type of mechanical device instead of her actual heart to keep her alive, while they found a donor. They were able to stabilize her to where she didn't need that procedure but she wasn't expected to live. Well, four weeks later and she had her pacemaker upgraded and can now get into a wheel chair and be pushed around. By the end of the third week at Stanford, she had made such an incredible recovery that she was stable enough to be transported to the cardiac unit at Kaiser (We would all rather have her at Stanford). They are still contemplating a transplant but aside from all of that she is smiling and talking and doing great!!! I am leaving out a lot of detail, both good and bad but this post could go on for ever. So, that's what I've been doing!!