Friday Fun Cancelled Because of Death in My Family

Sadly, there will be no “Friday Fun” this week either, because I’m not in the mood.

As I had said, I didn’t do one last week because I was heading up to my Mom’s for a pill caddy restocking and looking forward to a mini-reunion w/ my brother and sister-in-law, who were flying in from Tampa.

But sadly, we had a very tragic Labor Day reunion.  Mom & I learned that my brother’s PCP is sure his unexplained 75# weight loss over the past 9-10 months is due to cancer – but she hasn’t found the primary site yet.

But worse is that my sister-in-law passed away.

My brother said that my sister-in-law didn’t feel that well on their flight up last Friday, and Mom and I didn’t actually see her until lunch on Saturday.  She told me then that she was up all night w/ chest pain radiating to her scapula accompanied by nausea and vomiting.

I immediately said those are pretty classic symptoms for an MI and you need to go to the ER and I mean right now!  But she refused saying that she felt much better now, and she actually did eat a good lunch.  I tried several times to convince her to go – but she refused.

In late afternoon my brother came down and said his wife was still nauseated w/ vomiting – but no chest pain.  I asked if I could try again to convince her to go, and he said, “You know how stubborn she can be.”

I told him we had nothing to lose.  She needs to be in the ER NOW and she’s not.  If she refuses my suggestion we’re at the same place as we are now.  He agreed it’s worth a try, and this time she agreed.

My brother took her to the nearest ER where they diagnosed atrial fib (which they were able to convert), but a CT scan showed a volvulus (twisting) of her hiatal hernia that needed emergency surgery that they were not able to do.  So they transferred her by ambulance to the U. of Iowa Hospital.  (Iowa City is only an hour away from where I grew up.)

She got there ~ 1 AM on Sunday morning, and they repeated a bunch of tests and studies, and said she did NOT need surgery and dismissed her ~ 10 AM.

When they got back she still felt nauseated and had persistent vomiting.  I didn’t see her again until Monday noon when she came down briefly to say “Hello” to our aunt and her sister (my pseudo-aunt from the KCMO Metro who went back to Illinois w/ her sister for an extended visit after a wedding on August 12^th; I brought her back home w/ me yesterday).

At that time, my sister-in-law told me then that she was going to go straight to the ER from the airport when they got home from their 6 PM flight.  I told her I thought it was a good idea.  She only stayed a couple of minutes because she felt so ill.

Mom and I didn’t see her again until I loaded up their rental car for them, and she again said she was going to go straight to the ER from the airport.

But when they landed, she didn’t.

She told my brother that she was feeling better and decided she’d wait until the morning so she could see her PCP.

Later on that night she came into my brother’s study, said I think I’m having a heart attack, keeled over and died.  My brother tried doing CPR while calling 911, and the police and paramedics arrived shortly thereafter, but to no avail.

What a tragedy!  I have no idea if things might have been different if she had actually gone to the ER straight from the airport or not – but it literally makes me sick to think about it.

Now my brother is faced w/ a diagnosis of cancer, loss of his wife and Hurricane Irma is bearing down on Florida (although it looks like it’s going to head more toward the east coast than the Gulf coast).

Poor gut can’t catch a break.

Her three boys from her first marriage (her first husband died at a relatively young age) are in Iowa, Illinois and one in the Tampa metro, have been very helpful and my brother has largely deferred to their wishes.

She’ll be cremated and the ashes transferred to Iowa for a funeral service a week from this Saturday in the Waterloo area.  I’ll go up for it, but Mom is not sure if she’ll make the two-hour drive w/ me for it.

She has a plot next to her first husband, but I don’t know if the ashes will be buried their or in a columbarium.

My Dad passed away on September 10, 1962, so Labor Day has never been one of my favorite holidays.  Even more so now.