Sitting With My Sister-In-Law At The Hospital

She was flown to a larger medical facility for emergency surgery. The surgery wasn’t needed as her urine output was better. My sister-in-law had fallen and had broken her hip at her son’s house. I went to see her in the nursing home where she was for rehabilitation.

The surgery to repair her hip went well. The next time I saw her though, she was in the hospital as she had gotten an infection and pneumonia. We were told she was very sick and they had to put her on the respirator, and they weren’t sure for how long yet.

The next call I got was that they decided she would need surgery to put a stent in to help with her urine output, and she would be moved to a larger hospital to do that and to check a mass they discovered.

First things first. They have brought her out of sedation, she didn’t need the surgery as the urine thing corrected on its own. I was at this hospital now and was told that she would need to come off the respirator in a few days. She has been off sedation and appears to be doing well.

If she can’t be taken off the respirator to breathe on her own, then she will need a tracheotomy. For that, she will be moved to yet another medical facility. Further away from both her children and me. Her brother does live in that city, though.

My experience is that as we age, we fall more easily and we break. I was told a hip is the worst. I figured she would have a long journey back, but didn’t expect her to be so close to death and then have all the happenings since then.

My niece has been her primary person who has stayed with her. She also has her medical power of attorney, making decisions for her as she isn’t able to communicate.

Now that her mother is alert, she has work to do and will be gone for a few days. I hope to get there to sit with her more often. The trip to visit is a three-hour round trip, and sitting with her makes for a full day. So I’m hoping to get there every other day right now.

If I were younger, I might try to stay with her overnight. There is a sofa that folds down to sleep on. She is in the medical intensive care unit.

When she coughs, the machine is so loud that hospital staff, mostly nurses, come to the door. When she is suctioned, that is uncomfortable. It is a good thing when the gunk is coming up. The noise is loud and just above her head.

She has way more hookups than the one above. And at least 3 separate monitors. Lots of noise. Without sedation, I’m guessing it will be hard to sleep there, as it is in most hospital settings. You can think, I’ll go to the hospital and get some rest, and you would be wrong.

Maybe if you just had a baby with natural childbirth, you could sleep through that noise when the baby was born and safe.

My niece and I went for lunch before she left, and she got a parking ticket. The meter box was set back away from the street, no meters or signs by where we parked that said the street was metered. I noticed that on the block ahead of us, there were meters, but I didn’t think it applied to us as we didn’t see anything.

The parking ramp was $3.00 for the day at the hospital. And they had valet parking that would have probably meant at least a $5.00 bill. It is easy to get distracted with this stuff when I don’t want to admit that she is not out of this crisis yet.

She recently left my brother after many years of marriage, and they have two now-grown children and her two before their relationship. He would have been here, but she doesn’t want him to be. He is distraught and on a roller coaster with how she is doing better than when reported she is not.

Someone told him a 40–50 percent chance she would make it through what was going on.

My brother is an active alcoholic and drug addict. I learned in my family program that I can love him and pray for him, and that is what I do. In the meantime, I will stay out of their conflict and not take sides, and be there for both of them in the best way I can.

And I can’t help commenting from time to time about how he will need help to quit, as he isn’t doing so well on his own. Twice, he posted on Facebook while drinking, which convinced family she is dead, and I started getting calls.

I told them to watch the niece's posts and mine, and that will be the update they should believe. I told them I will put any news on our family board as to how she is doing.

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Published first by Mercury Press on Medium.com