rough week

This week has been a rough one. Things all started on Sunday morning when my mom had to go in for a second surgery. Her brain and swollen up very high and the her doctor needed to remove part of her skull to help relieve the pressure. We were all very optimistic going into Monday.

Monday is such a fog right now but Tuesday she made a turn for the worse. After a late afternoon MRI on her brain on Monday, we learned that she suffered a massive stroke on the right side of her brain. The cause was from the intense swelling before her surgery on Sunday morning. The doctor has told us that this stroke will leave her without the ability to use her left side at all. He used caution when saying that she'd never use it again but it's a major possibility that she won't. Fortunately the left side of her brain looks great and that's the side that controls speech, vision and things like that. On Tuesday morning the swelling continued to rise causing great concern for our family and her medical team.

It was mid morning or so and my sister and I went in to see her. Her room was full of doctors and nurses all buzzing around. She looked so helpless lying there. I just broke down. I just couldn't handle it. Everything seemed so urgent and crazy. I was sure I was going to lose my mom. We stood there for about 10 minutes and then headed back out to the waiting area. I cried and cried. One of the doctors in her room was performing a brain activity test to see how her brain activity was. Once we got the results from that we were going to have her go in for a third surgery if the results were good. Thankfully they were and so she had a third surgery to remove a second section of her skull.

Evan was well taken care of by Heather at the preschool. I was so thankful for her help. Evan had a fun day of playing with his friends and I didn't have to worry if he was doing okay. Ben and I went and picked him up around 3:30 that afternoon and then that evening took him over to my MIL's house to stay over night. I needed to be at the hospital again in the morning for most of the day and Ben had to work so it was wonderful to have a second person take over for a night.

Yesterday (Wednesday) was a better day. Her swelling has stabilized and continues to today. We spent the morning at the hospital again today but came home when things seemed settled down at the hospital. She's definitely not out of the woods yet. She's still very very critical. She's been sedated since mid last week and right now they're trying to slowly take her off so that she can wake up. Once she's awake we'll have a better idea as to the extent of the stroke and if she'll recognize us and be able to talk to us. Even though her left side of her brain looks good, you just never know. There's also the possibility that she won't wake up. She's able to breathe a few breaths by herself apart from the respirator and she reacts to pain so hopefully these are good signs that she'll be able to wake up. We're praying endlessly.

Things have just been so stressful and sad this week. I've always thought that if I ever lost my mom it would be the worst thing. The pain would be so unbearable. And now with the major possibility of that happening, it's like I'm trying to protect myself or something. The pain will be so great. I'm just so scared of it. I'm scared of hurting. I'm scared of losing her. I'm scared of what life would be without her here with us. I'm just scared. I'm scared to see her. Scared to go to the hospital. Scared to hear my phone ring. Have you ever not wanted your phone to ring in fear of hearing what the other side might say? That's me right now. I hate my phone.

So today things seem to be stable. But things were stable and great just after surgery and look where we are now. So I'm afraid to hold onto this stability because it can be ripped from my arms just like that. But I just have to keep praying asking the Lord to bring peace and comfort.

So that's my update for now. Please keep my mom and my family in prayer. We are all so very sad right now. We just need some peace. Thanks everyone.

I apologize if this post was all jumbled and mix up. I just wanted to get things down now before they start fading from my memory.