mom sick in ICU tonight

[musicman777]

Hello ENA, thanks for all the positive comments, thoughts, and prayers. I have some very awful news about my mom tonight. This situation unfortunately took a turn for the absolute worse. She ended up having a bowel obstruction caused by the hiatal hernia which was causing her pain last night. She was transferred to a major city hospital where they began immediate surgery on her. My sister and I didn't even get to talk to her before she went in. My mom did call me before going under and my stupid piece of phone didn't ring at the time.

 

They operated on her for over 8 hours. My sister and I sat there the whole time. They were working on her so long eventually me and my sister went home and they were still working on her chest. We were given two briefs by the surgeons mid-operation. It turns out that the hiatal hernia caused necrosis in her stomach and esophagus; in layman's terms, half of her stomach and part of her esophagus were "dead". They had the blood supply's cut off from the hernia. They ended up cutting out half her stomach (fortunately they were able to save the lower half, they almost had to completely remove her stomach...). They had to cut part of her esophagus out but do have a device in place to give her nutrition. She also had an intestine wrapped tightly around her colon. They had to cut her colon in half and remove part to fix this.

 

Before we left, they told us she was stable and all of the urgent issues for the day were taken care of. But the situation is far from over. They have to do another days worth of surgery tomorrow. She will most likely have to wear a feeding tube for 6~ months. She will also have to have multiple operations/surgeries to reconstruction her stomach and esophagus. They said it is possible to get her back to normal but it's going to be a very very long road. I'm just totally shocked and devastated as my sister is. We were not expecting this. She was doing so well at the nursing home. She was supposed to have a meeting 12~ hours from now to come home. And the most I was expecting was an atypical hernia operation. Not a total reconstruction of her innards.

 

I'm just really tired, upset, and exhausted. I don't know what to do and this is really pulling a fastball on my life. I was hoping to take a job to move to the west coast this month. I always wanted to finish my college, but I don't think I can do those things with my mom like this. Will keep updated.

[Capricorn3]

Oh my gosh, that's just awful. So sorry to hear this. Thankfully she is in good hands. I hope all goes well for her. Stay strong.

[HeartGoesOn]

I'm so sorry to hear of this unexpected turn of events. Sending my thoughts your way, and hoping for good news to come.

[Seraphim]

Wow,I am so very sorry. Praying for your mom.

[musicman777]

My mom was supposed to get surgery yesterday (Tuesday) but it was pushed back to the morning today (they will be doing it at around 8AM today) as other surgeries were going on with her primary surgeons. My sister went to see her, I didn't go because I didn't know if she would be very awake/conscious and yesterday we sat around for so many hours. It turned out she was awake and alert of what was going on but had a breathing tube in so she couldn't speak. She was also in and out of it from strong pain killers, kept falling asleep and things. She is in pain and was very hot, sweating constantly from after effects of the anesthesia and surgery. She is stable but in critical condition; her esophagus is disconnected as well as her colon is not connected together.

 

The doctors and surgeons told my sister today that everything with her outcome of the surgery so far and her vitals are exactly what they want them to be and everything is going well. They also were able to fully remove the hernia last night. The surgery in the morning coming up, they are going to reconnect her colon, working more on her esophagus, and they are going to install temporary feeding / nutrition tubes. They also kept part of her dead stomach, and they said they are going to use part of the tissue from it somehow to reconnect her esophagus. They actually had her dead stomach remains tied to a clear bag in some medical serum attached to her bed for this reason, so my sister go to see her stomach remains.

 

They confirmed today as well that she will have to be on a feeding tube for the next six months. They want her to use this period of time to recuperate/recover and let her stomach and insides fully heal from all the crazy work done now. At which point, they will do another operation to fully reconnect her esophagus, stomach, and everything so she will be able to eat and live a normal life again. That is the game plan. She is VERY lucky that they were able to save half her stomach, because otherwise this could have been a much much more dire situation with lifelong consequences. She is also very lucky in the fact that neither hernia caused cut off blood supply to her intestines as well.

 

It's still a very surreal experience, that she had to have major parts of her organs cut out. It's crazy. If I had known these were the consequences, I would have made her get this surgery many years ago and told her to quit making excuses. I knew she could get a twisted stomach, but I didn't know the exact consequences, and she was really responsible for taking care of herself which she failed to do so neglecting this hernia.

[musicman777]

Hello everyone following this thread. I appreciate all the positive thoughts and prayers for my mom. I just wanted to post an update for anyone listing and to vent a bit. Unfortunately things just keep getting worse and worse for her. Throughout the week, she's had several surgeries including putting a feeding tube (and other tubes) in her. She's been on a breathing tube for a week and cannot speak at all, she has to write notes to us to communicate. She's in pain, hot and uncomfortable all time, jacked up on numerous medications. Half the time she is in and out of it. She IS stable right now, nothing super super urgent/serious has happened (yet) but we do keep getting sidelined with bad news.

 

Today she had another surgery done for some bag they put onto her throat that will be used to collect food/water/saliva as she isn't going to have a functioning stomach for some time and it needs to heal from all the surgery. They also did some work on her esophagus. So bad news number one from today. They found a very tiny, black lump/cyst in her remaining esophagus, only a few centimeters large. They are concerned it is cancer and sent it for a biopsy. So even if she makes it through all this, they are talking about cancer and chemotherapy as if she hasn't had enough crap already. Problem number two - she is developing really dangerous infections in her esophagus and stomach from all the surgery. Number three - she keeps developing fluid in her lungs and might have to get a surgery done just over that.

 

My sister and dad went together to see her today but then they put her under for another surgery. The surgeons told them that she now has a 1/4 chance of not making it because of the infection developing. She's getting another CT scan in the morning and depending on the situation she may have to get surgery to remove part of the infection. I thought we were getting on the other side of this but it seems she just keeps getting hit with one goddamn thing after the next.

 

I really wish I could have made her get this surgery done a long time ago, when this hernia wasn't so serious. Things may have not gotten so critical now. I had NO idea it would escalate to this. I keep trying not to blame myself, though. She was ultimately responsible for her own health and knew she should have gotten this surgery done.