“These are the times that try men’s souls…” Who wrote that? I’m too tired to Google this evening, and these have been very trying times.
\nOn Monday, Elegante Mother had a seizure. She made a flying trip to the hospital with hunky paramedics, and spent the day in the ER. Most of her time there was spent waiting for a room assignment. She had a CT scan, and was admitted.
\nTuesday morning they did an MRI, and are fairly confident that she is suffering from herpes encephalitis. Most likely this is an offshoot from the shingles attack she had two years ago. It’s possible that it has been building over the past six months, as we’ve watched her language processing deteriorate.
\nEM had a second CT scan last night, and this morning they had fairly good news for us. No other problems showed up on the second scan. The docs are going to treat her with an antiviral, an antibacterial, and something to prevent more seizures. We hope that she will recover, but we have no way of telling if she will make it all the way back to the person we think of as EM.
\nMother is recuperating very slowly, but that’s to be expected, since she is 91. Each time I see her, she is doing better with cognition and language. She knows that I am her daughter, but she couldn’t remember my name. She recognized Dear Husband, when he visited today. She was thoroughly ticked at me when I left this evening, because I wasn’t letting her go home!
\nEM will be in the hospital until Friday, or possibly Saturday morning. Then, she will be moved to a nursing home for ten days, because she will be on an IV drip for her medicines. At that point, we will assess whether she is able to come home (with assistance), or needs to remain in nursing care for a while longer.
\nMy family has been very supportive. I would be lost without My-Sister-The-Nurse, who, thankfully, has the power of attorney for my mother’s health care. EM has had three generations of family visiting, and each day she remembers more and converses longer.
\nI hope…..and pray…..that she will be able to return home soon. We’ve been lucky so far. I hope she has more luck left.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“These are the times that try men’s souls…” Who wrote that? I’m too tired to Google this evening, and these have been very trying times. On Monday, Elegante Mother had a seizure. She made a flying trip to the hospital … Continue reading