Long road

So much has happened since my last post.  August 14th was my last post, which I actually didn't realize I had posted.  Looking at it, I took a lot of selfies on vacation, and I left out the best picture I took of Chris.

Let's just start at the beginning.  August 15th.  Chris woke up and told me he couldn't see out of his left eye.  I just figured he was still half asleep, he was going to go take a shower and wash the junk out of his eye.  He came out and told me that he still couldn't see anything in his left peripheral vision, he thought maybe he had scratched his eye in his sleep.  He decided he was going to go to work and see if it got better.  He had a trainee (someone he was training to do the work), so he was going to make that person drive for him.  While at work he text me and told me it wasn't getting better and if it was still bad, he was going to go to the dr "tomorrow."  I told him he should go to Urgent Care after work since they're open until 7pm.

I had ridden the bus that day because Damian was taking the car to go overnight backpacking, so I didn't get home until after 6.  While on the bus Chris text me again to let me know that the Urgent Care was walking him to the ER, he said it was because of his blood pressure being too high.  When I got to Mount Vernon I went straight to the hospital, I walked into the ER room as Chris was talking to the Dr.  He was saying "yeah, I went off my blood pressure meds about 7 or 8 months ago."  I said "What!?" and the Dr turned around and noticed me there.  Oh, and he said that he stopped taking aspirin as well, which is something that everyone with high blood pressure should be taking, along with meds.

I had to go home and get Maddox from his daycare, I asked our neighbors if they would mind watching Maddox while we were in the ER.  They said they would even though their oldest son was leaving early the next day to go to college and they were having people come over, but they were really great, and actually, Maddox loves their oldest son, so it turned out okay.  I went back to the ER where they were getting ready to do some tests to find out if he had a stroke.

Anyway, after a CT scan and an EKG it was confirmed that Chris had had a stroke while he was sleeping sometime the night of the 14th and the morning of the 15th.  They admitted him to the hospital, they said that the first 24 to 48 hours is the most high risk of having another stroke.  I went home for the night to get Maddox and go to bed. 

Unfortunately, both Chris and I had used all of our PTO (paid time off, which includes sick and vacation leave) on our vacation the week before.  So I went to work on Wednesday with the thought I'd leave early if I could.  I was able to come home early Wednesday and stayed at the hospital with him. Wednesday they did an ultrasound on his heart to make sure there were no blockages, valve problems, or clots so they could release him . . . good news, none of that.  Bad news, it was discovered that Chris's heart is functioning at about 10%.  As one of his dr's said, a heart's normal functioning is at 60% , the remaining 40% are used as reserves to use when in danger, exercising, etc. 

For some reason we still thought he was going to be released on Thursday, however, when I visited with him before going to work, I talked to the nurse and she said at least another day, possibly more.  They wanted to keep him under surveillance.  After I got to work Chris called me later to tell me that he was told that during the night his heart had stopped 6 times in a row before getting back into it's normal rhythm.  I called the nurse to talk to her about it because Chris has had a arrhythmia for a long time, where his heart will skip a beat or two and then go back to normal.  The nurse said that there are many different arrhythmia's and his has evolved into a very dangerous kind.  He was attached to shock pads, sticky pads that have attachments to jump start his heart if it stops, but was still able to walk around.

I think Thursday was his hardest day, and of course, I was stuck at work.  His mom came by for awhile and was there when the dr came in to tell him about his heart stopping.  He was told he has to stop all nicotine and all alcohol and to take his meds like his life depends on it, because it does.  When I got there in the evening, I think he had talked to a different dr, possibly a cardiologist, and she gave him a little hope.  He was also moved to the "critical care" wing of the hospital, which we were told he should have been in all along, but they had no rooms.

Nothing new happened on Friday, although they did take off the shock pads.  Damian came home Wednesday and was hanging out with him some while he was in the hospital.  He took several days off to be around for him. 

Saturday morning they did a nuclear stress test, he was injected with nuclear fluid that they can see, and then given a med to speed up his heart.  (That was a very frustrating morning, the nurse working that day was awful, no communication at all, and told us that he wouldn't be getting the stress test, and then at noon, suddenly she's wheeling him away to do the stress test because the dr overrode something.  It was horrible communication with her.)  Anyway, after a couple hours the dr came in and said he was going to be released.  Nothing concerning, or new at least, came from the stress test.  He has to take it easy.  He is in danger of going into cardiac arrest, but he's okay to go home as long as he's resting a lot and not drinking at all.

He was cleared to go back to work on extreme light duty and was set up with a cardiologist appt and a regular dr appt.  He was told he needs to see a neurologist about his brain/eyesight but no where in Mt Vernon has any openings until November, so he's going to go to the town where I work so that he can get in sooner. 

He's been working about 4 hours a day since last Wednesday, but is very, very tired.  His job is an extremely active job, he installs cable for a contractor for Comcast, so he's unable to do much of anything.  He goes to the warehouse and stocks stuff and makes connector cables.  I think it's pretty boring for him. 

I've been pretty worried, not just about him, but also about our finances.  We had just begun to recover from 2015 when we lost our house and then had several big financial hits, plus Damian's graduation . . . needless to say, I've been extremely worried about being able to keep lights on in our house, or even be able to pay our rent . . .

My sister is amazing and started a gofundme page for us.  I hate asking people for money, and there is no way I would have done it myself.  I've had to swallow my pride on this one and get the word out there on Facebook and on Instagram.  It sucks.  I hate it. 

If you are able, please look at the gofundme page, donate, share on social media, and keep us in your thoughts.  Even though Chris is home, he's far from better and this will be a long journey for us.

https://www.gofundme.com/wheatcroft-family

Oh, and if you're on blood pressure meds, don't go off them.  His stroke was not "minor" it was considered "significant."  He just got lucky that it affected the part of his brain for his eyesight and not somewhere else, otherwise we would have way more problems than his eyesight and weak heart . . . oh, and the weak heart is likely because of his heavy drinking combined with his high blood pressure.