He had a heart attack this morning.

It was major.  I woke up about 5:30 am and he was coughing so hard I thought he was vomiting.  I went in to check on him and he said, "I think you are going to have to take me to the hospital."  I said to let me get dressed.  When I went back he had tried to get up to put his shoes on and he couldn't and said I needed to call 911.  Which I did.

They took him to the local ER and I was right behind them.  They did a heart enzyme test called torponin.  I had never heard of it.  Normal is .02 and he was at an 8.  By 2 pm that had gone up to 81 and it will continue to rise for 24 -26 hours after the heart attack.

The local hospital wanted to transfer him by ambulance to a facility about an hour away that has a cardiac unit.  He did not want to go.  He wanted to come home and start palliative care.  He had an excellent physician who told him that he could do that, but he would surely die.  He thought that it could be something quite simple like just getting a stint and he could be back home in 2-3 days and not suffer.

So off he went in the ambulance.  I'm glad he agreed.  Nothing worse than watching the person you love suffering.

I came home, gathered a few things and one of my sisters rode up with me while the other one followed in her car.  Incredible sisters who drop everything at a phone call!

They did tests all day long.  Excellent care team - I'm so impressed.  They worked first to get him comfortable, breathing with no struggle and as stable as possible.  3 or 4 EKGs, a heart ultrasound, so many labs I can't count them.  They need to do an angiogram.  That's the test where they run dye through his heart to see where the blockage is.  The dye is extremely hard on kidneys and can cause them to fail.  So they decided to hydrate him overnight with iv fluids and do the angiogram in the morning.

We had rounds of discussions about this Humulin RU 500.  I was advocating for him every second of the way.  I had grabbed his and took it with me.  At first they were going to convert the 100 and administer that.  I told them about past problem we've had with that.  True to form, the hospital pharmacy does not stock RU500.  So finally it was agreed that he could use his own, but they will inject it and keep it in their pharmacy.  I'm fine with that!  I think the clincher was when I told the cardiac MD that he had crashed on the operating table during his spinal fusion surgery.....they decided I was dead serious and knew what I was talking about.

Everyone was pleased and impressed with my spreadsheet of every lab he has had done since 2006.  They couldn't believe it.  I also had lists of all of his medications, his allergies, his medical history with dates.....I doubt they've ever had a patient so prepared.  But I have learned that if you present all that - they know that you know what's going on and they pretty much have to be honest and up front.

And I made him be honest about his marijuana edibles.

Things are changing in the medical world.  They will honor his DNR.  So if he has a major heart attack, they will not put him on a ventilator, etc, trying to force him to stay alive.

And I stayed true to my promise after the last hospitalization.  I drove the hour back home and will spend the night here.  I will go back tomorrow for the angiogram.....then I will not be going back every day.  I just can't.  I am 9 years older than when he had his open heart surgery.  I now know how important it is that I take care of myself.

If you read my last post, you know that we were expecting something like this to happen.  Mentally, we were ready.  There was no panic.  We just went through the drill of getting things he might need while in the hospital, making sure the pups were taken care of, taking things that I might need for the day, grabbing the RU500 and needles.  We had just talked yesterday morning about his symptoms and how close I thought he was to having a heart attack.

He is not stable tonight.  He could have another heart attack overnight.  We are both ok with whatever happens.  I told him how much I will miss him.  He told me things that he wants done.  No matter what happens, it will be ok.

I'm going to get a good night's sleep so I can face tomorrow.

DW