Life is a Roller Coaster Right Now (long)

ksfrye

I'm feeling so blessed to finally be pregnant, but I'm also going through the one of the most difficult things a person can go through, all at the same time.  So yesterday, DH and I had our 1st u/s.  Everything looked great.  We were able to see a sac and yolk.  We have another u/s scheduled for next week and FX that we get to hear a heartbeat.  

 

Now with the bad news, my dad is not going to pull through.  To make a long story short, he has muscular dystrophy and for the past 6+years has been wheelchair bound and he is also blind.  He has been in and out of the hospital for the past month battling aspiration pneumonia.  His pneumonia is so bad that it's causing issues with his breathing.  He was admitted to ICU on Saturday (his 63rd birthday).  They went ahead and put him on a ventilator.  On a ventilator, he has to be sedated.  So since Sunday, he's been kept alive due to the ventilator.  The doctors are trying to give his lungs time to recover from the pneumonia, but they are not seeing a significant change in his oxygen levels.  They also feel that due to his muscular dystrophy, his lungs are too weak to breathe without a ventilator.  So the permanent solution would be to do a tracheotomy.  Even with the trachea, he still has a risk to aspirating again which could cause another severe case of pneumonia.  The doctors basically said, choose the trachea and you can possibly extend his life an unknown amount of time, but keep in mind the quality of life he will be living or choose to have the ventilator removed and they will make him comfortable until his lungs stop working.  My dad wrote up a living will years ago and in it, it clearly states that he did not want to be on life sustaining machines if he couldn't make a "full" recovery.  It also states that he doesn't want a trachea.  Being his medical POA and along with my family, we have decided to honor his wishes.  The doctors want to give it until tomorrow and if we aren't seeing a significant change, we will be removing the ventilator later this week.  The doctors cannot tell us how long he will live, it could be hours, days or weeks.  This has been a very difficult few days pull of happiness and sorrow.  In 2006, I unexpectedly lost my mom and now I'm about to lose my dad....

 

Sorry for the "debbie downer" post.  It's just hard to be so happy about being pregnant and so distraught about losing my dad.  It's hard to believe that now neither of my parents will get to "meet" my child.