Dad's second ablation session

11/09/06
Last Friday Dad had to go to the hospital via ambulance because his implanted defibrillator went off five times. It went off four of those times when he walked to the house for help. He was planting pansies. I think I beat the ambulance there since I was around the corner and up the road at my shop.

I waited in the ER and my uncle dropped by. We waited then he was brought into the Chest Pain center partly because the ER was jammed with the runny nose club. It's a shame a flex space isn't available for peak ER visits. The electrophysiologist was there and paced Dad back into normal rhythm and dropped his heart rate to 70. Medications including morphine and lidocaine went into Dad. I had to go home and help Mom and give Dad some rest.

I was furious in a sense that Dad could not have been fixed earlier this year. I thought about sending him to Emory as an option but Dad felt the care from the Macon doctor quite sufficient.

My dad got a room on the 8th floor and was spared the laggards who worked in the cardiac ICU. That Saturday he found that he would get an ablation and they weaned him off the lidocaine that Sunday. The doctor ablated his heart to burn off nodes generating short circuits. He wanted to do more ablating but could not. I hope that Dad won't have to make a return trip to the hospital.

I know my Dad won't last forever and that long-term care of some form is in the near future for both of my parents. I just feel I haven't done enough for them or to make myself a successful person. I dislike being so cynical, so angry, so quiet, so grumpy. I have another side to me that is nice and as honest as the day is long. I guess the word for me is scared. I've been scared and now that forty years close in on me I am tired of being scared of this, that, and the other.

KAT