Old-Timers
 

We got a text yesterday on the way home from Killington that Pete's step-Dad's alcohol, Alzheimer's, heart arrhythmia routine has been punched up to include a stroke. Remind me to look at a DNR for myself. Anyway late night holding hands with a pretty out of it old guy keeping him from getting agitated. Not a great scene. We know how this ends but not how much time modern medicine will prop him up for be it hours or years.

A good thing can come if everyone does check their DNR and other orders.

Shit Griff, that's tough, man.

Let Pete know we're thinking about her.

Tough times. Sending love.

Sent by magick

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroic_measure

In medicine, heroic treatment or course of therapy is one which possesses a high risk of causing further damage to a patient's health, but is undertaken as a last resort with the understanding that any lesser treatment will surely result in failure.[1]

Heroic measures are often taken in cases of grave injury or illness, as a last-ditch attempt to save life, limb, or eyesight. Examples include emergency trauma surgery conducted outside the operating room (such as "on-scene" surgical amputation, cricothyroidotomy, or thoracotomy), or administration of medication (such as certain antibiotics and chemotherapy drugs) at dosage levels high enough to potentially cause serious or fatal side effects.[2][3]

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation is a particularly well-known heroic measure; vigorous chest compressions often result in fracturing one or more of the patient's ribs, but since the alternative is certain death, the technique is accepted as necessary.

Patients with advanced AIDS and concomitant pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP) are in serious danger of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). A heroic rescue could use the chemotherapeutic drug trimetrexate, which would destroy bone marrow as well as the PCP, although leucovorin can protect the marrow.

Trying to think about level of care vs quality of life... too many known unknowns.

A Do Not Resuscitate order sounds very final (IS very final), but it isn't the only option, indeed, not always applicable.

Please include a POLST.

Ya do the best ya can do, and that's all ya can do.

I've been thinking a lot about this lately. The mind numbs.

Fuck that, resuscitate me so I can grope the nurse and curse you motherfuckers one more time. [evil]Bwahahahahaha!![/evil]

Ran across an interesting tidbit awhile back.
Since 2000, hospice patients have tripled in Minnesota, accounting for half the deaths.

Better insurance? More doctors recommending? Get the almost dead one out of the way of normal routine? Ain't nobody got time for that? I'm agonna inherit that house I don't want 'em dying there?

I'm sorry Griff and Pete. It's a difficult thing to go through. No schedule, no map, no control.

I'm so sorry to hear you're going through this. It's such a painful thing. My thoughts are with you and the whole family.

:sniff:

It's the worst because you know what's happening and there's not a damn thing you can do about it no matter how hard you wish.:(

Thanks all.

Interesting. Thanks again.

Yeah, I need to just admit this and let it happen.

Sorry, Griff. Please pass along a hug to Pete for us.

Thanks Clod. Vascular surgery today. Pete's mom is pretty much a Pollyanna, this shits gonna hit hard when it hits but that is the way she's rolled for 83 years so interfering in that would be like telling me the glass ain't half-empty. I wouldn't know what to do with a half-full glass, I might spill it.

I hear ya. Like, even if the glass is completely full, the smart thing to do would be to split it into two half-empty glasses so they're more manageable. That's just common sense.

You get it!

Unexpected good news today. The bleeding was from a fall (drunken) and being on blood thinners. They expect him to largely recover back to where he was. Pollyanna dodges another bullet.

Yay!

Wow! Good news. :)

Non sequitur, I got a compliment today on one of the pieces Pete's Mom made for me. :thumb:

Nice, she loves it when compliments filter back, this one will. :)

Tell her it was Seasons...

Attachment 66588

although I get frequent comments on this one too.

Attachment 66589

Seasons is beautiful, but I have to admit... it bugs me that they go counter-clockwise.

I suspect that's because the person who carved the mold did it clockwise, without considering that it would be reversed, since it didn't have any words or other things that would immediately cause them to consider that.

I'll let her know. That's one of my favorites as well.

She was happy to hear that.

MRSA - looks like we're using precautions this morning.

Shit.:eek:

Extubation failed. He is back under sedation. This does not appear to be going well.

Alzheimer's got my Dad, went from fine, to couldn't function outside the house, to a locked ward in the Soldiers home, to dead in 6 months.

Yeah, the decline is stunning.

It took 10 months for both my folks. :(

Sorry to hear it, Griff. Thinking of you and your family today. :sniff:

He is in an old folks home. I'm seeing cracks in the reality my MiL is trying to support. She's exhausted and he is the same. Sad times.

I hope they make him comfortable there, and he embraces it.

:( Sorry, Griff.

It is done.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

My friend...


I'm with you, from here.

May his memory be a blessing.

He gave Griff the greatest gift of all... his daughter.

Sorry about this Griffster.

Give Pete a hug for us.

:blackr:

Give Pete a hug for us.

I'm sorry Griff

He is at peace. I hope you and your family find peace in this. {{{Griff & Pete}}}

Thank you so much guys. David lived beautifully by staying interested in the world around him. I hope that this is evident to all the Grandkids. The amount of anxiety and despair I see in kids now seems to me to be related to a physical disengagement from things of interest and from the natural world. Dave and I spoke of this often. He had a great ability to spark interest. His hope for technology would be for it to support interests not distract from them. I know that I have to be very intentional on-line as my brain doesn't do a great job of stopping me from making the next click. I love that the cellar has some intentionality to it. People are still the most important part of this place.

Peace

He sounds like a man who will have given those who knew him much to think about and remember him by. Hugs to you and your family in your time of loss x


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So every time I go to my Mother-in-Laws she suggests I take things. She gave me a clutch of hand tools last night that I'll have to sort through and a couple more knives. He gave me a lot of knives over the years.

Those are lovely.

You have some nice tools and you give a gift in return by graciously accepting them. It's satisfying for the giver to see their things being put to use and to see the pleasure of the receiver.

The fact you could set those planes on the couch to photograph them, without starting a war, says volumes about your peaceable kingdom. :thumb:

Wise words. It took me a long time to figure that out.
I'm always surprised what couples find to fight about. I'm just gonna go ahead and count that blessing.

I'm a big fan of those hybrid planes with the wooden bodies and metal guts. Easy to adjust the depth and the wood just glides over the work surface.

Can't wait to find a job for them.

So the old guy had more guns. The potential Columbine kid, you know the unemployed college graduate who games in the basement while his arthritic mom mows the lawn, across the street asked about getting one. Yeah, no, that won't fly. FiLs blood relatives are afraid of guns so I'm pretty well stocked now. I'm going to find a good home for some of them. I also was given a bunch of fly fishing gear, which is very cool. The clean out has been pretty wild, the man had his passions. Garden scale trains and telescopes will probably land on ebay...

Thank you. If only all retailers would be so conscientious.

It's got me wondering about this whole generation leaving their guns behind...

Just more stuff.

No, not just more stuff. You don't leave them on the curb for the trashman, you don't shuffle them off to Goodwill, or put them up on ebay in a surprise box. :headshake
Somebody has to take the time for some serious thinking about the disposal. It's a conundrum for that person because a gun in the worst shape possible is still worth money.
Probably the lowest $ return is selling to a licensed dealer, and the highest is selling on the street. The Good-Doobie return is reversed.

There aren't that many hunters in the followup generations. So we have a shit-ton of weapons being handed off to folks without any firearms training or any use for them... It gives me pause.

Help your fellow living creatures by taking those guns to the zoo, loading them, and giving them to the monkeys so they don't have to fling shit anymore. How degrading that must be for them.

The monkeys won't learn self-sufficiency if you do it for them.

But they'll learn ballistics.

I am for the arming of zoo monkeys, don't get me wrong, but I think they have to be released onto the public.

If I can't hunt over bait, then neither can the monkeys.

Also, if they take a gun, they have to give up the typewriter. Only one weapon per monkey.