my dad’s story – A Year in The Life

March 25, 2020

Since I told you a little about what the last year (months) of my dads life was like a couple of days ago, I figured I’d expand on it a little. So, if you don’t want to read it, click off the page. Here, I have only gotten as far as September, when he had his first fever… the last six months will come next week.

At this point, I’ve gotten so I write down stories and/or memories as they come to me. His actual story is in order in Word, and I will more than likely make a page for his story. Soon… although I do have his stories linked so you can read it in chronological order.

Hope you enjoy!

A Year in the Life

One morning, in April of 2016, I woke up to find my dad sitting at the kitchen table staring out the window. He had an empty bowl in front of him, he had already finished his oatmeal. He was fully dressed. I took one look at him and knew something was wrong.

Apparently, his RA doctor had called around 6 o’clock in the morning…his liver enzymes levels were extremely high, around 4 times the normal level. I had taken him to have bloodwork done only the day before, the lad started calling the doctor at two o’clock in the morning. He needed to get to the hospital…but he waited for me to wake up and get motivated.

Little did I know what the next year had in store… at the hospital, they couldn’t find anything wrong. He was admitted and stayed for a couple of days.

For the next several months, things stayed pretty normal. We would go out and work in the yard, family reunion in June, church outings. Life was pretty normal, with the one exception that we were going to the doctor’s more often. Oncologists, family doctor, gastrointestinal doctor ( he had been diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in 2011), RA doctor, getting lab work done.  

Then in September, 6 days after celebrating my sons 18^th birthday, the first fever hit. In the morning, it was 99.9…I called the doctor and made an appointment for that afternoon. By the time it came time to leave, his fever had skyrocketed and I ended up taking him to the hospital instead of the doctors. This was the scariest drive in my life – he was hallucinating, telling me we weren’t going to make it Arizona (his liver doctor was in Georgetown and one road we had to take was Pheonix Drive), trying to take his seatbelt off. I drove the whole way with one hand on his seat belt so he couldn’t take it off.

This first fever was just the beginning of what was to come over the next six months.

more to come….

Please don’t be sad…he had a good life, a fun life and while he may have been taken to soon from this earth, I will see him again!

to read his story from the beginning, click here

Take care
Stay safe
Much love