Circle of Life

Turns out I ended my daycare responsibilities not a moment too soon, as I received news last Wednesday that my grandfather, 95, whom we call Poppy, had fallen and hit his head and was at the hospital. My initial impression was that it wasn't too serious, but his head was bleeding quite a bit (which heads tend to do) and my grandma couldn't pick him up, so she had called 911.

Upon doing a CT scan, they found a hemotoma, or a build-up of blood on his brain and soon discovered that it was actually mostly old blood rather than fresh from this fall. Over the next 24 hours, his condition worsened from flirting with the nurse and asking for a kiss before his transfer to the Level 1 Hospital, to being relatively unresponsive and in obvious discomfort by the time I was able to visit the next morning. We were told that without surgery to drain the blood, he would only last a few days, but that if the surgery was successful, it could greatly improve the quality of the remainder of his life. We knew it was a gamble and we knew it was risky to perform brain surgery on a 95-year-old, but the doctors seemed hopeful and Poppy mumbled a feeble "d'accord" (OK) when my dad asked if he wanted them to do the surgery, so we went forward.

A temporary pacemaker was installed to help regulate his heart during the surgery, which was performed Thursday evening. It appeared to be "successful" in terms of removing the blood; however, he never woke up after the surgery. At first when I went to visit him in the ICU Friday morning, he just appeared to be peacefully sleeping, even snoring away. By the next morning, he was still sleeping, but now had an oxygen mask and looked worse. We held a family meeting with his doctors and decided to let nature take its course rather than taking aggressive measures to prolong his life, according to his express wishes.

Doctors removed the pacemaker and then transferred him from the ICU to a regular room in the hospital. From there, he was transferred last night to Hospice Care near his house in Scottsdale. We have all been visiting and he seems to respond ever so slightly to our voices. He is at this point "actively dying" and we are told that he will probably remain with us for a few more days.

I have much more to share on all this, but thought I'd get at least the basic info out before I go to bed tonight and add more later. It has been an exhausting few days to say the least. Some of us are handling it all better than others. It is always sad to lose a loved one, but I know that he lived a long and healthy life and he has been ready to leave this world for a while now. I just pray that God will grant him the peace that only He can...