Scared

Yesterday I had a lovely evening with my friend K. We did sushi and then relaxed at the Kabuki Baths. After we just hung out and talked. It was wonderful!

As I was driving home, I had a message from my brother last night on my cell to call him at whatever time I listened to the message as he would be up. I called him at nearly 1am his time. Our favorite uncle, J, is in the hospital. He has two blocked arteries, his lung capacity is 37% and he's anemic so they can't even do surgery. They gave him two pints of blood, but it did nothing for the anemia. They now assume he is bleeding internally somewhere. They are doing a colonoscopy today to try and find out where. Apparently when they were running one of the tests he had a heart attack. It wasn't severe, but there is damage from it in addition to old damage done at some other point in time. The doctor thinks it may be a few weeks before he's strong enough to have surgery.

UJ has been a part of our lives since we were born. He would always come to town for Christmas and we'd have one day where it was "our" day. We could go where we wanted, do what we wanted, eat and drink what we wanted, etc. Then he'd take us home, drop us off as we were bouncing off the walls on a sugar high and grin and wave at my parents as he'd go to grandma's to stay. :-) He's always been such a big part of our lives.

My brother and I have both been really concerned about him the past few years. He's gotten severely overweight, has smoked since he was 12 and we both think he's probably been depressed since our parent's deaths. Dad was his best friend and mom was his little sister. it always bothered him that he's been the one who has abused his body for so many years (he's also an alcoholic who stopped drinking long before I was even born and hasn't touched a drop since) and it was my parents who both died. I've tried talking to him multiple times saying, "Hey, you're all I've got left and I'd like to keep you around for a good long time. Let's try and take some steps to ensure that happens." Even that didn't work.

The extra-annoying part - his PCP missed all this. UJ's breathing had gone downhill a lot recently. He saw his PCP who didn't think it was anything to be concerned about. He even had his annual physical at the end of December and said he was fine. My uncle was at a Christmas Eve party and got to chatting with a cardiologist who said, "I wouldn't be so blase about your symptoms. Check yourself into the ER tonight, put me down as the attending and I'll be in first thing in the morning to see you." So he did. The doctor in the ER said he thought he had some clogged arteries and emphasema, but dismissed him so he never saw the cardiologist who had sent him there. He got some prescriptions from the ER doc and then had a follow-up visit with his PCP. His PCP said he didn't have any blockages and didn't have emphasema (keep in mind this is like a week ago) and there was nothing to worry about. Who knows how long this guy has missed it?

So here he now is in the hospital with two arteries blocked and 37% lung capacity. He's supposed to see the cardiologist this morning and then have the colonoscopy. His ex-girlfriend is there with him and calling my brother with updates. I'll hear from him once we know anything.

I'm scared. I'm scared of losing him too. I hope that everything will turn out fine and that this will be the kick in the pants he needs to get his life back on track. I pray that is the outcome. But mostly I'm just scared right now.

Please add my uncle to your prayer list. Thank you!

This moment of being scared was brought to you by the letter S and the number 3.