So What's Wrong With Victor? (Pt.3)

There have been many more procedures since that super scary one that Victor has had to endure:  various abdominal drains, mainlines, various configurations of breathing apparatuses, feeding tubes, etc., and I had to get a phone call to approve every one of them!  (I designated a special ringtone for the hospital because I was practically getting anxiety attacks every time I heard my phone ring.)  All these things happening and yet the most stand-out operation was still to come.  [Side note:  I'm trying to document all these medical terms and procedures as accurately as I can remember them; I'll have this all double-checked if possible so as not to accidentally mislead or cause confusion concerning my dad's health.]

Dad had been teetering on balancing out after that initial operation until I received a call telling me the doctors felt they MUST OPERATE NOW OR ELSE!  (They needed to do the procedure AGAIN that scared us the last time!!!)  They had to go back in and try to physically remove the pseudo-cysts forming in his abdomen, as well as try to remove more of the dead pancreatic tissues.  His mortality was once again on the line.  "Can't the poor man ever catch a break?!" was on everyone's mind at this point.

We received yet another miracle that day thanks to the skilled hands of the surgeons working on my dad!  The surgery went as planned and they were able to remove a huge chunk of the dead tissues!  (Everything we kept hearing from the doctors was that they will try everything they can in order to NOT operate on the pancreas.  Apparently it's THAT volatile of an organ to deal with.)  The unfortunate part was that they were not able to fully close him back up due to his body being so inflamed/swollen, so he was left with a surgical mesh and a drain over the wound until he could properly be mended.

Slow but steady progress followed, he no longer needed to be intubated and had been given a tracheostomy instead.  (This was actually better because we were told it'd be less uncomfortable and he'd be able to talk with it when he was well enough; my dad not being able to communicate to us or the nurses had been a major concern.)  Soon there were less drains, less IVs, and real food brought for him to eat!  We finally started receiving text messages from him again and even phone calls!

Not being able to talk to my dad every day has been the second hardest part of all this for me.  (The first obviously is his life being in danger!)  I'm so thankful that so many family members and friends have visited him since he's been in Albuquerque; I can only be there so long at a time!  Plus, poor Kim fractured her foot recently, making it impossible for her to drive for the past few weeks! 

I just returned from my most recent trip about a week ago with my mom and am happy to report that Victor was eating, talking (when his energy level permitted), and had requested that we bring his guitar for him to play!  (He still was too weak to really play anything, but it was nice to see him doing something normal again.)  He'd been moved out of the ICU at UNM and placed in an acute care facility called Kindred.  He's scarily thin from basically not having any food for 3 months, but seeing him drink most of a frosty was encouragement that he's on the road to recovery!  (Don't worry, the nurse gave us permission to bring him some junk food to help entice him into eating more.)  He thinks everything tastes weird..... but we tried to convince him it was probably due to his non-eating since forever, the medications he's on, and the fact that he was, after all, eating hospital food! hahah!  (Sorry cafeteria people, I know you do the best with what you have!)  He still has the mesh covering the wound on his stomach, but the doctors say they will cover it with skin grafts as soon as it's healed the proper amount.

Unfortunately, we received some bad news on this most recent trip.  My dad's FMLA had run out and his company decided to fire him.  This means no more income and no more insurance.  *@$%&$#?!@#$&!!! Was all we could think at this point.

I feel ya, bro.

I admire that his boss drove to speak to him personally about this matter and how the man expressed how greatly disheartened he was that the company had made this decision, trying to reassure my dad he'd have his job back as soon as he was well.  But a terrible time had just gotten worse.  We were already in a financial crunch trying to make sure his normal bills were being taken care of and this was just the icing on the cake.  Thank goodness he is receiving long-term disability pay so that means he still has some kind of income, but this barely takes care of his regular bills and doesn't even begin to cover his medical ones. 


So this is where everything currently stands.  I got an emergency call from Kindred a few days ago that my dad had to be taken back to UNM due to complications of an infection that was highly resistant to antibiotics, but he is still on the path to getting well again.  Victor has a very long recovery road ahead of him; that skin graph still needs to be done, he's going to to need lots of physical therapy, and his body needs to kick out those stupid infections and abscesses!  We all hope he'll at least be able to come back to El Paso sooner than later and receive treatments closer to home, but right now he's still far too fragile for that.