Distress

As I started my workday, I received a text from Carmi. Dad had begun to run a fever during the night. He had been on antibiotics until Wednesday. I had seen him twice that day. On my second visit, I had felt his forehead and asked him if he thought he was running a fever. He said no. I trusted his judgment and anyway, he had just come off antibiotics only a few hours before. I knew Carmi had a doctor's appointment on Friday morning and that she would relieve the other caregiver as soon as her appointment was over. Dad's fever had been 104 during the night. As it turns out, Carmi's doctor ran over two hours late, and the medications that were prescribed for her took a long time to fill. She didn't get back to the Health Care Center (HCC) until after noon. I got there right after 1:00. The idiot relief caregiver had not notified the nurses that Dad's fever was returning. In fact, when the nurses had asked him, he had only pressed his hand against Dad's cheek to check, and then he told the nurses he didn't think there was any fever. In the meantime, the temperature continued to rise. By the time I arrived, they had discovered this raging fever, and he had ice packs jammed in Dad's armpits, in his groin and around his neck. They had given Dad Tylenol and had called the doctor. Unfortunately, Dad's primary physician was on vacation, and the doctor covering his calls was not responding. Carmi had gone to the nurse's station asking for a doctor. I went to the nurse's station twice. They said the doctor was seeing patients at the hospital. I said this was urgent. Then my cell rang. It was my youngest sister returning my call from last Sunday. I told her my dad was in distress. I was starting to cry. She asked if I needed her because, unbeknownst to me, she was just two hours away, celebrating her 20th wedding anniversary. I said yes. She is medically brilliant and she is great in a crisis. Then Laura called, and I told her the same thing. She headed on over. A few minutes later, the HCC administrator came into the room and said he had taken it on himself to call the doctor. He said that man had a colleague here who was in immediate need of medical attention and if the doctor couldn't get over to the HCC right now, he needed to send an ambulance to take my dad to the ER. I had only met this administrator once, he was new to the HCC since Dad had been there last. I was so grateful. An ambulance showed up. The EMT's invited me to ride with them. They made a U-turn right there on 20th Street and headed the block and a half to the hospital. As we rode, I gave them Dad's medical history. Arriving at the ER, someone had parked their Prius right where the ambulances park! Wow, someone has quite a sense of entitlement! Once in the ER doors, we had to wait for the intake nurse to finish with another patient from another ambulance. All the while I felt Dad slipping away. He had recognized me when I had arrived at the HCC. He had tried to say something to me but he could only move his mouth. No sound came out. I had noticed this inability to speak growing over the past week. He had also been sleeping a lot. I wondered, and I still do, what he had been trying to say. Now I'll never know.