Sunday, July 16, 2006

Here is an update on mom.

Thankfully, the ICU waiting room at Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas has a computer for public use. Here's a recap:

Early morning, July the 4th, Mom threw up and broke out in a cold sweat. Mom never complains of being sick, so judging by her looks and complaints of not being able to breathe, I knew this was serious. The ambulance rushed her to the hospital. (Thankfully we couldn't get her into the car and called an ambulance instead.) By the time I reached the hospital, she suffered a massive heart attack and flat-lined for 2 minutes. She had to be jump-started back to life. As they were wheeling her to the cath lab for emergency surgery, we talked to her and told her how much we loved her and was praying for her, in spite of her being "unconscious". Later we found out that she heard every word we said but was unable to respond. Remember this if, God forbid, it should ever happen to you.

She had 100% blockage in one of her main arteries, in which they placed a stint. Two other coronary arteries (the ones feeding the heart) were 80% blocked, but were unable to be repaired with a stint due to their location on the heart. She would need a bypass but was too weak at this point to survive the surgery. She came out of the stint surgery ok. By Sunday she was stable enough to be transported to the Methodist Hospital in Houston. Tuesday she underwent triple bypass surgery. Today, Sunday, she is able to sit up, talk, and her heart is now free of the balloon pump, which was helping her sick heart recover. It's been a stressful 2 weeks, but she is now on the road to recovery- thanks be to God. Looking back, it's a miracle she is here today. If she would have been in the Philippines or on the transpacific flight from there to here when it happened, she would have died. If we would have tried to take her ourselves in the car to the hospital, she would have died. She had the heart attack two days after Eric and I got here, so I was glad that we were already here when it happened. All things played to her favor. If she was going to have a heart attack, these were the best circumstances for things to happen.

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