Need advice overwhelmed!!

[sassycat]

Hello,
I am hoping someone may have advice for me on the following:

I am 11 weeks post-op from mitral valve surgery and have just returned to work.My employer was terrific, allowing me the time I needed. I thought it was going to be 4-6 weeks (what did I know!) but after having complications
of a-fib, neumothorax and pericarditis (spelling?) I wasn't ready. Now that I am back, she is putting the pressure on to "get back to work" I feel
pretty good. I feel down sometimes still.

Also: 3 weeks ago my mother passed away of cancer.

Now believe it or not my father, who is 73 yrs old is in the hospital because of bleeding in the intestines (there working on that)and they found that his aortic and mitral valve are leaking severly. My father lives about an 1 3/4hrs away in CT.The doc there said he should consider surgery soon.

My dad feels because I had such a great success with my surgery, he would feel more confident with everything if I could arrange to get him setup with my Cardiologist here in Boston and to hopefully get the surgery (if that is what my cardio advises) at Brigham & Women's Hospital with the head Cardiac
Surgeon like I did.

After loosing my mother recently, I do NOT want to loose my father.
I will get him the BEST care. I also believe this is a better choice over the small hospital in CT. Also I would be able to help him with recouperation
because he is now all alone. This is important to me.

I don't know where to begin...
How do I arrange for this?

I have no more FMLA left at work to care for my dad. I only hope my boss will not let me go. (I need my job)You all have mentioned about how people forget you had heart surgery pretty quickly. I think she forgotten already! I don't feel that she will be too thrilled that I will need time off again soon.

Sorry this so long. I hope someone can point me in the right directions.

Thanks so much

 

[Nancy]

Dear Virginia-

First let me express my sincere sympathies on the death of your dear mother. How terribly sad.

You have so much on your plate. It is truly overwhelming. You're going to have to tackle each of these serious problems a bit at a time. Your job is very important. You need that. If you were out of work, that would be exceedingly hard to deal with. So you must protect your job.

Getting your dad the best care for his surgery is also of utmost importance. But you won't know exactly what the surgeon will recommend until you have your dad get a consult with a cardiologist and then the surgeon of your choice. The fact that your dad has bleeding in his intestines, might alter the surgical schedule. I am sure the doctors will try to take care of that first and try to keep his heart issues at bay until the intestinal thing is cleared up. He would have a terrible time if he were to have another bleeding incident during his surgical recovery period. So you may have some time to think things through until heart surgery is necessary.

When Joe had some serious medical problems unrelated to his heart, he had the services of visiting nurses. They were just wonderful. You could call the cardiologist and ask about that as a possibilty for post surgical in home care for your dad, and find out whom he recommends. He would need it at least for the first week and possibly for the second, especially with his other medical problems. That would help you and give you some peace of mind while you were at work, there would be someone there to take care of him. You could also have someone there at night for the first few days at home. Or, maybe you know of a nurse who would be available. But the visiting nurses are under the umbrella of supervised care and would probably be the most reliable. They were for Joe. He didn't need them all of the time, but he did need them for dressing changes and to monitor his very severe problems. They also knew when to go to bat with the doctors and didn't hesitate to do that.

The other avenue you could explore is having your dad go into a physical therapy center for a couple of weeks after surgery. Many of the heart surgery patients who were rooming with Joe during his month-long stay at a large hospital were sent to such a facility directly from the surgical floor, after the first 4-5 days. That facility was right in the hospital complex, and one of the wives came back to visit us and said her husband was enjoying his physical therapy stay. That would certainly give your dad a head start on independence, and will be important for him because of the loss of your mom.

I'm not sure what others would say, but if I were you, I would wait to tell my employer until the very last moment. Wait until you have all of your ducks in a row. Try to minimize your time off work as best as you can.

You'll probably have to have a heart to heart talk with your dad, and also with the cardiologist and surgeon and tell them all exactly what the situation is.

There are always ways to work around everything. The doctors might have some ideas also.

Best wishes.

 

[sassycat]

Re: Need advice Overwhelmed

Re: Need advice Overwhelmed

Thank you Nancy,
You make some great suggestions which I will look into...
I think you're right....wait till all my ducks are in a row before
I go about saying anything at work.
I really appreciate your taking the time to respond.

Virginia

 

[Sherry]

Hi, Virginia,
Sounds like you are really overwhelmed right now. I'm so sorry that you are facing problems with your employer in terms of caring for your father. Also, I'm very sorry about the loss of your mother. Do you have any family members who could help relieve you? I also agree with all the advice that Nancy gave about visiting nurses and the like. I myself took advantage of that after my tricky post op. Please know that we are all here to help you or at least to lend a shoulder.

 

[sassycat]

RE:Need advice overwhelmed!!

Sherry,
Thanks so much for your reply.
Yes, I do have a sister, however she is in Colorado with 2 young children.
She flew out with her family for my Mom's funeral and stayed 2 1/2 extra weeks to help my dad, but needed to get back. I'll be taking 2 days off already from work next week to go to the hospital and talk with the Docs there. My father really wants to come to Boston for surgery. I know my sister will try to come here as much as possible, but I think it's probably going to be me who handle most of it all.

I think my father understands that a rehab center in my area
will probably be best immediately post-op (we have a very tight, small house , 4 people and no extra bedroom) and I would want him here so I can support him. I think the visiting nurses etc is a great idea when he returns to his house in CT.

Do you or anyone have any ideas about him seeing my cardiologist
or using a hospital out of his area when he is on medicare?

Thanks for the support. Although my husband is wonderful, it's nice to have
another person who has been in this heart place before to share ideas with.

 

[Ross]

As long as he's not on a Medicare HMO, he should be able to go anywhere and see anyone he wants to that will accept Medicare assignments. If he has a Medicare HMO like I do, he's pretty much stuck where he is unless the HMO will approve out of network treatments.

 

[nefarious_muse]

Hi Sassycat: My sincere condolences to you on the loss of your mother.

I can certainly relate to what you are going through with your father...I was in a similar situation a few years back.

I know that you mentioned that you have no more FMLA leave, but am wondering if there is any way that your employer can allow you a more flexible schedule (i.e. partial work from home?). Not sure if this is something they'd allow OR if it is something that will help you to care for your father...but just thought I'd throw it out there, just in case

All the best to you
Nef

 

[KathyH]

Virginia,
Sorry to hear about your loss of your MOM and now your Dad's health issues. It sounds like Nancy has given you some good advice. Like she said, they would have to deal with the intestinal bleeding before they could do anything with his heart. Sorry I can't be any more help, good luck.
Kathy H