Friday, October 03, 2008

I Hate Waiting

I'm sitting here on pins & needles. I hate waiting. My mom is having an angiogram done at this moment. She is 1000 miles away. Mom has been in the hospital for a week now. She has battled "this thing" for nearly 2 months. (Although it might have begun back in May.)

I might have told you that the doctors at another hospital have seen her 6 or 7 times, sending her home with high blood pressure. They diagnosed her as having panic attacks. I didn't believe that for one minute. Something was wrong.

Her own doctors were not treating this serious. They played this shuffle game, passing her back and forth from doctor to doctor as if whatever was going on was not their specialty. That was one of the reasons I went to see her last month. Only I didn't actually ever talk to her primary doctor. She had too many emergencies and passed my mom off to the PA.

This new hospital has been wonderful, running ever test imaginable, but coming up with "normal" on virtually everything. They moved her out of the cardiac unit telling her she didn't have a heart problem. On sort of a whim, her internist ordered a stress test. The cardiologist tried to talk her out of it, saying he didn't think it was necessary.

Last night, the cardiologist came in and told her there was a blockage and he wanted to go in and do an angiogram/possible a stent or whatever was necessary. He was shocked at the stress test. He said every heart test that had been performed on her was perfectly normal. It makes sense now that the other hospital diagnosed her with having anxiety attacks. I've heard that women sometimes present with these type of symptoms when they are having heart problems. They usually have a fatal heart attack because they aren't diagnosed properly.

Ugh! Did I mention how much I hate waiting??? The procedure was supposed to take 1 hour. It has been an hour and a half. Can't someone at least phone and say, "she isn't out yet, we don't know what is taking so long," rather than just leave me, waiting?

Thank-you to all of you who have prayed.

Oh, and the wedding is a week from today. My mom and dad won't make it. I'm so sad.

8 comments:

Heth said...

Thinking of you Joanne. You have A LOT on your plate right now. I'm praying you will be at peace and be able to fully enjoy the wedding and all that it entails.

~Tammy~ said...

oh, Joanne, please let us know how things have turned out.
Now I am worried for my Mom... she spent a week undergoing heart tests last year, and it all came out mysteriously normal.
Praying this gets your Mom fixed up. Maybe it will be a speedy recovery and your folks will make it after all!
~Tammy~

Kristin said...

Oh wow, that's SO hard, esp. being far away. I'm glad she finally got a good doctor and I hope they bring her back to health.

PJ said...

Praying for you!! Hope all is well by now.

We shall have to get together one of these days -- who knows -- miracles happen, and watch WNTW!! (Or then, God could send you a lovely little granddaughter, genetically disposed to like WNTW!!) Love!

Anonymous said...

Oh Joanne, how did it turn out? I'm praying your mom is well now!

Anonymous said...

How is she?

FLmom7 said...

I hope everything went okay Joanne, please update when you can.

Anonymous said...

I am hoping all is well with your mom this morning. I know the anxiety of being far from a parent who is seriously ailing.

He had the same procedure you mom had, several years ago. All is well.

And you are right about how ERs don't take women's heart attack symptoms seriously or seem to understand we present differently, you know? It's scary.

Prayers and hugs.