Whilst we were away on holiday last week Derek suffered a subarachnoid haemorrhage – basically a bleed on the brain. Mum got him to the hospital and he was operated on and placed into the Intensive Care Unit. It’s not possible to stress how important life-threatening this is. At the time of writing this it’s now 6 days and we’ve visited him with Mum for the last two days (having not come home until midnight on Sunday) and we’ve only seen him open his eyes in that time.
During the holiday we kept in touch with Mum and it seemed he was progressing and she was positive but something went wrong and he had to go back to ICU which is where he’s remained and where we’ve seen him. Tubes coming out of him in all places and helping him to breathe, it’s heart-breaking to witness.
Mum is bearing up okay but she must be exhausted, it’s tiring for us and we’ve only been there a couple of sessions – we’re allowed there in the morning and afternoon/evenings. It’s hard to know what to do or say and slowly we’ve got more information from the nurses or doctors there. They’re very good and he’s on a constant watch, it makes you realise how serious this all is and reading the literature, it’s not positive reading whatsoever!
We can only keep supporting Mum and hoping for the best. Tash went up there with Mum this evening and they came out much more positive as his eyes were open and they were trying to communicate with him, how much he sees or hears we don’t know but you hope it’s helping in some small way.
It’s draining physically and of course emotionally, it’s so sad to see him like this and also see the desperation in Mum willing him to be well and to pull through this, she’d be so lost without him and it’s a terrible thing to face up to and think about, but it’s a real possibility that he won’t survive this, but also, if he were to survive, what sort of state he will be in terms of mental and physical health. We can’t and mustn’t speculate, we just want him to get through this first hurdle and then go on from there.
Tash spoke to the nurse today asking about their experience in this sort of situation and they advised that it’s the first 10 days that’s the main milestone for someone to survive, tomorrow is day 7!
The kids are not sure about visiting, I think Charlotte might go but Lewis is up in Manchester and I think Jack won’t feel comfortable – he might wait and see what Charlotte says if she does go on Thursday.
It’s hard to think of anything else at this time, it’s a horrible, horrible situation and as I mentioned above – absolutely heart-wrenching.
Fingers crossed is all we can say
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