Daily Anna Updates

I created this blog to keep everyone up to date on my mom , Anna. I always called her Anna banana when I was a kid and thought it was so funny, she always laughed when I did that. I will update you on her condition and try to share some funny stories also. Here we are in the days in the life of Anna banana: I will begin with a summary of where we are so far and how we got there. Anna has had this overactive parathyroid for years now. She has been taking medicine to keep the levels down. When your parathyroid is overactive you usually would get surgery to have it removed but her heart was not good enough to survive the surgery 5 years ago, and it has got worse. If you google parathyroid disease you will see all the symptoms. Her symptoms have continued to get worse in the last couple of months. She has not been able to keep food down. First about a month ago she could not even keep a sip of water down and that is when I took her to the hospital the first time. She was dehydrated and her calcium levels were up to 15, the doctor said that was coma level, they rehydrated her and gave her drugs to lower the calcium and it dropped to 10.8 and she felt a lot better for one day. We were home one day and her levels went up to 13.8 and she started throwing up again. I took her back to the hospital because she could not keep anything down, even a sip of water. The second time she was admitted, her potassium was dangerously low so she had to have meds to bring that back up. When we got home after that and she started throwing up again, she told me she does not want to go back to the hospital. We had a discussion and she knows her body is not working and she is ready for her soul to go to heaven and be with my dad. It is so sad to watch her decline. I am very empathetic, so when she is sick, I feel sick. I am now a 24 hour nurse. I always thought and wished when the time came that it wouldn't be here, I didn't want to find her dead. Her wish is just the opposite and it is not about me. This is her life and her wish is to die here in our home where she is comfortable and peaceful. I have to put my big girl panties on and honor her wishes. Brianna lives with us and she is suffering , as I am, watching her suffer. She always said that she wanted to live long enough to go to Brianna's wedding. She looked at Brianna and said "Oh Brianna, your wedding...I came up with an idea. I told her that I constantly see signs from my dad that he is here watching us. I asked her to show me a sign when she is gone. I asked her what she wants to do.. She said she wants to be a blue bird. I said ok when I see a blue bird I will know that is a sign from her that she is happy and not sick anymore and with my dad and everyone else who is in heaven. I also said when Brianna gets married and we see a blue bird we will know that she is watching us and watching Brianna get married. She smiled, the three of us laughed and cried that day. So far I have noticed she has a good day and then a bad day.. She is taking anti nausea medicine and some days it works and some days it doesn't. Yesterday was a bad day so I am hoping today is going to be a good day. It is 3:00 and so far she has not thrown up. She wakes up every day with a different craving for food. I make sure she gets whatever she is craving but when she gets it she usually doesn't eat it or eats only a small amount.The amount of food she eats is about a teaspoon of jello or two tiny bites of a cracker. The hospice evaluator came over today and she got approved for hospice. They will be sending nurses over, and they do all kinds of services for her which will take some of the pressure off of me too. If they see she needs her medicine changed they will order it go get it and bring it to us..All those phone calls and running back and forth to doctors and stores, pharmacies,etc. is what all adds up to more and more stress. A friend of mine who is a hospice nurse told me hospice not only helps the patient, it also helps the caretaker. I think that is enough information for one day. I will be posting updates daily. Follow my blog to keep up with the days in the life of Anna banana.