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Monday morning I was sleeping in and was awaken by my cell phone ringing. I usually check the number and if its local I answer it in case its important so I see its local and of course I answer it. The voice on the other end identifies himself as a Colorado State Trooper. I went from barely awake to eyes bugged out and wide open. He begins to tell me that by now the hospital should have called me, to which I can only reply with "what are you talking about why would the hospital call me?" His reply is that the hospital was suppose to call me and then call the army. Yet he still hasn't told me why. By now I am starting to freak out and he finally says "Ma'am you husband was in a wreck this morning. Now don't freak out he is okay but by the looks of the truck its a miracle he's alive." If I hadn't been so freaked I would have told him his bedside manner sucked. He then went on to tell me that the best he could figure is that my husband fell asleep at the wheel and crashed. I told him I couldn't believe that; he was heading to PT there is no way he fell asleep. But he had made up his mind and told me that he was asleep however in the next sentence he admitted that my husband was so incoherent that he couldn't even say his own name. So there is no way for the trooper to know that he was or wasn't asleep. Anyway moving on.
I quickly threw some clothes on and ran out the door. I made great time getting to the hospital and found him in the Resuscitation unit barely awake and miserable. He had blood on his head. He had a huge lump next to the cut. He was on the verge of throwing up and he couldn't stand up. He was so miserable and I felt so bad for him. They told me that they did CT scans on his body and found nothing wrong with him. So they felt he could go home. They put him in a wheel chair and took him out to my car. He was in immense pain and super sensitive to light and sound on the ride home. They diagnosed him with a concussion and told me to keep an eye on him. On the way to the post hospital to fill his pain pills his 1SG called me and told me to take him to the post ER to be re-evaluated in the event that the civilian hospital missed something. So I took him to Evans and they got him back right away. The doctor comes in and asks me why I brought him in after he just got out of another hospital. I told them that I was told he needed to be seen by army doctors. They then took his blood pressure and his heart rate and told me that they agree with the other hospital and sent him home. I got him home and as the day went on he got worse he couldn't eat, he couldn't handle anyone talking, and the natural sunlight was killing his head. I followed instructions to wake him up and keep checking on him while running errands, talking to his commanders, and taking care of the kids. I was exhuasted but he needed me. The next day he got worse he couldn't stand up on his own and he still couldn't keep food down. He was in severe pain and his head was killing him. So according to directions I took him back to the hospital.
This time I took him to Evans as requested by his company. He wouldn't let me take him by ambulance so I drove him. When I got there I told them his symptoms that he was severely dizzy, couldn't keep anything down, his head was hurting so bad it felt like it was going to explode, and he could barely walk. After all that they still told him to sit and wait to get called back. We waited in the waiting room for 3 hours the whole time he was getting worse and worse. I went up several times and yelled at them for treating him this way and finally after 3 1/2 hours they took him back to a room. They got him into a bed and settled down. The doctor came in and explained the treatment plan for the night. They took him down for an x-ray which every one knows doesn't show tissue or disc damage. After x-rays were done and he was back in his room they started pumping pain meds into his IV. The down side is that the pain meds were calming the back pain a bit but adding a bunch of pressure to his already throbbing head. So they had no choice but to stop giving him the pain meds. One would think that they would try something else but nope they actually told us that "soldiers will do anything to get out of PT". I was getting so angry that they were treating him like a dirt bag. He was in pain, his hands were twitching uncontrollably, and he couldn't handle light or noise and the doctor comes in laughs it off and says "your going to be feeling bad for a bit." He didn't try to do anything else to help him. In fact he admitted to us that the x-ray was just to look for broken vertebrae. He tells us that without a MRI they wouldn't know if there was anything wrong but they want to wait for the swelling to go down before they do one. Then once again they discharged him this time though they said he had not just a concussion but a severe concussion and once again told me to keep an eye on him. By now I haven't slept and I was so over tired but I still had to get him home and into the house by myself and he can barely walk.
I finally got him to bed at 3 am and then got myself ready. They next morning which was Wednesday I woke up fairly early to hear him pseudo whimpering in pain. I did what I could to get him comfortable. I told him though he was fairly incoherent that I had an appointment that I couldn't miss so I had to leave I would leave our son home if he needed a drink or something but I wouldn't be gone for long. I told him to just rest I would be back soon. I gave my son instructions on how to take care of his father for the short time I was going to be gone. I hadn't been gone for more than 30 minutes when my cell phone starts ringing; on the other end is the fire chief telling me that my husband had tried to get up to walk and fell down. Our son found him on the floor in the living room. He was barely conscious when the EM T's got there. So once again we were on our way to the hospital.
What happened next was so frustrating...... But it is late so you will have to check in tomorrow for the rest!!!
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