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We waited all day.

Kept recalculating the hours. Let’s see… if he went in at 3am, it’s an 8-12 hour surgery. That has him out between 11 am and 3pm. Let’s say noon to be safe, noon to 3pm.

Over and over.

Then it was 3pm.

Then it was 3:45pm.

Then it was 4pm.

Then my stepmom and my sister called, at the same time. I talked to my stepmom. He had been out since 1pm (YEAH!). The surgeon went to the wrong waiting room and just didn’t bother to find them after that.

Dad made it through surgery fine. His liver looked way worse than they thought, so thank God he got the transplant when he did.

The surgeon says he’s still not out of the woods, but that he did well and they are over the first hurdle.

One sigh of relief down. All morning I walked around with an exhausted grin on my face.

My dad is in surgery right now. Getting his new liver.

I’m finally hopeful he’ll make it through this.

Or the right ones, at least.

There has been a silence, I know. There are many reasons for it. Khalil was here, which made for less blogging time. Some painful things were going on. Some things I didn’t want to talk about and some things I didn’t have the words for.

It occurred to me the other day that this blog really started as a weight loss blog. I don’t even pretend right now to be losing weight. I make efforts to exercise, and that has been happening a few times a week, for the most part. Eating right has gone out the window. If I think about it too long I will break down, because it is frustrating. But I just do not have the mental or emotional space to think about it for too long. I just don’t.

I don’t know what to say about my dad. Right now, my dad is not my dad. He used to say something that made me hugely uncomfortable, and I find it coming to haunt me these days. Whenever people who couldn’t care for themselves, who were losing their mental sanity or independence were on TV or talked about in conversation, he would tell us what to do if that happened to him. “If I’m ever like that, shoot me. Put me to death. Something. Don’t let me live like that.”

He’s now living like that. I never promised him anything. His attitude right now, thank GOD, is one of wanting to live. He wants a liver desperately and he wants to make it through this. But his words haunt me. Every time his dependence is highlighted, every time he loses his mind…. I hear his voice in the back of my head. It makes me want to sob.

I don’t know what to say about my Grandma. My heart hurts when I think of her. I have been irrationally angry with my mother for the last year for leaving and moving to Kentucky. I understand why her and her husband did it, and I understand just how selfish and irrational my anger is. But she dealt the latest blow this weekend when she decided she could best care for my grandmother with her husband in Kentucky. Far, far away from me. My first reaction was that she is taking my grandma away from me. Is it the best decision? Possibly, quite possibly. Am I still angry about it? Yes.

My sister said, and I agree with her… she’s having a hard time crying. Because you feel like once you start you may not be able to regain mental sanity. You may not be able to calm and come back to a place where you are not crying. If I fall apart will I ever come back together again? This is how I feel right now.

Last night I finally got to spend some time with my husband. Over the phone, but time nonetheless. It was wonderful.

Then today happened. Today was a hard day, but for some reason I handled it much better than I did the hard day that happened, oh, two days ago.

My sister and I went to the hospital first thing to see Dad, so she could say goodbye to him. He was slow, very Underwater Dad, but seemed fairly lucid. They said their goodbyes, and I told him I’d see him later. Drove Shannon to the airport, and went to Target.

I mostly went to Target because I needed cash. And I figured what better way to get cash than at Target? Except now they only give $40 back. Argh. So I went to Walmart for a bottle of water and got some cash.

Went back to the hospital. Chatted with some of the girls from work on the way. I got to the hospital.

I met my stepmother at the elevators, and she looked… tired. And stressed. She told me that dad was confused.

He did some weird things today. To save his dignity (not that he reads here) I’m not even gonna get into them. Also, when I one day am able to relive this experience by reading these posts, I don’t want to be reminded of the specifics. I just want to note that my dad was not my dad for much of the day. When he finally got settled and took a nap, and woke up, he was at least a version of my dad. Which was better. It’s hard seeing him when he’s like that though. Although I have to admit, sometimes I just wanted to laugh. It just seems silly and so ridiculous.

And what is there to do, but either laugh or cry??

Yesterday was one of those no good, terrible, very bad days. Not in that any one huge thing happened.

I woke up in a bad place. I was tired and had cried before going to bed because I missed my husband. And my cat. And my life. I woke up still sad. I didn’t exercise. It was not a good start, all the way around.

I stayed cranky. I swore at other drivers. I was quiet. I had a hard time snapping out of it and really, I never did. I felt bad because when you’re in this kind of situation, one person’s mood affects other people. It’s not like at work when you can just kind of be to yourself. You’re on top of one another and you’re around to support each other. One’s in a bad mood and it’s going to affect the other. I felt bad for my stepmom. I tried to snap out of it and just never really did.

I wanted to cry every time I looked at my dad yesterday. He just… I don’t know why but he was just breaking my heart. Every time I looked into his eyes and saw the shadows and the person he used to be, my heart shattered. He finally had a procedure to lessen the fluid in his body, mostly his stomach. We left for a while and he got confused- he got out of bed without having the nurse disconnect him, and pulled it all out. Something he had been waiting for for almost 10 days, and one moment of confusion, and he only got about 1/4 out of it what he should have.

When we got back to the hospital, he was so frustrated with himself, disappointed. My stepmom and I both felt guilty. She does a better job of staying in denial/ positive thinking. I was so upset- at the confusion, at his frustration, at the nurse’s concern, at him not getting 100% relief.

Today was a better day. I woke up in a better place. Exercised. It’s snowing and icing here today, but I still managed to get my sister from the airport safe and sound.

Up and down days. Good and bad days.

Lastly, my stepmother’s sister (step-aunt?) and the nurse from the hospital they were working with in our home state, both told my dad when he’d be getting the liver. Predicted it. They told him it would be tomorrow.

They said that Valentine’s Day afternoon.

If he doesn’t get it tomorrow, and I don’t think he will, sorry for the negative thinking, I won’t be able to bear his disappointment.

My dad is Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

He’s always been this way, on some level, but that’s a whole other conversation. He’s now this way not due to alcohol, but due to the liver failure (which I guess is due to alcohol still, but… well, that’s splitting hairs.)

When we arrived at the hospital initially, dad was being wheeled by another patient’s stepfather. He announced to us he was going to church (!!!). We decided to head to Target while he was at church with his new friend.

When we arrrived back, the energetic mood was gone. It had been replaced by someone else. He had a hard time answering questions. Sometimes the questions went unanswered. Sometimes they were answered a minute or two after they were asked. (Try doing this with a friend. Ask a question and then make them wait one full minute before answering. It feels like ten minutes go by.) Sometimes he’d start to answer a question and then get distracted by something else. Once he has something in his mind, there is no getting around it until it is resolved in his head.

His smiles were more sad, anxious. I told him he seemed slower today, and he did the ‘crazy’ sign by his ear and nodded. When he is in this mood, he does less for himself. He lets others do for him if he can get away with it. (My stepmother will do more for him. I let him do or try something- if he can’t, I’m more than willing to help. If I know he can do it, I want him to do it. Simple things- as simple as shaking the can of Ensure. He can shake it but not open it. Which is fine.)

When he’s this person, Underwater Dad as I think of him, he can only talk about things in the immediate. What he’s eating for lunch. What the nurse just said. He repeats things over and over. He moves as though moving through molasses.

Then he took a nap. And he woke up.

And my dad, though more subdued and aged, reappeared. He answered questions as they were asked. He was less stuck on one thing or another. He still repeated things, but he does this now. He didn’t do it to quite the same extent as Underwater Dad. He gave attitude when he didn’t like something. Dad could talk about things that had happened, that were happening, that went beyond dinner.

This is so hard to explain. If you’re not watching it, I think it’s hard to understand what the difference looks like. It is blatant, in some ways, but it is so subtle in others. You can tell in about 15 seconds if you’re dealing with Dad or Underwater Dad. Underwater Dad makes me want to curl up in a ball and cry. This can’t be my dad, I think. Dad just makes me sad, but not quite as devastated.

My stepmother and I were talking a little bit about his good days and bad days, and how he can change so much in the course of one day. I mentioned how scary it was. She said that’s she’s kind of used to it by now, but it’s still hard for her.

This is not something I can ever imagine getting used to. Any of it.

You spend your days, all day every day, wishing and waiting.

For someone else to have a tragedy.

So you can avoid your own.