Dad hates dialysis, calling it torture. Yesterday, he told each of us, one at a time as we showed up, that "They kept me out of my room until 4:24 pm." I don't know, I've never heard anyone say that dialysis is painful, just boring and tiring. Maybe there isn't a TV in the dialysis room. (They're now taking him to dialysis rather than bringing dialysis to him.)
But I hate that he hates it, and particularly hate that he said the part that he hates is "having to keep breathing." I'm sure he didn't mean anything as awful as that sounds; the probability is that they put him on the BiPAP machine again, or on some other kind of oxygen mask, during dialysis. We couldn't get any kind of clarification from him (as he was very tired), but of course we all assured him that we want him to keep breathing.
In general we are all frustrated, particularly at the low level of information we're receiving and from its inconsistency. Malcolm heard first that Dad would get a week's break from dialysis, then that it would only be a couple of days and then he would get it Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. We're seeing a lot less of the ward nurse and a lot more of the techs, who turn out to be student nurses. While everyone is very nice, it would be a lot less frustrating to know what in heck is going on.
Today of course we will put on our sparkly faces and do our level best to give him the best Father's Day possible under the circumstances. And we are certainly grateful that, much as he may hate dialysis, it seems to be doing him a lot of good. We will continue trying to make him see it.
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