My Grandpa, My Hero

This past week has been awful. Grandpa passed away last night in his sleep. That's the important news..now let me back up and start from the beginning. Thursday night (Oct. 14th), Mom called to tell me he'd had a heart attack and was at the hospital but that they were just making him comfortable and not taking any drastic measures. That's never good news. Plus, she usually waits a few weeks to tell me that anything has happened, so the fact that she called me the same day was alarming. He'd been in the hospital a few times during the past 6 weeks for angina, but they'd just run tests and send him home. I decided I was coming up here to visit for awhile and left early Friday afternoon.

Friday evening, he was talking and being his usual self..goofing off, telling jokes and war stories. Saturday afternoon, the 16th, I was on my way to a friend's house to visit when Dad called to tell me that my uncle had called with news that Grandpa had taken a turn for the worse and they only expected him to live a few more hours. I whipped the car around and drove the 5 minutes to the hospital. Mom and her brothers were at the VT football game b/c they thought he was fine. When I got into his room, he was napping but I took his hand and he looked over at me and smiled. We chatted for a bit and other than his hands being cold, he seemed ok. I thought, "What was all the fuss about? He's fine." The nurse told me I should've been there all morning b/c he perked up as soon as I got there. His family is his strength. I updated everyone else and they arrived shortly afterwards. I had a good 45 minutes with him all to myself. He told stories, we laughed, he held my hand. That was around 3:30 and we stayed until visitation ended at 9. He even got to see his great granddaughter and that just made his whole face light up.

Sunday, we went to visit and he seemed more tired. He was still smiling, laughing and telling stories, but I could tell he was very tired...and the fact that we have a huge family who didn't want to leave didn't make it better on his energy levels. I'm not saying the family shouldn't have been there, I'm just saying it took a toll on him. He had a larger than life personality and always loved to be the entertainer. We should have given him time to rest instead of staying in the room with him the whole time. We couldn't help it though. We love him so much we didn't want to be away from him. He was so much fun to be around and the greatest story teller I've ever known. I'm sure it made him happy to have all 3 of his granddaughters together in one room though b/c we all live so far apart. I had planned to leave on Monday to head home b/c he seemed to be ok despite being tired. I thought that was due to having people in his room all day visiting. He did have a weird episode where he started coughing and then just stared off into space while jerking, like a petite mal or focal seizure. It lasted for about 30 seconds and then he was fine. It was really scary.

Monday, I packed my stuff to head home and was going to stop by the hospital to visit for a bit before I left. Once I got there, I found out he'd seen a woman standing above his bed looking down at him. He didn't know who she was but it took him a minute to realize she wasn't real. Then, he saw my Uncle CG standing at the foot of his bed. He's been dead for several years, so i was automatically put on alert. While this could have been due to morphine, my paternal grandmother saw my grandfather just before she died and my Uncle CG saw his mother shortly before he died and I've heard of countless other instances where this has happened. So, I stayed.

We were there most of the day and did our usual shifts in his room so we wouldn't all be in there at once overwhelming him and I got a bit concerned because he had no appetite. Grandpa was always a hearty and voracious eater..so much so that we'd get done with grace and he'd be halfway through his plate. =) Any activity at all just completely exhausted him...even just cutting up his food..which is what started the episode Saturday where they thought he wouldn't make it. They made a decision to move him up to palliative care so he could rest better. The rooms are bigger and he'd have a view. There was no way he could go back to the V.A. b/c he was beyond the skilled nursing there. We had to accept that he wasn't getting out of that bed. Just shaving his face exhausted him.

Once he was moved, we stayed until around dinner time. As we were sitting there talking quietly so he could sleep, he choked in his sleep and started coughing again, which sent him into another seizure like state. It was more violent than the first time, but didn't last as long. Once he was out of it, he started trying to vomit..but it was stuff from his lungs. Mom got upset b/c this was the worse we'd seen him. They gave him more morphine and we decided to let him sleep, so we left..agreeing that the next day, we'd just hang out in the lounge instead of in his room. I had a very fitful nights sleep. I was so worried and I just knew it was going to happen this week. I kept thinking, "he's 90 with congestive heart failure and a bad aortic valve....and he won't eat. He's never not wanted to eat. And he was quiet today. He's rarely quiet."

Tuesday morning..today..the 19th...I got up a little after 9am and went downstairs to see if there were any updates. I got to the den and Mom was crying. She told me he'd passed away in his sleep during the night. She got the call around 1:50am. They told her it was peaceful and quiet. He just slipped away. He'd fought for so long and had been living on borrowed time for more than a year...he just had no strength left. I found it interesting that he was in room 1040..my department's 10 code for "fight". Before that, he was in room 518..which is my street number. There's nothing interesting about that, I just thought I'd throw out the parallel. His funeral is Thursday with full military honors. I will forever miss his war stories. He survived 35 missions in WWII as a tail gunner for "Double Trouble" and he survived Korea. He was a machinist, a coal miner and held other jobs, but most importantly, he was a father and grandfather. He loved making people happy by making them laugh. He was always ready with a hug and a smile.

I was so lucky to grow up in the same town as them. Countless trips to Dairy Queen with Grandpa. Countless weekends at their house or dinner at their house. Every holiday at their house. Banging on the organ or piano making a huge racket and they'd never say a word. I remember one time I was about 15 and Grandpa stopped by the house around noon to ask if we wanted to go to Dairy Queen. My response? "I just woke up." With a kind of dejected look on his face, he just said.."Oh...ok." and then left. He drove all the way across town to spend time with us and I turned him down. I could've asked him to stay there or I could've gone with him. Why didn't I go with him?!?!?! That's time I'll never get back. I will regret that for the rest of my life and I can never tell him how sorry I am. I just felt like I had more time. I wasn't ready to say goodbye...so I didn't, and I should have.

He'll never know how extremely proud I was to be his granddaughter and how proud I was of the passion with which he served his country. He'll never know just how much I loved his stories or how much I'll miss his big bear hugs. Could he even understand how much I love and admire him for his strength, determination, loyalty, generosity, selflessness, charm and kind spirit?? For his hearty laugh, his jokes, his stories, his quick wit and his ability to wiggle his ears? He did that for me this weekend too. It'd been too long since I'd seen him do it. Once upon a time, I'd ask him to do it every time I saw him. I'll just miss everything about him. He was a ladies man right to the very end. His nurses at the V.A. even came to see him. He was always so flirty and I found it so entertaining. He could charm anybody. I could write so much more, but it's after midnight and the next 2 days are going to be very long and tiring, so maybe I'll finish this up later. I just wanted to write all this down so I could remember it. I love you, Papaw and one day, I'll see you again. We can go get ice cream at Dairy Queen.

My Sweet Grandma: January 30, 1922- June 2, 2009

Sorry I haven't updated lately, but there's been a lot going on. I'll start with the most recent..then go back to the beginning and fill in. Grandma passed away last Tuesday, June 2nd. It was kind of expected, but you can never really prepare for an event like that. I'll really miss her. Let me go back to May. I didn't get to see her for Mother's Day because I was working, but I saw pictures of her. She looked tired, but she held out her hands for Noel and would talk and interact with Mom and Kelly. I went up to see her on Memorial Day weekend and she looked, well...awful. She kept holding her head and moaning as well as pressing on her stomach. I could tell she was hurting, but she couldn't verbalize what hurt. Mom got her to eat a little, but not much. She didn't talk and rarely opened her eyes and was shaking the whole time. She did respond to Noel a little, but not like it was in the few weeks before. She was just so weak and it was a very emotional visit for us. She didn't even know who I was. She looked at me as if she recognized me, but couldn't place how she knew me or who I was. When we left, she did put her arm around Mom and hug her back, but with Kelly and I, she just leaned her head against us and that was it. I just remember how frail she felt and how soft her skin and hair were. Her eyes weren't quite as sharp as they had been, but were still a beautiful aqua/green. We gave her a little mini manicure because her nails had gotten too long, so I hope she enjoyed that.

On Memorial Day, her sisters went to go visit and got her to eat more than she had in the past few weeks, so we were encouraged. They kept giving her whole foods which she can't eat without her teeth, so they tried putting her teeth in and found out she had thrush, but they did get her to eat some pureed food and started treating the infection. They never did test her for a UTI even though she got them frequently. Anyway, I kept in touch with Mom on how she was doing and I prayed for her and Mom both rather frequently. Last Tuesday, Mom told me she wasn't doing well at all and was refusing to even drink water, so I told her I'd be up Wednesday to try to visit with her since it sounded like the end was nearer than we thought. Turns out, that was quite true.

Tuesday night around 11pm, Grandma let go and was finally at peace. The nursing home called Mom late that night and told her that Grandma's breathing had become ragged and that they felt that this was it, so Mom and Dad jumped in the car to rush over there and during that 15 min. drive, she was gone. Grandma was always a very private person, so she waited until my uncle left around 10 and let go before my Mom got there a little after 11. The strange thing is that Kelly had told me that it was around 11pm that she started really thinking about her. What's also strange is that around 11pm, I started praying for God to just take her and to end her pain. I didn't want her to die and would do anything to have her back, but I knew she was hurting and while I couldn't do anything about that, God could. She was one of the most generous people I've ever known and always had a smile on her face. She wasn't happy until everyone else was happy and she didn't deserve to go through all the pain and suffering that she did.

Grandma amazed me with her memory. She could remember dates and events in such detail that I wondered how she could possibly store all that information. She remembered all the stories of her childhood...as well as numerous ones of her parents' childhoods and the names of many ancestors..and names of neighbors from 50 years before...plus who they married and the names of their kids. It just fascinated me that she was such a wealth of knowledge. I've found it ironic that a person with such a sharp memory ended up with Alzheimer's. It's such a cruel disease.

In her younger years, she was a 5th grade teacher and that job never left her. She was always teaching us things and encouraging us to learn. If I had a question, I went to Grandma. I remember making butterflies out of paper by folding the paper in half and cutting it out and then coloring it. We did that with snowflakes a lot too. I remember catching fireflies in jars in her backyard and sitting downstairs stringing green beans. I remember the childlike sparkle in her eyes when she was really tickled over something and would laugh. I remember her babysitting me and having to sit with her on the couch while she watched her soap operas and I remember her trying to teach me how to play the piano. She had a never ending supply of patience and generosity. She was also a fantastic cook! I remember making a LOT of peanut butter cookies with her over the years.

I also remember her pin curling my hair all over like she did hers when I was about 4 or 5. She'd twist the hair around and pin in down and then cover my head with a bonnet to sleep in. In the morning, she'd take it out and I'd have spirals all over my head...completely out of control..lol. I'll always look back and smile when I think of how embarrassed she'd get to be seen without her teeth in. She was so cute when we'd try to say goodbye and she'd follow us to the car and keep us there for another hour because she didn't want us to leave. She'd always make sure we knew that we could stay the night whenever we wanted.

I'll also never forget working with her in her garden or all the times I spent the night with her. I remember the empty food boxes she'd save for us to play with and all the Sundays of sitting next to her in church. I remember so many holidays at her house and Sunday dinners with huge bowls of mashed potatoes. I remember picnics up on Mill Mountain with her and Grandpa. He'd go to KFC and get a bucket plus all the fixing's' and we'd head up the mountain. Grandma always had such a comforting presence. Just being with her gave you the feeling that all was right with the world. I never once saw her get angry or worried over anything. She just took things with a grain of salt because she had such a strong faith in God and knew that he'd take care of everything.

I feel like I took so much for granted and didn't appreciate her as much as I should have. I think I just thought she'd been around for so long that she'd just always be there. I feel so lucky to have known her and to have had her influence in my life. She was just an amazing woman with a very bright and kind spirit. She didn't have one enemy in her life and not one person who didn't like her. That's quite rare and I'm so proud to have been able to call her my grandma. I used to call her Granny, but somewhere around age 11, I felt that I was too grown up to call her that.
Over this past weekend, I also learned that she played basketball in high school and college and was named after her mother's roommate at Radford University. I also learned that she was in several gardening clubs and I never knew that. I knew she had a love for gardening, but I didn't know she belonged to any clubs. I got to hear so many stories from Grandpa about their dating years and old family stories in general, but I'll save those for another blog. During her funeral, I kept thinking about how much she would've loved to have been there laughing and talking with her family. She was very close to her family and blossomed when everyone was together.

It was a beautiful service and she looked like herself again. They did a fabulous job of capturing her and making her look like her old self. There were 87 pink roses on her casket and they played some of her favorite songs; How Great Thou Art, Amazing Grace and In The Garden. There was another song, but I can't remember the name of it. She was always concerned about making everyone happy and not inconveniencing anybody and she did that until the end. She waited until everyone was in town or on the way there before she passed on and then on a very rainy day, we were in a mausoleum where it was dry. That's Grandma...always looking out for everyone else. Now, she's just doing it from a place with a much better view. I'll see her again someday, but until then, I just wanted her to know how much I love her and will miss her sweet face, soft skin and comforting hugs. The world would be a much better place if more people were like her. I had found some drawings in Grandma's attic that I'd done as a child and I kept them. After she passed away, I thought it'd be fitting to leave them with her. Two were of butterflies and one was of a house. One stands for transformation and the other symbolized her new home. It wasn't planned, it just worked out that way. I forgot them the night of visitation and then again the day of the funeral. I was so upset, but I did a quick mini drawing of a butterfly and house and then wrote a little note and left it in her casket with her. Some may think it's silly, but I felt better for doing it.

After the funeral, we had a ton of people over to Mom and Dad's house for food and family stories, most of which involved Grandma. It was so great to have that part of the family together again, even if it was under somber circumstances. We hadn't had a Sykes Family Reunion in years, so it was fun talking with everyone again. Saturday, some of the family stopped by again before they left town and then Kelly and I went shopping. We went by the Goodwill to try to find a bunch of my grandparents stuff that was donated by mistake while they were cleaning out the house. Grandma had a deep dish blue ceramic pie plate with a lid that I really wanted but it was donated along with a cross stitched picture of apples that my mom had made and with a black and white step stool/seat that I used to sit on at the dinner table when I was little, but that Goodwill is a distribution center so that stuff could be in any Goodwill from Charlottesville to Danville. Ugh! We left her descriptions and Mom's number in case it happens to still be there, but it's likely long gone. =( I do have a few things of hers that I'll always treasure, so that's a comfort to me. She'll always be a part of me and I'll always cherish everything she's taught me and all the memories I have of her. So, to Anita Florence Sykes Anderson, the best Grandma in the world, I wanted to say I love you and hope to be able to pass on everything you've taught me to my own children. You'll never be forgotten!

Sigh. Anyhow, here's a few pictures from the past week that I hope you'll enjoy.

Grandpa kissing Noel's foot

Noel standing up on her Great Grandpa's walker.

Noel having a snack! Cute pigtails!

Jeff and I in my parents yard.

Grandma's brothers & sisters and their spouses w/ Grandpa.

Rita, Carol, Gay, Alton, Clair, Grandpa, Beth. The joke was funny, but too long to explain!

Beth, Rita, Carol, Gay, Alton, Clair and Kenneth: My Great Aunts & Uncles.

The Dooley Family: Tim, Kelly and Noel

Fertility Chronicles: Part 5

Sorry I didn't update this last week, but I was busy! Jeff and I had our IVF medication instruction class last Thursday. There were 4 other couples in the class and it lasted about 2 hours, but was filled with a LOT of information. She gave us the details of which meds to take and when and for how long and showed us how to draw the meds. She left very few questions unanswered. I'm really glad Jeff went with me b/c it was a lot of information to get in such a short amount of time. The progesterone needle was the only part that made me go.."hoollly crap". Two inches long..all the way in my hip..every day for 10 weeks after the embryo transfer. If the embryo's don't attach and I'm not pregnant, then I don't have to take it..otherwise, it's through most of the 1st trimester. OUCH.

So..where do we stand now? I got a letter from Duke telling me the amount I owed after insurance paid, which is $3518. I faxed that to ARC Sunday night and they called me back confirming that they got it and were just waiting on the clinic to fax the prescriptions. Duke faxed those to ARC today and she called telling me the price on those was $2328.48, for a total loan amount of $5846.48. She said she'd get the loan paperwork up and ready to go and fax them to me tonight...which I never received..but then I just sign them, fax them back, they order the drugs and have them overnighted to me..and away we go! I still have to go in for my baseline ultrasound before I can start the drugs, but hopefully I can start them the first of next week.

Jeff got me all freaked out the other night because he told me his contract expires on April 15th and I thought we had until April 30th. If I had started the drugs tomorrow, we'd be looking at an embryo transfer date of around April 13th. That's cutting it verrrrry close. The only way this is going to work now..is if Jeff gets the COBRA insurance through the end of the month. That's also really expensive, but still cheaper than paying full price for IVF. If his insurance hadn't covered any of it, we would've paid about $13,000 for everything. We're hoping that his insurance doesn't end the day of his contract, but at the end of the month during which his contract ends. We'll see. I can't stress over it b/c there's nothing I can do, you know?

The fact that this might not work hasn't even set in really. I'm just confident that it will work...I have to think that way. I'm trying not to get my hopes up, but at the same time, I'm thinking of names, who to pick for an OB, how I'll do the nursery and wondering how fat I'll get. My biggest concern is that Jeff can't get another job until this cycle is over with b/c of the insurance. So..he'll be technically without a job before we even have the embryo transfer and that scares me. I know we'll be ok because we always have been...it just works itself out...but that doesn't mean it'll be easy. Our first year was rough b/c he got laid off..and even if he gets another job, he may not be making as much...and we need to prepare for that. I'm putting away as much as I can to help cushion it a bit, but it's not going to be enough. The job market for IT people in this area has slowed to less than a crawl. It's kind of like a baby who's just lying on the floor, drooling, rocking back and forth but not going anywhere. He's looked for jobs outside of the Triangle and in other states, but the truth is that we don't want to move. Despite the strange weather and unbearable summers, we like it here. We're close to just about everything and there's never a shortage of anything to do..but...you have to do what you have to do. If we can't make it through the next 18 months and wait for the economy to turn around, we'll have no choice but to go elsewhere. That makes me sad.

I'm just so thankful to have a very supportive family who I know will help us out when and how they can. All I can do is pray. So, here's to a successful IVF cycle, a new job for Jeff, and strengthening our bond by extending our family!

Oops, I forgot!

I said I'd update on our beach trip when I got back and forgot. Jeff and I did end up with a non-smoking room since the whole floor was non-smoking..so that was a blessing. Lucien's snoring was like having to sleep next to a jet airplane during take off. We even had earplugs and that drowned out most of it..but not all. He knows he snores, so he'd leave the room after he woke up so we could get some "real sleep" as he put it. Friday we had planned on leaving at 9 which would put us at the beach around 12 and give us a half day on the beach. Nope, we left around noon and by the time we stopped at South of the Border, ate lunch, etc..we got to the beach around 5pm. Just enough time to check in, meet up w/ Jeff's parents and brother..and go out to dinner at Sticky Fingers.

My eye was really bothering me that Friday. I thought we'd have a day on the beach so I put my contacts in that morning. At some point something got under it and was making me scratch my eye. By the time we got to the beach, my eye was red, puffy and oozy and stayed that way all night. I could barely keep that eye open, so Saturday, it was off to urgent care. It took us almost an hour to find an urgent care place close by AND open. They numbed my eye, put in orange drops and looked at it under a black light. Fun, fun. I had a scratch from the 3 to 9 o'clock position around the top of my iris. She flushed the orange dye out of my eye, gave me a prescription and sent me on my way. When I asked her about going to the beach and told her I was worried about getting sand in it, she told me to wear an eye patch...so Saturday, I was a pirate for a day. I couldn't go out far in the water or ride waves..so I just sat in a chair in the surf and moved back every time the tide came in. Jeff's brother James called me Peggy all weekend. Griffin, my youngest nephew kept trying to put potato chips on my shoulder so a bird would land on it. Ha. Ha.

Since I didn't get to the beach until around 3pm that day, we stayed until around 7, then had to get 9 people showered and ready for dinner. Needless to say, we didn't eat until around 9pm...but it was a seafood buffet and quite yummy...so I didn't mind the wait. Sunday, we just couldn't get going and didn't get to the beach around lunch time, stayed until 5, showered and then went our separate ways for dinner. Jeff, Lucien and I went to Dick's Last Resort. None of us had been, and even though we knew what to expect...it was too much money to be insulted the whole night. The food was ok and the hat's were incredibly funny..but it's not somewhere I'd go more than once probably. After that, we went to a bar and had some drinks and didn't make it to bed until around 2am.

Monday, Jeff, Lucien and I went down to the Boardwalk to walk around and did a little bit of shopping here and there along the way. That evening, we headed up to Sunset to visit w/ Ron & Misty. We had dinner, got to see the kids and watch Lucien dance. Lucien was staying with them the rest of the week, so we headed back home around 8pm and got home around 11:45..something like that. All in all..it was fun, but not nearly long enough. I had just started to relax by the time we left. Ok..now that I did my update..I really need to go and run errands like I said I was..lol. Sorry it took 2 weeks to do this..but life gets in the way...you know how it is!

Uncle Update

As many of you know, my dad's brother Wayne was burned in a house fire back in July and has been at UVA ever since. He seems to be doing much better. They've put a voice box on his trachea so he can speak, so he's still adjusting to that. They were having to pump him full of so much fluid to keep his skin hydrated that it was backing up into his lungs..so they had to put in some chest tubes. They've removed one and the other isn't draining as much, so that's good news. They were able to take the braces off his hands and the skin graphs are doing very well. He's able to move his hands on his own and still has rehab daily. Yesterday he was able to move around in his chair a bit and spent the day in it rather than in his bed. He still has good days and bad..but he's progressing. They're also hoping to replace his trachea with a smaller tube so it will be more comfortable, but the tube they ordered hasn't come in yet. He's also been coughing quite a bit, but they want him to in order to get the mucus and what's left of the ash out of his lungs. I think he's also complained of his back itching which is good..that means it's healing. His other complaint is that he's thirsty and I can understand that being that he's had a tube down his throat for more than a month.

Dad's doing much better too. The first few weeks after the accident he wasn't himself since we didn't know if Wayne would make it. Now that Wayne's recovering, Dad's much more at ease and back to his old self. He's still been going up once or twice a week to visit with him and I think Wayne enjoys that. I was a little disappointed to find out that our annual Kitts reunion up at The Homeplace Restaurant in Catawba has been cancelled. Dad said that since Wayne's in the hospital and everyone's tired from all the travelling to visit him, he thinks it'd be just too much for everyone to attend. We haven't missed a Homeplace gathering in..um..12-13 years. Something like that. Maybe more like 15. I think the immediate family..meaning Mom, Dad, Kelly, Tim, Jeff and I may still try to go sometime this fall just so the tradition isn't broken. It will mainly depend on when we all have an available weekend together and if Kelly feels like traveling with the baby. I get to go to the Homeplace only once a year and I really don't want to miss it. There's just something about sitting on the porch swing up on the mountain taking in the fall colors and knowing that you're going to get yummy home cooked food and blueberry cobbler for dessert!!

Anyhow..I'm off to run some errands and get food for the football game today! Jeff requested some chicken wings, salsa and beer, so while he's off working on the car, I'll be making food to eat during the VT-GT game. Hope they win!! Go Hokies!! =)