Wednesday, June 20, 2012

WDM, IA - Cataracts

No, that doesn’t refer to us - no cataracts here yet. Actually, Gary’s father, Lug, at the ripe old age of 89 is having cataract surgery on both eyes this spring. His vision has been getting progressively worse what with the glaucoma he’s already fighting and now with cataracts in both eyes. His left eye is his worse eye and he will admit that he can’t see much of anything out of that one. That makes his right eye his good eye.

He’s always said that he was not going to have any surgery on his eyes but, when the doctor said that he would not certify Lug for driving, it made him take notice and he signed up for the surgery. He had the surgery done on his left eye first while we were still traveling this spring and Cathy, Gary’s sister, took him in along with Barb, his girlfriend. Cathy took pictures on her I Phone and continually sent us updates so we could follow along with them throughout the day. His second surgery was today and we got up to Fort Dodge about 8:45 for his 9:30 appointment. Barb met us at the hospital and we all sat down to wait.
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Soon, a nurse come out and Lug was escorted to his own personal ‘waiting room’ where he changed into a gown and waited some more. We all were able to wait with him there. We could tell that Lug was getting antsy but there’s no hurrying the doctors since they have 12 other antsy patients ahead of him.

I had called my brother to tell him we were in town and he came over to visit. This gave me an opportunity to give him the family picture album that I had made for him. I’ve had several family pictures framed for him but I had the bulk of the pictures from our parents’ photo albums. All I did was put them all into a computer album and print off the pages, but it did take some time compiling them all and arranging them on the pages. He seemed pretty pleased to get it and admitted later that he had teared up seeing all the pictures. Some he had never seen.
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Finally Lug had his surgery about noon, came out and had to wait some more for the ok to leave. Gary meanwhile took pictures on his I Phone and sent them to his sisters with updates on the progress.
Milans2ndCataractSurgery-2-2012-06-20-11-16.jpg
At 1:45 or so, the nurse told him that he could put on his regular clothes and, when he had, we 4 tried to make a break for it and head for lunch. Oops, the route out ran right past the nurses’ station (I’m sure it was planned that way) and she hustled us back telling us we couldn’t leave just yet but that Lug had to get some further instruction. Feeling like criminals, we scurried back to his waiting room, the nurse came along, gave him his instructions and now, at 2:00 we could leave.

Lug was understandably hungry since he hadn’t eaten since 5:00 p.m. yesterday. After lunch we took Lug home and started to leave. Lug said, ‘I’m going to check my mail.’

‘Good-bye, Dad,’ Gary said as we walked out the door. Oops, Lug came to the door and waved us off, thanking us for coming. He’s had a long nerve-wracking day.

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