Heart attack day.

Oh, brother. Last night Ruthie called me after she read my blog post and she said, "This is the point where you over rule him." We were both in bed and I knew there was no way he was going to leave. I promised to check him all night. Through the night his fever went down a little, but this morning it was 102.4. He didn't resist when I called his urologist, but the urologist was out of town! He made arrangements for Don to see another doctor in Altus today. On the way to the doctor he was groaning and when I asked what hurt he said his chest! We got to the doctor's office and I was filling out the forms, asking him what meds he was taking and he gasped and his eyes rolled back in his head! I ran for the nurse and they came right away. He came around really quickly, but had no idea what had happened. They put him into a wheel chair and then took him back to the office. His temp was 95! They decided that his infection was septic, so they wanted to put him into ICU to watch him closely since his fever was so volatile and his blood pressure was very low. They did an EKG in the ICU and asked me if he'd ever had a heart attack. I said, "Not unless it was back there in the doctor's lobby." The cardiologist from OKC was in Altus today and they called him in and he said, he's having a heart attack right now; we've got to get him to the city. So, they medi-flighted him here and I drove. Trish was at the hospital before he got here and she was here with me until about 15 minutes ago. Davy and Susan came and Frank and Jo Ann Meier came to be with us.

There are 3 arteries to the heart and one of his is completely blocked and has been for a long time. They've left it alone for now. The 2nd artery completely blocked today and they opened it and put two stents into it. They also have a little pump they put into his heart to pump the blood for him tonight. They'll leave it for 12 or so hours to give his heart a chance to rest and heal. Depending on how he does in this 12 hours they'll determine what to do next. They don't believe he has infection all through his body, so he is not septic. All his symptoms were about his heart. They do not know how much damage has been done; we'll know more tomorrow.

They think he looks great, but he does not look like he does in tonight's picture. That picture was taken August 2, so about 6 weeks ago. He looks wonderful to me, but he has a lot of drugs in him and a million tubes running all over him and an oxygen mask on. I wonder if they'll let me take a picture? He'll never believe how he looks; probably he'll never want to see it, either.

Anyway, the doctor said that he looks so good and he was hardly complaining. He said he had pain of about 3 out of 10. The doctor said, most people would have turned green at what he was going through and many would not have lived through it. Bless his heart, I think he was having a heart attack for the last 2 weeks! It's a wonder the muscle relaxers didn't relax his heart and kill him!

That was way more information that you all wanted, I'll bet, but I had to spill it all out. I've had calls from all over and I know you are all praying for us. Thank you! (Linda, Ruthie loved talking to you; I'm so glad she called you!) I love you all!

PS: I'm staying in the waiting room and it's very nice. They'll come and get me if I need to go back there and I can go in at 8 or so in the morning. I pray he'll be even better in the morning.