An up and down day for Dad yesterday. He still has trouble with his short term memory. He hasn’t had a fever for two days so the doctors have ruled out the pneumonia and lack of oxygen as possible causes. After a more detailed read of the brain MRI the doctors now believe that the tumor in his brain is slowly bleeding. They believe that the bleeding is putting pressure on the part of his brain that contains short term memory. They are doing another scan today to see if the issue is resolving itself or if they might need to do surgery to add a shunt and get a biopsy of the tumor. The MRI of his back showed compression fractures that are common for someone his age. He goes back and forth from being in extreme pain to sleeping like a baby. They are going to fit him for a brace today so that when he is ready to walk he can do so with less discomfort.
Michelle came up yesterday and brought the North Platte Bulletin. Dad perked up as she read him a story about the North Platte baseball team. He was interested to hear about the problems with the wheat harvest and how the Sensations softball team was doing. He was able to tell us that 30 bushels is okay but 50 would be better. He also recognized several of the girls names mentioned in the softball article. This morning he doesn’t remember reading those stories. It’s as if everything from two weeks ago until this moment are wiped clean from his memory each time he wakes up. He is very pleasant to be around.
Thanks for your prayers and kind thoughts,
David
P.S. Some have asked for an address and phone number of the hospital. I would recommend sending any cards to our house as we only live minutes away. Our address is 3444 11th Ave West, Seattle WA 98119. I don’t recommend calling his room at this time because he sleeps a lot and the phone wakes him up.
