September 13 th and 14 th 2024 Another day at the hospital watching labs and meeting with the doctor. We are feeling positive, and the team is going to attempt dialysis again. If that is successful, they will attempt to do a form of dialysis that takes fluid off the body but doesn’t return it. This is imperative to remove some of the fluid accumulation from all the IV’s. Mark is carrying 80 extra pounds of fluid. In the late afternoon they attempt SLED (a slower form of dialysis) and are having some success. We are so elated; it is the first time it has worked! The machines are giving them some issues so we all headed home feeling confident that they would be able to remove some of the fluid buildup. How did it all go so wrong so fast? Or does it just seem that way because we were so focused on each small win? The next morning, the 14 th , we gathered for coffee in the early hours to go over the chart notes for the night before we headed for the hospital. I did...
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From Despair to Hope. Posted 2/3/24. Lived 9/11/21- 9/12/24 I drove over to Providence knowing there would be a lot of information and possibly not great news. For the surgery to last 15 hours I assumed there were problems. I was not wrong. The surgery started as usual for an aortic dissection, with the valve needing to be replaced and a portion of the aorta replaced. Dr. Ritchey was expecting some issues from Mark having been on blood thinners, but it was so much worse than anticipated. His remark was it is the worst blood loss with which I have ever dealt. Mark lost 40% of the blood in his body. Just controlling that was a major issue. The ascending aorta had to be replaced as well. There were other procedures done but these were the major issues. They weaned him off the bypass machine and were preparing to close him up. This was around midnight. Just as they were getting ready to close, his chest filled with blood. Another disruption occurred, this time at the aortic ro...
Today would have been our 45 th anniversary. If I were a betting person, I would not have placed a dime on this marriage lasting. Let me tell you why I say that. December 21 st , 1973, Snohomish High School, a home basketball game. The games at home were always followed by a dance afterward. I was with my girlfriends at the dance when Mark came up and took my hand and off we went. Now if I were writing a script for a Lifetime movie I would say, “and we danced together for the rest of our lives.” But this most certainly is not a Lifetime movie. Mark was a sophomore, and I was a junior, fifteen and sixteen years old, what are the chances of being together still together fifty plus years later? Our oldest daughter was born the May before Mark graduated. Yes, that is correct, we had a child while he was still in high school. You are now understanding why I would not make that bet. Mark worked for a year and then went to Central Washington University and when ou...
Written 1/10/2025. Lived September 10 th and 11 th , 2024. I watched as they wheeled Mark off to the operating room. They would put a camera down his throat and get pictures of his heart from a different angle. They told me to go up to the third floor waiting room where the operating suites were. By now I had been up for 25 hours. My children were waking up, reading my texts and the calls started to come in. At the sound of my youngest daughter’s voice on the phone I broke down. As the words of the surgeons started to come back to me, I realized that this might be worse than I thought. I had brushed the weight of their words off; I did not want to hear things like “in the world of bad things that can happen to a heart this is one of the worse.” Still, in my mind, I was thinking long recovery bad, not he could die bad. He went in around 5:30 and about two hours later Dr. Ritchie, the cardiothoracic surgeon, came out to speak with me. A note about Dr. Ritchie. Wha...
This is a space for me to share my journey. I don’t want to, because I wish it never happened. Ninety days ago, my life changed forever. Even as I type these words it still seems unreal; I still struggle to accept that Mark is forever gone. September 9, 2024 Monday was such a good day. John was over and we harvested the last of the hops we grow for the brewery. Mark was on his tractor cleaning the barn paddocks and then replacing hose bibs for me. After the long hell we went through with his operation to remove cancer he was finally independent. Able to get around with no assistance even though the surgeons had said he’d always need a cane. But that is a whole other story. The weekend had been wonderful, filled with grandkids swimming, watching the Seahawks on the patio TV and just hanging out. After everyone was gone Monday Mark suggested we get Chinese take out since we both had worked so hard that day. While we waited for the food to arrive, he made us a drink and we...