The end

I ended my externship last week in a bit of a blur...I saw lots of patients because the third years I had been working with were all done on Wednesday morning, so from then on it was just me and the attendings every day.  My kid with appendicitis came back for a check-up and is doing well, I saw several kids with hilariously interesting names, and I dealt with several more clueless parents.  I admitted a 12 year old to the hospital the day before her birthday--she showed up that morning for an allergy shot just like she does every week, but the 1.5 mile walk to the bus stop that she and her mom took her get her here (just like they do every week) was too much in the heat and sent her into a massive asthma attack.  It was scary and sad at the same time.  

Now I have a week at home and then Saturday we leave for family vacation in Florida, which should be a lot of fun.  The rest of my family is already there--they go for two weeks, but D could only get off of work for on, so we'll meet them down there.  This ends up being ok, because it gave us the chance to celebrate D's birthday (which is Wednesday) with his family last night, and that was a lot of fun.  

Today (and probably every day this week) I am going to be helping drive my grandmother around, because my grandpa is still--yet again--in the hospital.  He went in on June 1st for a hip replacement and was in for about a week.  He was doing well, got transferred to a rehab facility, and was moving right along with his therapy--but after about a week developed an infection from all of the antibiotics he'd taken to prevent the incision site from getting infected.  He went back to the hospital last weekend, stayed for a week, and then this past Friday went back to the rehab facility.  He was doing ok there, but Saturday morning when he tried to stand up his blood pressure was apparently so low that he collapsed, so now he's back in the hospital again, where they're trying to get his blood pressure up and continue to fight the infections.  It's getting very tiring for everyone, not least because the longer he stays in the hospital, the more disoriented and confused he gets and the worse off he becomes mentally.  We all want him to just come home, so if everyone out there in internet-land could say a quick prayer to your favorite deity, it would be much appreciated.