Old 11-11-2010, 05:16 PM
  # 12 (permalink)  
evenkeel
Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Iowa
Posts: 42
Update...

My father-in-law is in the hospital as of yesterday for an infection and DTs. Apparently he cut way down on his alcohol on Monday and by Tuesday evening he was showing signs of DTs with a high fever. This evening they have the infection under control and the docs told him tomorrow he'll either have to transfer to the behavioral health unit to finish detoxing and manage the DTs or go home. He won't go to the BHU, so we're waiting to see if they'll actually boot him out tomorrow. He needs to be an inpatient for at least a few more days so he can be monitored and have people available to react if something goes wrong (his heart stopped four times the last time he detoxed) but he won't have any of it. He feels better so he wants to go home and he's convinced that he can manage on his own. He was also told that his liver is almost completely shut down and all things considered his liver will not regenerate nor is he a candidate for transplant.

So, we're waiting for something to change. My wife was told that she could come home but she's waiting to see if anyone puts a time frame on things before deciding to leave early. I told her I'd support whatever decision she made but she's caught between wanting to be home with him and not wanting to be there for the detox again if she can help it. Right now we're somewhere between hour-by-hour and day-by-day because everything is so uncertain overall. *sigh* I took the kids to see him tonight. He looks okay except for his yellow-ness and he was in a better mood than he's been for months, even cracking a few jokes. Unfortunately the only other thing that's improved is losing a little fluid from his legs. Everything else is the same or worse and we're all caught between wanting to cheer him on in detoxing and trying to talk him out of it because of the possibility of detoxing killing him sooner. I just wish something would change to take some of the uncertainty away...
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