Makings of a Conspiracy

So, the week we got home, he was beginning to have some pain alternating between his left knee and left hip. My smart brother suggested crutches, as we were basically hobbling him around ourselves. I got him in to a chiropractor that could start working on his back, trying to give him a little relief in that area... As we neared the end of October, a friend of ours offered use of her old walker. This was definitely easier than maneuvering the crutches, and that seemed to help, but he just kept getting weaker. Took him to the ER one Saturday night (10/21), just to get him checked out, with the weakness/low intake, just figured it would be safe to get some fluids into him and have all his vitals checked out.

In the meantime, we finally found a doctor who would see him with just his retired military insurance...(forgot to mention, he never set up his Medicare, since he's never had reason to go to a doctor these past 18+ years! Can't even remember the last time he's had a cold!) Went to our "meet & greet" appt on 10/24

I get the immediate impression this guy was not excited about our natural plan of action...so it goes in the American Medical community. But he ordered a CT scan (a week later) and a followup appt for a week after that! Seriously!? Two weeks for looking into a serious cancer situation?!?, but I guess since we're not going the traditional "cut and burn" route, they're not in any hurry to help us figure out what we're dealing with.

So, two weeks later, (Monday, 11/7) back to the doctor who comes in with his very somber look, saying basically, there's really no hope here... but, let's put him in the hospital a couple days, see if we can build up his fluids, get him a little stronger for you. To make a very long story short, since I'm really trying to get caught up to current days, a couple days later, now with no strength in his legs at all...dad was going through a variety of hallucinations, he was frantically telling us to get furniture moved around the room (that wasn't there), for one of the milder moments. The mania continued for about 36 hours he didn't sleep, talking constantly, no rest for a weary brain (or weary daughter at the bedside for that matter). At our lowest point, in the middle of the night, he was so agitated he was ripping out his IVs and I finally had to have him restrained. ugh.

So the following morning, when he was trying to get out of bed, and I grabbed his feet to put him back in, he pulled back so I could see his intent was to kick me with both feet in my chest. Thankfully, he's slower than my reaction and not strong enough to hurt me...but his thoughts were that he was being held hostage in some dumpy garage in WV (I got that information when I let him talk to Lisa on the phone, hoping her voice would bring him around. Instead he used the phone call to beg for help, that he was being held hostage by the worst kind of people he could think of. Anyway, he was in about the worst possible place he could be, and he was afraid of me. Thus we have our conspiracy...

During all of this, I'd had a visit from the oncologist whose outlook was just as bleak if we didn't go the chemo/radiation route..."3 months if you don't do what we tell you to do". He wouldn't give an iota of attention to my attempts to explain to him, show him studies where the natural route has worked...but since there haven't been any accepted clinical studies in his medical journals, he wanted nothing to do with the rantings of a daughter doing what she knows in her heart can have success.