Listen to your gut... before it tells you goodbye

I like my gut. It's been good to me through the years, so I try to be good to it. I feed it when it's hungry. I try to keep in reasonable shape so it looks good. And I try to listen to it when it talks to me. Except this time I didn't. And I'm so mad at myself I would kick myself in the groin if it was physically possible.

And, if I had a groin.

Anyway, if you read my last post, you know my Mom, who is in town visiting, became sick and I took her to the ER on Saturday to be checked out. The diagnosis came back as a bladder infection, even though my Mom was telling the ER doc that the last time she felt this bad was when she had a kidney infection. And I at one point I remember asking the doctor if a bladder infection would make someone as sick as my Mom.

It was at this point my gut was telling me to push the issue. Except that I didn't. I know my Mom doesn't like confrontation, and at this point it was after midnight and we were pretty tired. Besides, my gut doesn't have a medical degree, so I let it go.

Fast forward to Sunday and my Mom isn't doing any better. She's had flashes of okay-ness, but for the most part is pretty sick. I try to convince her to go back to the hospital because my gut keeps poking me, and it's getting annoying. But we figure she just needs to stick with the antibiotics she has and give them time to work.

On Monday it's clear things are getting worse, so I take her back to the ER. Since it's a Monday and a holiday, I figured it would be pretty light.

WRONG.

We wait in the ER for 3 and 1/2 hours, all the while my Mom is getting worse and worse. Finally they take her back, but they have no rooms, so she has to lay in a bed in the hallway. It seems we have found a competent doctor who tells us that, yes, she does have a kidney infection and it has gotten so bad that they need to admit her.

At this point it's about 7:30 at night, she's STILL in the hallway, and I need to go home to eat and put Elise to bed. After we get all that done, I'm exhausted, so Fred goes back up to the hospital to spend some time with my Mom. It's now 10:00 pm, and she's still sitting in the hallway of the ER.

Thankfully, they get her into a room before she was discharged, and ends up staying for three days. I am so mad at that first doc who didn't listen to my Mom, and even madder at myself for not listening to my gut.

And because every story should have a moral (or two), here are mine:

Listen to your gut (duh)

You make sure you buy travel medical insurance when you travel to another country. Do it. Don't argue with me and don't be a dummy about it. I shudder to think of what it would have cost my Mom if she didn't have it. I'm betting it would have been cheaper to fly her back to Vancouver first class, than to admit her to the hospital.

So now you know why things have been so quiet around here lately. You don't think I finally just decided to shut up, did you?

Edited to add: I forgot to say one very important thank you to my sweet friend, Liz, for bringing us dinner when we were in the midst of all of this, and for bringing my Mom flowers when she went to visit her in the hospital. So, thank you Liz... you have no idea how much you blessed us!

Because I'm not like other girls

Fred got me a washer and dryer for my birthday

This is a disclaimer to all and any men reading this... I am not like other girls. Buying a present like that for your wife will probably end up with you sleeping on the couch for an undetermined length of time, and spit burgers served for dinner. And most likely the longest "dry spell" (aka no bow chicka-bow-wow), you've ever experienced.

But me? I was ecstatic with my new, high-efficiency, front-loading, visions-in-white, time-savers. Mostly because it means that my husband listens to my never-ending griping about certain appliances that take almost two hours to dry a load of laundry because the stupid (man) person who designed it thought that a 30-minute shut-off gave the machine more than ample time to dry the articles within. I would like to meet that man and, you guessed it... kick him in the groin.

It took me a long time to be okay with the fact that I'm just not like other girls. I read the "Love Languages" book and figured out that "gifts" were definitely not mine. I'll probably get kicked out of the girl's club for saying this (heck, I think I'm already on probation), but jewellery doesn't do it for me. Neither do flowers... giving a person something that just ends up dying is rather morbid. I would rather the flowers stay in the ground and remain pretty and alive.

I like gifts that are useful.

I remember one birthday I asked Fred for some sort of kitchen appliance. He said no, he hates to buy those types of gifts. So I stomped my feet, wailed and gnashed my teeth some, and he gave in. And saw how happy my electric griddle/crockpot/blender (okay, I admit I can't remember what it was) made me. And he's been hitting the nail on the head ever since.

Don't worry, the washer and dryer were not the only gifts I received, Fred is a lot smarter than that.

And by the way, I do consider a massage and facial a very useful gift.