Bleh. Sorry, man.

I'm sorry, glatt. That really sucks.

Oh I'm so sorry, Glatt.

I'm sorry, glatt.

Damn, Glatt. That's a really tough situation.

If you ask very nicely, maybe the photog could take a version of said photo so lovely wife could be 'shopped in at a later date?

Oh, crap, glatt.

But may I say (and it's no consolation) what a wonderful family you have? Your wife seems to be a really good person and you are a husband who wants her around.

I'm so sorry she won't get to go. :(

The decline of my father in law
 

That sounds so hard to deal with, Glatt. My thoughts are with you and your family.


Sent by thought transference

Sorry man. Does anyone else involved think the surgery is appropriate?

I was going to suggest exactly what grav said. Could your wife even maybe come for a couple of days? Its a terrible situation. I wish there were an easy solution. Xx

Your situation is what private duty agency nurses are for if you can swing it. You can specify an 8 hour shift and on call for emergencies; also, male or female, native English speaker, private transportation, PC literate with own laptop/notebook and Skype. Give the nurse FIL's advanced directives, your contact numbers while away, and any special instructions you want followed. Arrange access to FIL's stuff at the nursing home in case something there is wanted. Meet the nurse at the hospital to communicate your instructions, do a video call check, and introduce the nurse to FIL then it's bon voyage for the glatt family going on vacation/respite. You'll be able to have virtual face to face communication with FIL and hospital staff via the PC equipped private duty nurse. You haven't got much time to make the arrangements; but, either the nursing home or the hospital can help link you up with a reputable nursing temp agency. Good luck with whatever you do.

Thanks everyone! We're going to take it a day at a time and keep all options open. Including possibly changing the tickets so she can join us a few days later if possible. FIL asked her today about the vacation, so he remembered after all. And when she said wasn't going, he was incredibly grateful and apologized for ruining things for her. So she feels a lot better about it now. We'll still miss each other if she can't come, but there won't be any resentment about the situation.

Of all the possible outcomes to this unhappy situation, that seems like the least bad one. Good luck to your FIL and your wife and bon voyage to you and the rest of your family. You're in for a treat out West.

Yech, what a horrible situation. At least, as you say there's not that underlying resentment now, adding to the mix. Hope it all works out and you both manage to make it to the party. And hope your FiL is feeling better soon. He's clearly been through the mill a bit this past year.

I stopped updating this thread when we went off on vacation and left the Mrs at home with her dad. That was a bummer that she didn't get to come, but he got the pacemaker like a day after we left, and was discharged from the hospital in mid-July. He went into a rehab facility until yesterday, 9/11. So that was 2 months in rehab.

The rehab was really good for him. Got him to a point where he was better than when he went to the hospital 3 month ago. Plus, now he has a pacemaker.

The bad thing is that he's not independent enough anymore to go back to his independent living apartment, and has to go into the nursing home wing of this place. It's really nice, but the other residents are mostly not there in the head any more, so he doesn't have anyone to talk to. We're hoping this nursing home is a temporary stop, and that he can go back in his apartment, but I suspect in a month we will be giving up the apartment to save money and emptying it out.

This nursing home is really expensive, and he can only afford it for about 2-3 years. He could afford the apartment pretty much indefinitely.

So it's a mixture of good and bad news. He's way way better than when he was in the ICU on a ventilator in June. But we're disappointed that he's not going back to the apartment. It's like he's too tired to try anymore to get stronger and independent.

I hope when I get that old, I'm just hit by a meteorite or something right before I'm scheduled to go into a nursing home.

Does the nursing home offer occupational therapy?