Lucky New Year

I am already considering 2009 a lucky year. My mom got sick with the flu last Monday. She called the doctor and he sent her out a Z Pac on Tuesday. On New Year's Eve she thought she was getting better. On New Year's Day I cooked a big Turkey dinner and the kids came over. She didn't even get out of bed. She said she had a bad headache. On Friday morning when I was getting ready for work, her light was on in her room. I checked in on her to see if she thought she was getting any better. She said no. She has COPD, so I was afraid that this would lead into pneumonia. I told her I was going to take her to the emergency room. I went and got dressed and then I went back into her room to tell her to get her shoes and socks on. She told me that she couldn't. I told her fine, I would call 911 and have them send an ambulance and they would take her to the ER. She said ok. Then I knew she was REALLY sick. My sister Robyn and I followed the ambulance to the hospital. When they let us go back to her room, they told me that I was lucky that I had got her there when I did. Because she was so sick and weak she was not able to exhale the carbon dioxide (not sure I am spelling that correctly)in her system. Normal counts are 20 to 30 and hers was over 100. They didn't know how she was even awake. This could have killed her. They admitted her to the ICU. By Saturday her count was down to 54. Today they got her blood work back and she was overdosing on Tylenol. For her headache she was taking Tylenol, and Day Quil for her flu, and Darvocet for her aches and pains which has Tylenol in it. They said she will be there for a few more days until they nurse her back to health. I am so glad we had put a lighted ceiling fan with a remote in her room. She was able to turn her light on even when she couldn't get out of bed. If her light had not been on, I would have probably left for work and not checked on her and she may not have made it until I got home at 5 pm.