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S2.Ep16 - Birthday Tears and a Week Long Hospital Stay
34 Plays1 day ago
This week starts off exactly how you'd expect from us—Natalie introduces everyone to Wilma, the newest (and sassiest) member of the family, Gene celebrates his fourth birthday, and a surprise birthday decoration goes hilariously wrong.
Then everything changes.
What began as a normal birthday quickly turned into one of the scariest days our family has ever experienced when Natalie's dad suddenly developed subtle neurological symptoms that were initially dismissed. We walk through the entire experience—from the first signs that something wasn't right, to navigating multiple ER visits, advocating for additional testing, and the emotional roller coaster of watching a loved one suffer a stroke.
This episode is funny, heartbreaking, and incredibly important. We discuss the warning signs of stroke that aren't always obvious, why trusting your instincts matters, what happened after the initial diagnosis, and how standard hospital protocols can sometimes create unexpected challenges.
Whether you're here for the life updates, the laughs, or the deeper conversations about health advocacy, this is an episode you won't want to miss.
As always, this podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only and is not medical advice.
Recommended
Transcript
Intro
Reconnecting and New Beginnings
00:00:50
Felicia Devine
Hello and welcome back to episode 16.
00:00:52
Natalie Richards
Hi, hi.
00:00:53
Felicia Devine
Hi, Natalie.
00:00:55
Natalie Richards
Oh, I'm so happy to see you.
00:00:56
Felicia Devine
and know it's been, i just looked, we recorded last 25 days ago.
00:01:00
Natalie Richards
Okay, that sounds about right.
00:01:02
Felicia Devine
It's been three weeks. Yeah,
00:01:03
Natalie Richards
It is crazy, actually. Yeah, it's been a wild few weeks.
00:01:08
Felicia Devine
yeah it has.
00:01:08
Natalie Richards
That's for sure.
00:01:09
Felicia Devine
It has. You have quite a few updates, Natalie.
00:01:12
Natalie Richards
Yeah, we have... Did we have Wilma the last time we talked?
00:01:16
Felicia Devine
No.
00:01:17
Natalie Richards
Oh my gosh, that's right.
00:01:17
Felicia Devine
Wilma was about to be picked up the next week.
00:01:20
Natalie Richards
Okay, so there's like some serious things that have happened.
00:01:23
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:01:24
Natalie Richards
Yeah, we have Wilma now and she is a little... She is.
00:01:29
Felicia Devine
Spitfire.
00:01:30
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Yeah.
00:01:31
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:01:31
Natalie Richards
She's really good. Like she, she really is so good and she's very sweet.
00:01:33
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:01:37
Natalie Richards
She's very smart, but my goodness is she sassy.
00:01:41
Felicia Devine
Yes.
00:01:43
Natalie Richards
sassy.
00:01:44
Felicia Devine
Oh, yes.
00:01:45
Natalie Richards
she is sassy yeah
00:01:49
Felicia Devine
It's different too because you're used to like, like Gator was the newest entry into your home and that's like a boy.
00:01:54
Natalie Richards
I know. and he was a yeah And he was a year old when he came into the picture.
00:01:57
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:02:00
Felicia Devine
Yeah. So it's just interesting that you have like a female and a puppy.
00:02:01
Natalie Richards
so to have a girl is really interesting. Kyle was like, oh my God, I should have gotten a male because she's so stubborn.
00:02:08
Felicia Devine
No.
00:02:09
Natalie Richards
Like she really has like, she is her own being.
00:02:09
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:02:12
Felicia Devine
Has personality. Yeah. Now she integrated with the inside dogs or just with Gator.
00:02:14
Natalie Richards
That's for sure.
00:02:18
Natalie Richards
All, but Gator's the one who likes her the most.
00:02:19
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:02:21
Natalie Richards
Yeah. which is so funny.
00:02:23
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:02:24
Natalie Richards
He loves her.
00:02:24
Felicia Devine
He's like a friend.
00:02:25
Natalie Richards
Yeah, he is. I think he's been like desperate for a friend. It's so cute.
00:02:29
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:02:29
Natalie Richards
And Kyle doesn't really like bring him around other dogs all that much because he doesn't really trust him.
00:02:30
Felicia Devine
Oh my goodness.
00:02:33
Felicia Devine
No, no. Unless they're like working dogs.
00:02:36
Natalie Richards
Right. so and they don't get to like play.
00:02:36
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:02:38
Natalie Richards
you know So Gator doesn't play.
00:02:38
Felicia Devine
yeah
00:02:41
Natalie Richards
Like he literally doesn't.
00:02:42
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:02:43
Natalie Richards
so He's like out in the yard, like on his back with his belly up and she's like climbing all over him.
Pet Dynamics and Logistics
00:02:48
Natalie Richards
It's so cute.
00:02:49
Felicia Devine
So he's like learning how to play with her.
00:02:49
Natalie Richards
He actually really is playing with her and he really likes her. She's like bit him in the balls a couple of times and she's like trying to nurse, I think.
00:02:57
Felicia Devine
What?
00:03:00
Felicia Devine
my God.
00:03:03
Felicia Devine
That's crazy.
00:03:06
Natalie Richards
It's like, Wilma, you are going to get eaten.
00:03:08
Felicia Devine
Oh my God. She's literally going to get destroyed.
00:03:09
Natalie Richards
He's literally going eat you.
00:03:10
Felicia Devine
He's going to chomp down on her one time.
00:03:14
Natalie Richards
But the one who's been the problem has been Duke.
00:03:14
Felicia Devine
Well,
00:03:16
Natalie Richards
He was like really not into her at all.
00:03:19
Felicia Devine
Really?
00:03:19
Natalie Richards
And he still, he like growls at her multiple times a day. Yeah.
00:03:23
Felicia Devine
Just like not into it.
00:03:25
Natalie Richards
And now he'll like kind of come over and now he like licks her once.
00:03:26
Felicia Devine
Where's she living?
00:03:29
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:03:29
Natalie Richards
And then he's like, he's just, he's a grumpy old man.
00:03:31
Felicia Devine
Anyone like you? Yeah.
00:03:34
Natalie Richards
yeah.
00:03:34
Felicia Devine
Is she inside or outside?
00:03:36
Natalie Richards
Yeah, she's inside.
00:03:36
Felicia Devine
Like inside.
00:03:37
Natalie Richards
kind of yeah for the most part. Like during the day she's inside and then she sleeps in the kennel in the garage overnight.
00:03:42
Felicia Devine
Different kennel than gator.
00:03:43
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:03:44
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:03:45
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:03:45
Felicia Devine
So your garage is being taken over by dog kennels.
00:03:45
Natalie Richards
So, yeah, it has been for a while.
00:03:50
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:03:51
Natalie Richards
Because Gator's is like a big run, like a dog run.
00:03:53
Felicia Devine
No, it's huge.
00:03:54
Natalie Richards
It's
Birthday Mishaps and Celebrations
00:03:54
Natalie Richards
huge.
00:03:55
Natalie Richards
Hers is like a little crate. Like she's fine. But truthfully, like Gator's.
00:03:55
Felicia Devine
It's like, it's like the size of my master bathroom.
00:04:01
Felicia Devine
Does gators have a lid?
00:04:02
Natalie Richards
Yes, because he will climb out.
00:04:03
Felicia Devine
Yeah. He will climb out.
00:04:04
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
00:04:04
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:04:04
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
00:04:05
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:04:05
Natalie Richards
so is It's as tall as the garages, but like he could still climb over the top.
00:04:09
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Right. Cause that's what they're known for. They're like climbing dogs.
00:04:12
Natalie Richards
yeah Yep.
00:04:14
Natalie Richards
Yep. So it's been fine.
00:04:15
Felicia Devine
Among other things.
00:04:15
Natalie Richards
It's been fun.
00:04:16
Felicia Devine
Now, how is her mold training?
00:04:17
Natalie Richards
He's been working on her. Good. He's working on scent stuff with her right now, like just getting her to like put her head in the box that he trains out of.
00:04:21
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:04:23
Natalie Richards
And yeah, it's so it's good.
00:04:24
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Has he introduced any mold yet?
00:04:25
Natalie Richards
She's very smart.
00:04:27
Felicia Devine
Or is he he just training how to train?
00:04:27
Natalie Richards
No, just training it correct. Just introducing how he's going to introduce them all.
00:04:33
Felicia Devine
To learn.
00:04:36
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:04:37
Natalie Richards
Yeah, so it's not all that all that involved as of now, but she's doing well.
00:04:41
Felicia Devine
That's so cool.
00:04:41
Natalie Richards
She really is. And we brought her up to the lake. like she She's doing well, yeah.
00:04:46
Felicia Devine
Wow. My gosh. So do you bring Gator and Wilma?
00:04:49
Natalie Richards
hu We have four kennels in our truck when we go up there. like kyle Kyle has four.
00:04:55
Felicia Devine
I'm sorry, you take all four.
00:04:56
Natalie Richards
No. So he has two kennels in the cab of the truck okay with Gene. So Gene is in his little seat, like barely fitting.
00:05:05
Felicia Devine
is he in the middle and then kennel on each side? Oh,
00:05:07
Natalie Richards
No, so they're stacked. they're They're stacked like one on top of each other.
00:05:11
Felicia Devine
cause he folded the seat up.
00:05:14
Natalie Richards
So the seat comes up. Two kennels go in Gene has his one little seat.
00:05:17
Felicia Devine
So Gator's now kenneled in the cab? Yeah.
00:05:20
Natalie Richards
When we're driving, yes.
00:05:21
Felicia Devine
yeah
00:05:21
Natalie Richards
h And then overnight, then Kyle has bigger crates that are in the bed of the truck that is like a whole setup.
00:05:28
Felicia Devine
Yeah, like sleeping crates.
00:05:30
Natalie Richards
And and that's where all, yeah So they sleep in the bed of the truck with fans going and like he's got the whole thing.
00:05:37
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:05:37
Natalie Richards
But we have four dog crates in this truck whenever we go.
00:05:40
Felicia Devine
And then you had to bring things.
00:05:41
Natalie Richards
And then we have things. So I like leave my things up at the lake for the most part and bring one, i bring one bag and that's it.
00:05:46
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Oh my gosh.
00:05:50
Natalie Richards
And food.
Health Scares and Hospital Experiences
00:05:51
Felicia Devine
huh That's crazy.
00:05:53
Natalie Richards
It's so funny. So it's, we're like decked out, decked out.
00:05:54
Felicia Devine
How involved?
00:05:57
Natalie Richards
It's actually insanity.
00:05:57
Felicia Devine
Well. for For as many dog crates as you have, we have bicycles.
00:06:02
Natalie Richards
Correct. So everybody has their thing. Yeah.
00:06:05
Felicia Devine
Every family does its own thing. That's insane.
00:06:10
Natalie Richards
It's really funny. i'll send I'll send you a picture of it. It's ha quite, quite interesting.
00:06:12
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Wow. Wow. Okay.
00:06:15
Natalie Richards
So it's been fun.
00:06:16
Felicia Devine
You have to tell me about your father, Papa John.
00:06:19
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Yeah, I do. I do. You had an update though too, didn't you? Did you have something fun?
00:06:23
Felicia Devine
Yeah. It's honestly so depressing.
00:06:25
Natalie Richards
What do you mean?
00:06:27
Felicia Devine
it's It's just depressing.
00:06:28
Natalie Richards
Okay. what Well, so is my dad's story, so we might as well.
00:06:33
Felicia Devine
Yeah, but it's not about me.
00:06:34
Natalie Richards
not All right, fine.
00:06:34
Felicia Devine
see
00:06:35
Natalie Richards
Okay. Well, it has been a very interesting... God, what day is it today?
00:06:42
Felicia Devine
It's middle of, wait, it's end of July.
00:06:43
Natalie Richards
The 19th. Okay. So it's been two weeks. So, okay. Another thing that happened in this three weeks is Jean turned four.
00:06:50
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh, you're right.
00:06:51
Natalie Richards
Right. It was 4th of July and then it was his 4th birthday.
00:06:53
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:06:56
Natalie Richards
And that kind of is where the story is going to begin because he had we woke up on his lovely 4th birthday and we had the plan you know to go to Toy Story 5.
00:07:00
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:07:07
Natalie Richards
This is the day after the 4th of July also.
00:07:09
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:07:09
Natalie Richards
So like we do an entire day's worth of stuff on the 4th of July.
00:07:10
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yes.
00:07:14
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:07:15
Natalie Richards
So it was a whirlwind. It was a whirlwind day.
00:07:18
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:07:19
Natalie Richards
Very fun. Super fun.
00:07:21
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:07:21
Natalie Richards
Jean loved it. So we wake up and I'm kind of just like, you know, just a little little out of it. I'm like, happy birthday, Gene. you wait Oh, he wakes up.
00:07:33
Natalie Richards
I put streamers on his door, okay?
00:07:35
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:07:35
Natalie Richards
For when he woke up, he would open his door and there would be streamers.
00:07:39
Felicia Devine
Stop. He hated it.
00:07:39
Natalie Richards
He hated hated it. he hated it he so immediately upon waking up, he is he starts bawling the second he sees the streamers.
00:07:52
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:07:52
Felicia Devine
No. Oh, no, Natalie. You had no idea.
00:07:57
Natalie Richards
He woke up he goes, why would you put those on there before I woke up?
00:08:04
Felicia Devine
Oh, he was sad you did it without him?
00:08:06
Natalie Richards
He just didn't like it. Like he just didn't like that it was a surprise.
00:08:07
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:08:10
Natalie Richards
He's apparently not a surprise guy.
00:08:12
Felicia Devine
Okay, okay, we're learning that.
00:08:14
Natalie Richards
So, okay.
00:08:14
Felicia Devine
Lesson learned.
00:08:16
Natalie Richards
Lesson learned. No kidding. Okay. So we, we, we remedy the day. Okay. We come out and there's like, there's other decorations that he did like because his presence were underneath them.
00:08:24
Felicia Devine
You recover. Okay.
00:08:30
Natalie Richards
So all was well.
00:08:30
Felicia Devine
Oh, okay, okay.
00:08:32
Natalie Richards
Okay.
00:08:32
Felicia Devine
Yes.
00:08:34
Natalie Richards
Meanwhile, I think Kyle got home like a few hours late from work to that night because it was the 4th of July.
00:08:39
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:08:41
Natalie Richards
so I think he got home at like four or 5 AM.
00:08:41
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:08:43
Natalie Richards
I don't even remember. So it's, It's not a great start to the day.
00:08:44
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:08:46
Natalie Richards
Okay.
00:08:46
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:08:46
Natalie Richards
So we're opening presents.
00:08:49
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:08:50
Natalie Richards
Kyle's dead to the world.
00:08:52
Felicia Devine
yeah
00:08:52
Natalie Richards
Gene's loving his presence and it was really fun. We're going about our day. I'm getting ready because we're going to go to toy Story 5 in the movie theater with my parents, with Matt and Quincy, with Carson.
00:09:00
Felicia Devine
it
00:09:04
Natalie Richards
We're all going to sit there in the movie theater and then we're going go to Hibachi for dinner because that's Gene's favorite.
00:09:09
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:09:11
Natalie Richards
And i had this whole, you know, the whole day it was just planned, ready to go.
00:09:14
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:09:15
Natalie Richards
It's going to be super fun. All of his favorite things. So I'm getting ready. He's playing in the sink with water. Okay. And he does that almost every day.
00:09:26
Natalie Richards
Like, and he's very good about it. He doesn't get water everywhere.
00:09:28
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:09:29
Natalie Richards
Like he's very good. I go with Wilma to do something in our bedroom for one second and I come back out and water is everywhere across the entire kitchen. Like both ways on the countertop, all like down in between the stove and the cabinets, pooling everywhere.
00:09:51
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:09:51
Natalie Richards
And I immediately, i start bawling because for not really any, real truly like that's why I was, I just was like, oh my gosh, I don't think I can handle this right now.
00:09:56
Felicia Devine
Mold.
00:10:02
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:10:03
Felicia Devine
You don't cry often.
00:10:04
Natalie Richards
No. And I was all, I was sitting there like, why am I crying about this right now? And I was uncontrollably sobbing for 20 minutes.
00:10:15
Natalie Richards
I could not stop. And I'm like cleaning it.
00:10:16
Felicia Devine
Was Kyle home?
00:10:18
Natalie Richards
No, he was gone. He had already gone to work. I don't even understand why.
00:10:24
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:10:24
Natalie Richards
Well, I do now. and I now understand why I was crying. So in the midst of like cleaning up the water, my phone is like in a pool of water and I see my mom calling me and I'm like, I just set it to the side because my phone, I take it out of the dripping water and I set it to the side.
00:10:36
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:10:40
Natalie Richards
I'm like, I can't i can't talk to you right now.
00:10:41
Felicia Devine
I can't answer this, Anita. Yeah.
00:10:43
Natalie Richards
but Meanwhile, I'm bawling, crying for no reason. because it's really not a big deal. Like I've cleaned up water before.
00:10:49
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah.
00:10:51
Natalie Richards
I'm getting it cleaned up. It's not a big deal, but I can't stop crying. So I like pull myself together. i'm like, okay, it's going to be fine. The day is going to be fine. My mom, I call her back because I have like three missed calls from her. And she texts me. She says, we're going to the yeah ER. Something's wrong with dad.
00:11:10
Natalie Richards
And I go, oh my goodness. So I call her back. It had probably been like 20 or 30 minutes. I think they had just gotten to the yeah er and they had admitted him, thankfully, that he got right in because the ERs in our area are not so good about that.
00:11:20
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:11:22
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:11:27
Natalie Richards
Like you could go for like a real problem and sit there for five hours.
00:11:27
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:11:30
Natalie Richards
waiting to get in.
00:11:31
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:11:32
Natalie Richards
It's bad. So that was nice. So so I call her like, what's going on?
00:11:35
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah.
00:11:38
Natalie Richards
What are the symptoms? She said, well, he's he was pulling staples up from yard. Oh, a few days before this i forgot this, I forgot this part of the story.
00:11:50
Natalie Richards
A few days before this, Kyle and my dad had gone up to the lake and they redid like, I think 12 of the stairs down to the lake. So like, They took out, they ripped out the wood and replaced it with new, which is like a major job when you're having to go up
00:12:01
Felicia Devine
Oh. The wood?
00:12:07
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:12:09
Natalie Richards
60 more stairs in order to get to the part that needed to be replaced.
00:12:13
Felicia Devine
Whoa. Yeah. Okay.
00:12:15
Natalie Richards
So it was a big job. So they had just done that. And it was very strenuous, but he felt really good when he came back. He was like, I feel fine.
00:12:20
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:12:22
Natalie Richards
Kyle was dead. And my dad was like, yeah, I'm fine.
00:12:24
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:12:27
Natalie Richards
Like, okay.
00:12:28
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:12:28
Natalie Richards
and So Kyle goes, I need to work him harder next time.
00:12:29
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:12:31
Natalie Richards
like go, I don't know, but he he did fine.
00:12:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:12:34
Natalie Richards
70.
00:12:34
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Wow.
00:12:35
Natalie Richards
He's going to be 71 this year
00:12:38
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:12:38
Natalie Richards
So he's, he's getting older, but like, he's very active and he is very healthy.
00:12:41
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Physical.
00:12:45
Natalie Richards
He's very physical.
00:12:45
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:12:47
Natalie Richards
So, so he's outside. My parents are doing all kinds of stuff at their house, like renovations, just like fixing things that just need to be redone basically after 20 years of living in a house. So there the whole screened in porch on the outside had to be re-screened or something.
00:13:08
Natalie Richards
The parts were rotting. I don't even know. So he's repeatedly bending bending over and pulling staples out of wood and probably like hundreds of staples.
00:13:18
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:13:19
Natalie Richards
So it's like multiple repeated all the way down, leaning over a banister basically, pulling staples and coming back up.
00:13:27
Felicia Devine
oh Oh.
00:13:28
Natalie Richards
Like he's fully leaning and coming back. He comes back in the house after doing that and he's like dizzy a little bit, disoriented. Like he was walking and he would like kind of lean into a wall as he was walking by the wall, right?
00:13:45
Natalie Richards
They go to church.
00:13:45
Felicia Devine
Oh
00:13:47
Natalie Richards
He's driving to church. I don't know why, he did.
00:13:50
Felicia Devine
my God. Yeah.
00:13:52
Natalie Richards
He's like missing the green arrows to go. And my mom's like, John, it's green. And then they get to the turn in church and he like doesn't go where they usually go to the parking lot. He like keeps going straight.
00:14:06
Natalie Richards
which is something he's done like millions of times, like literally millions.
00:14:10
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:14:14
Natalie Richards
And he makes the wrong turn and she goes, are you okay? And he goes, I don't know. i don't think so. So he's like admitting that something is not right, which is weird for him because usually he's very much like, I'm fine.
00:14:20
Felicia Devine
Whoa. Not right.
00:14:28
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:14:29
Natalie Richards
So he admitted, he's like, no, I think something might be wrong. So they go to the ER for not really any...
00:14:35
Felicia Devine
Did Anita drive?
00:14:36
Natalie Richards
I don't know. actually don't know that information. Probably not.
00:14:41
Felicia Devine
You're like, didn't ask.
00:14:42
Natalie Richards
Probably not.
00:14:42
Felicia Devine
Yeah. He probably was just like, okay, direct me.
00:14:44
Natalie Richards
He probably drove himself to the ER.
00:14:45
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:14:46
Natalie Richards
r I don't know. I don't know.
00:14:47
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:14:48
Natalie Richards
So they were just going to go get checked out because he's like, something's weird. still was a little vague, but for him, that all is weird.
00:14:54
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:14:57
Natalie Richards
Like that's very alarming symptoms for him and for him to say something's wrong.
00:14:58
Felicia Devine
One for him to admit that something is wrong.
00:15:02
Natalie Richards
Like that, that was enough where I was like, I don't like the sound of this.
00:15:06
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:15:07
Natalie Richards
Uh, and like the dizziness and the, like, just weird, just really weird.
00:15:07
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:15:14
Natalie Richards
So they get to the er I, that's when I get ahold of her. She doesn't have service in the ER. It was like this whole mess.
00:15:21
Felicia Devine
a
00:15:21
Natalie Richards
She could, she had to use like the nurse's phone to talk, to call me.
00:15:22
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:15:25
Natalie Richards
So I'm getting like a random number calling me I'm, it was just weird.
00:15:29
Felicia Devine
yeah ordering
00:15:30
Natalie Richards
So they're getting scans kind of, and she's like telling me what they're telling him. And basically they ordered nothing for the most part. It was, she's like telling me what they're doing and I'm like, okay, well make sure they, they do, you know, like a CT angio and like all this, stuff like they need to go through things.
00:15:53
Natalie Richards
these stroke tests. Right.
00:15:54
Felicia Devine
yeah yeah
00:15:55
Natalie Richards
cause that's, kind that's what I was thinking it was at that point, like a really early stroke. I mean, we kind of know how to, how to look for these things.
00:16:04
Natalie Richards
We kind of have it pounded in our heads for our entire schooling.
00:16:04
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:16:06
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:16:08
Natalie Richards
It's kind of like, this is a little weird.
00:16:08
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Right. Mm-hmm.
00:16:12
Natalie Richards
she then relays that information to the doctor And i end up getting a call back from that random number and I expect it's my mom.
00:16:23
Natalie Richards
It's actually the doctor calling me.
00:16:25
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:16:26
Natalie Richards
And she goes, so I hear you have some problems with what I'm ordering.
00:16:34
Felicia Devine
Natalie.
00:16:35
Natalie Richards
And I'm just like, oh, how do i how do I address this situation? How do i and so I'm being very nice.
00:16:42
Felicia Devine
What?
00:16:44
Natalie Richards
I'm being very nice.
00:16:45
Felicia Devine
Why was she older younger?
00:16:47
Natalie Richards
Younger, younger, younger yeah ER doc. I couldn't even believe, couldn't even believe it. And she goes, I just, you know, there's there's not really symptoms to warrant this.
00:16:58
Natalie Richards
We're going to order a head CT, a plain CT, basically plain without contrast, which is just looking at his brain.
00:17:03
Felicia Devine
So just looking at his brain.
00:17:06
Natalie Richards
And I go, so what is your preliminary diagnosis?
00:17:09
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:17:09
Natalie Richards
And she goes, well, we don't, we don't really have one right now.
00:17:09
Felicia Devine
Like, what are you looking for?
00:17:14
Natalie Richards
And I go, so why are you even ordering the head CT?
00:17:18
Felicia Devine
like if you don't even have a generic idea of what's going on, what are you ordering?
00:17:20
Natalie Richards
i like You don't even have a clue what you're looking for? it is protocol to do that first to check for a but brain bleed, which, okay, fine. He didn't have a headache at that time at all.
00:17:32
Natalie Richards
No head pressure, nothing. So it was kind of just like, i I don't know what you're looking for, but I don't think you're looking for the right thing.
00:17:41
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:17:41
Natalie Richards
Either way.
00:17:44
Felicia Devine
So you're going back and forth with her?
00:17:44
Natalie Richards
Okay. So they no, I was being very nice. I was just like, I really think he needs some sort of vascular testing.
00:17:51
Felicia Devine
Yes.
00:17:51
Natalie Richards
i i really would like that to be done.
00:17:51
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:17:54
Natalie Richards
i understand the symptoms are vague right now. And she's just like, yeah, I just don't think we have we have anything to warrant ordering that right now. I go, okay. i said, you know what?
00:18:06
Natalie Richards
Yeah, you you do what you feel is necessary. And I'm not there. Like if I was there and I was seeing him, I probably would have pushed a little bit more.
00:18:12
Felicia Devine
Right. And they're in Rockford.
00:18:14
Natalie Richards
Yeah. So we were like 40 minutes away. i would have come there, but my mom was like, I don't know. Maybe it's nothing. Maybe he is just having, he didn't really have any other symptoms.
00:18:23
Felicia Devine
Maybe he's dehydrated and vertigo.
00:18:25
Natalie Richards
Right.
00:18:25
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:18:25
Natalie Richards
Like so maybe it's nothing. I'm like, okay, yeah, maybe it's maybe it's nothing. I don't know. Seems a little weird. So they did the plain CT. Nothing shows up. Oh, really?
00:18:38
Natalie Richards
Interesting. They send him home. They send him home. They don't do anything further. Nothing. Okay. So he gets home.
00:18:52
Natalie Richards
we, was happening at that time with our life? We were driving in because we were still going to go to the movie. Like we were like, just let us, we're going at least be in Rockford.
00:18:58
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:19:00
Natalie Richards
We'll be close. Like if you need us, let us know.
00:19:02
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:19:03
Natalie Richards
Right. But I wasn't going to go like bombard the ER if it really wasn't a problem. Right.
00:19:09
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:19:11
Natalie Richards
So I should have, but I didn't. So we're at the movie, I think at that time, she texts me, we're heading home. I go, okay, awesome. Like, I guess everything's fine. Right.
00:19:24
Natalie Richards
They get home. i get another text. She goes, His whole call me and I called her and she goes, his whole left side is numb. They got home and he basically had all of these symptoms.
00:19:37
Natalie Richards
So his whole face went numb. His arm went numb. His leg went numb. He was having a hard time walking. Like he couldn't even hold him, like stand up on his own because his whole leg was not working.
00:19:45
Felicia Devine
They
00:19:48
Natalie Richards
So at that time, they didn't even, he he said, no, don't call anybody. I don't want to go back to the ER. They don't they think nothing's wrong with me.
00:19:55
Felicia Devine
they don't know what they're doing. Yeah.
00:19:56
Natalie Richards
They don't know what they're doing.
00:19:59
Felicia Devine
Oh, no.
00:19:59
Natalie Richards
She calls 911.
00:20:01
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:20:01
Natalie Richards
Paramedics come within minutes, but then he still, he didn't have like hand motor things. So they still were like, well, I don't know if you're really having a stroke. And he was saying he didn't really want to go anywhere. So they stayed there for 30 minutes at my house at my parents' house, just chatting.
00:20:20
Natalie Richards
Because he's he can talk. Like he he didn't have the droopiness necessarily.
00:20:23
Felicia Devine
He wasn't slurring.
00:20:25
Natalie Richards
He wasn't slurring. So I can understand where the confusion comes from. However, there are some other symptoms here are very alarming.
00:20:36
Felicia Devine
and also the fact that they' it's all left-sided.
00:20:39
Natalie Richards
I know.
00:20:40
Felicia Devine
I'm like, oh, let's talk about the brain.
00:20:42
Natalie Richards
Very alarming. Okay. Okay.
00:20:46
Natalie Richards
Anyway, literally brain level.
00:20:47
Felicia Devine
Brain level.
00:20:50
Natalie Richards
Hello, people.
00:20:50
Felicia Devine
Yes.
00:20:51
Natalie Richards
it's It's just kind of like actually ridiculous. I don't know if we really do get it pounded in our heads so much so that we really do know how to recognize
00:20:54
Felicia Devine
Okay, so everyone's just like standing around talking. i don't know. That's the only thing we recognize.
00:21:03
Natalie Richards
But do people, do they really not know how to recognize that a stroke is happening? I don't understand.
00:21:08
Felicia Devine
I don't know.
00:21:09
Natalie Richards
So this is just like part one of the whole saga. Okay.
00:21:12
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:21:12
Natalie Richards
This is how it began. So he, finally, they get him to the hospital
00:21:15
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:21:18
Felicia Devine
So they he agrees.
00:21:19
Natalie Richards
He agrees to go. They take him to a different hospital because we thankfully we have three options in our area.
00:21:23
Felicia Devine
Thank God.
00:21:27
Felicia Devine
Option A, B, or C.
00:21:27
Natalie Richards
So they take him to a different hospital.
00:21:29
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:21:29
Natalie Richards
All of them are bad in different ways. OK, and we know that they're bad in different ways.
00:21:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:21:34
Natalie Richards
But for this, apparently this one place was going to be the place to go. OK. So they take him there. Thankfully they give him, that they're calling me again. We're at dinner now.
00:21:47
Natalie Richards
They're calling me on the phone. The doctor's talking. He goes, so unfortunately your dad had a stroke. I go, yeah, i know.
00:21:55
Felicia Devine
I knew this at 11 AM.
00:21:55
Natalie Richards
i'm I'm aware.
00:21:56
Felicia Devine
eleven a m
00:21:56
Natalie Richards
Yes, I know. I know he had a stroke. Thank you. hygiene. And they're like, well, we have to give him this, this particular medication. I go, yeah, I know.
00:22:06
Natalie Richards
Give it to him now. Give it to him. Like they have to give him the clot breaking medication. And they're like explaining. I'm like, no, this is an obvious thing that you need to do.
00:22:15
Felicia Devine
yeah
00:22:17
Natalie Richards
Go get daddy and have him help you go potty. Okay. You can have them go take them to dad. Okay. So I'm like, he needs the the TPA or whatever it's called, trippoint whatever that, I can't remember what it stands for.
00:22:27
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:22:30
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:22:31
Natalie Richards
So he needs that clot breaking medication. So they they got him to the hospital. They obviously did another scan. They did the appropriate scan.
00:22:38
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:22:39
Natalie Richards
Okay. And my mom's talking to their neurosurgeon friend. He's telling her that, yes, he needs, he need he's obviously having a stroke.
00:22:46
Felicia Devine
having a stroke.
00:22:48
Natalie Richards
He needs this particular scan. I go, yeah, that's the one I told him to do hours ago.
00:22:53
Felicia Devine
Mm.
00:22:54
Natalie Richards
So they finally did it. found us They found the stroke. It's in a smaller part of the brain, thankfully.
00:22:59
Felicia Devine
OK.
00:23:01
Natalie Richards
So it wasn't, that's why he wasn't having like the speech issues.
00:23:04
Felicia Devine
Or the motor.
00:23:05
Natalie Richards
I forget what it was, what the area of the brain was called. Something weird. P2 or something like that. We referred to it as like the P2 area, which I don't even know what that means.
00:23:16
Felicia Devine
i don't know if we label it like that.
00:23:16
Natalie Richards
I've never, I don't think we label it like that.
00:23:17
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:23:19
Natalie Richards
I was like, I don't know what that means, but whatever.
00:23:21
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:23:21
Natalie Richards
So it obviously had some sort of motor motor control to the body.
00:23:26
Felicia Devine
o
00:23:27
Natalie Richards
so they give him the medication, but it was seven hours later. So they're supposed to do it within four. But now he the doctor said, we can do it within nine.
00:23:33
Felicia Devine
Oh God.
00:23:36
Natalie Richards
We don't really know what's going to happen. But- but we can do it, administer it see what happens. The clot is really small is what they said.
00:23:47
Natalie Richards
So it should work really well.
00:23:47
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:23:49
Natalie Richards
Also, you know, we don't have to worry too much about like major adverse effects, which is good.
00:23:49
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:23:54
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:23:54
Natalie Richards
And I was like, okay, fine. But they had to put him into the ICU to monitor for bleeding, which, okay, fine. Yes. Very reasonable.
00:24:03
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:24:03
Natalie Richards
i and I agree with all of that.
00:24:04
Felicia Devine
and
00:24:04
Natalie Richards
Yes. And my mom, you know, she didn't know what all that meant, but I'm like, yes, he needs the medication. I have no problem with that at all.
00:24:11
Felicia Devine
Right. Yeah.
00:24:11
Natalie Richards
Very reasonable. I'm not against all medication, right?
00:24:15
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah.
00:24:16
Natalie Richards
I don't like the medical field, but I'm not against all that. Because it's an an emergency, a true emergency.
00:24:22
Felicia Devine
Right. Yeah.
00:24:23
Natalie Richards
i've I've got you.
00:24:24
Felicia Devine
Warrants medication.
00:24:24
Natalie Richards
I'm on the same page.
00:24:25
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:24:26
Natalie Richards
I'm good. We got it.
00:24:27
Felicia Devine
hu
00:24:27
Natalie Richards
Okay. So, and I'm, I'm prefacing all of this for our later discussion for the second half of of this, of this whole, of this whole scenario.
00:24:34
Felicia Devine
For the later medication. Yeah.
00:24:37
Natalie Richards
I have no problem with medication when it makes sense. Right. And when it is an emergent situation, absolutely. Please do, do what, do what you need to do.
00:24:45
Felicia Devine
Absolutely. Yeah.
00:24:48
Natalie Richards
okay. So he's in the ICU has the medication, has more CTs, whatever. Everything looks good. He wakes up in the morning has zero symptoms, zero. All of his numbness is gone.
00:25:01
Natalie Richards
i go there in the morning and we're talking like everything's normal.
00:25:03
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:25:06
Natalie Richards
And it was truthfully like he was a okay.
00:25:06
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:25:09
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:25:09
Natalie Richards
Everything's good. Blood pressure was high. but they expect it after a stroke.
00:25:14
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:25:14
Natalie Richards
So like naturally you want the perfusion be high.
00:25:15
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:25:17
Felicia Devine
To increase. Okay.
00:25:18
Natalie Richards
Yeah. So that's like, they didn't do that on purpose. That's what the body does post-stroke. It increases blood pressure to increase perfusion the area.
00:25:27
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:25:28
Natalie Richards
Amazing.
00:25:28
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:25:28
Natalie Richards
Look at how, and they're saying all of that.
00:25:30
Felicia Devine
Smart the body is.
00:25:31
Natalie Richards
They're saying all of that. They're like, this is a natural thing that the body does. Like this is, you know, we're going to let that happen and we don't have to have to worry about bringing it down.
00:25:37
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Bringing it down.
00:25:39
Natalie Richards
We're not, want to bring it down.
00:25:39
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:25:41
Natalie Richards
We want it to stay high to increase healing. Okay. So that was day one. And day two, he was in the ICU for two days. Meanwhile, in the ICU, he's literally normal.
00:25:54
Natalie Richards
And you're I'm walking by all these people that are near death in the ICU and I'm getting to his room at the very end.
00:25:54
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:25:59
Felicia Devine
Oh my God.
00:26:01
Natalie Richards
And he's perfectly fine. Okay.
00:26:04
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:26:04
Natalie Richards
it was and That was miraculous.
00:26:07
Felicia Devine
A miracle.
00:26:07
Natalie Richards
Like, thank God.
00:26:07
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:26:08
Natalie Richards
Thank God he's totally fine.
00:26:09
Felicia Devine
okay Yeah.
00:26:11
Natalie Richards
Okay. So then we have second phase of our story.
00:26:16
Felicia Devine
Jeez, John. Run away, John.
00:26:18
Natalie Richards
At that point, I wish he would have.
00:26:21
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:26:21
Natalie Richards
I came back to the hospital that second day night or the first day night. I can't remember. Second day of this whole thing. It was after work. I saw him again. he was still doing really well, but I like said bye to him and I like had this pit in my stomach when I left.
00:26:41
Felicia Devine
What?
00:26:41
Natalie Richards
And I got to my car and I was like, I don't feel good at all. Like I don't feel good. And he was fine. And I was just like, I don't feel the same way that I felt when I left this morning.
00:26:54
Felicia Devine
The first time, yeah.
00:26:56
Natalie Richards
Because at the morning I was like, oh my gosh, this is amazing. Like everything's good.
00:26:59
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:26:59
Natalie Richards
He's going to get out of here. Everything's fine. Well, I don't know if they can discharge them right from the ICU. think they, i don't know if you can be just discharged right from ICU. Right.
00:27:09
Felicia Devine
Like you, I don't know if you can qualify from like critical care to gone.
00:27:13
Natalie Richards
Right. So I think they had to transfer him to some other floor.
00:27:14
Felicia Devine
Step down unit.
00:27:17
Natalie Richards
Okay.
00:27:17
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:27:18
Natalie Richards
i had Before I left, I had heard that they were transferring him to the cardio floor. And I'm just like, oh boy. When he was in the ICU, they did every test possible on him. They did multiple echoes on his heart. They were trying to figure out where this clot came from, right? He had a contusion on his leg like a month before and went on a couple of flights. And I was like...
00:27:40
Natalie Richards
maybe that could have caused a problem.
00:27:42
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:27:43
Natalie Richards
Right.
00:27:43
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:27:44
Natalie Richards
so they did full leg ultrasounds, making sure that he, he had no clots.
00:27:49
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:27:49
Natalie Richards
And I was very happy about that. And I actually, i pushed for all of that.
00:27:51
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:27:52
Natalie Richards
Like he needs to have all these tests done just to make sure, just to make sure they were, you know, hung up that he doesn't go to the doctor.
00:27:52
Felicia Devine
Yeah. To just have a workup. Yeah.
00:27:59
Natalie Richards
i get it. It's fine. Yeah.
00:28:02
Felicia Devine
I get it.
00:28:02
Natalie Richards
I get it. It's fine. He doesn't go the doctor, but he's good. you know
00:28:06
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:28:07
Natalie Richards
Doesn't have any symptoms. He's fine. so so But they did all these tests. They made sure he didn't have a hole in his heart that maybe a clot from his leg could have could have come up and caused a stroke, blah, blah, blah.
00:28:13
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:28:18
Natalie Richards
They did a lot, and I'm very grateful that they did all that. However, now we know that he really is totally fine.
00:28:21
Felicia Devine
and
00:28:24
Felicia Devine
and
00:28:26
Natalie Richards
They still, okay, so they changed him to a cardio patient. And they're like, ooh, this blood pressure is still a little high. Ooh, we don't like that all of a sudden.
00:28:39
Natalie Richards
so the neuro guy on the ICU floor says, oh, no, need the blood pressure.
00:28:44
Felicia Devine
Was like, this is great.
00:28:45
Natalie Richards
Amazing. Your body's physiologically doing what it needs to do. The second he changed to a cardio patient, they're like, oh, no, we really don't like this. And it was down from what it was before, naturally, as the body does.
00:28:58
Felicia Devine
It's slowly coming back.
00:28:59
Natalie Richards
Brings it down. I wasn't there because it was late at night. They gave him lisinopril to bring his blood pressure down.
00:29:09
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:29:09
Natalie Richards
And then we are on this whole cascade of problems from there.
00:29:15
Felicia Devine
events
00:29:17
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:29:18
Natalie Richards
So overnight, it was like his his blood pressure was not really being regulated. They gave him I gave him a statin at that time too. His is cholesterol was perfect, if not even low.
00:29:36
Natalie Richards
Okay.
00:29:37
Felicia Devine
And they gave him a stat.
00:29:37
Natalie Richards
they're They're looking for problems at this point. And it's just purely like standard of care, normal hospital protocol.
00:29:40
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:29:45
Natalie Richards
Like you get a beta blocker, you get a, or no, you get a blood thinner. they started him on a blood thinner, which, okay, reasonable, fine.
00:29:56
Natalie Richards
started them on blood pressure meds and a statin because that's just what they do post-stroke. Okay.
00:30:02
Felicia Devine
Oh, no.
00:30:02
Natalie Richards
And I'm telling my mom, please don't let him do that. Like, please.
00:30:05
Felicia Devine
No.
00:30:06
Natalie Richards
And she just isn't refusing it at that time. And I'm like, okay, fine, fine, fine.
00:30:08
Felicia Devine
She doesn't have like, yeah.
00:30:12
Natalie Richards
And I'm like, the statin is not going to kick in for a month or two anyway, whatever. i don't care. It is what it is.
00:30:16
Felicia Devine
Yeah, we can take them off it later.
00:30:17
Natalie Richards
But they're giving him all these things and And he's never been on a medication like that in his life ever, ever, ever, ever.
00:30:22
Felicia Devine
andie
00:30:24
Natalie Richards
The only thing he's probably ever taken in the last 20 years maybe was an antibiotic for a sinus infection.
00:30:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:30:32
Natalie Richards
That's literally it. So he's coming into this situation with nothing. And then they're giving him all this stuff and his vitals are kind of going like this a little bit.
00:30:42
Natalie Richards
They're like, they're going up and down. Nothing's really stabilizing.
00:30:47
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:30:47
Natalie Richards
He's getting a headache. He's getting like, there's all kinds of like stuff happening.
00:30:51
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:30:53
Natalie Richards
Meanwhile, he is discouraged as hell that he wasn't getting out of there because he was supposed to get out of there.
00:30:58
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:31:00
Natalie Richards
Like after the ICU, it was supposed to be like, okay, you're good.
00:31:04
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:31:04
Natalie Richards
Everything's fine. Bye. The next day, i think it was the next day after that, he was in the room and they had been giving him these medications now.
00:31:16
Natalie Richards
And they rush in because his pulse is now like high for whatever reason. His pulse was sitting at like 55 the whole time, like he he which I think is his normal, which is low, but it was like very much what his normal probably is.
00:31:24
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.
00:31:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:31:31
Natalie Richards
And they rush in because it's like 114 or something. And they go, sir, are you okay?
00:31:36
Felicia Devine
Resting.
00:31:38
Natalie Richards
And he's sitting there texting like nothing even happened. He's like, yeah, I'm fine. What are you talking about? Yeah.
00:31:46
Natalie Richards
So they found that he went into AFib, but he had no physical symptoms of it. No, like, like he didn't feel the symptom.
00:31:52
Felicia Devine
Like he didn't feel it.
00:31:55
Natalie Richards
Okay. It was there. It was tracking. It was AFib for sure.
00:31:59
Felicia Devine
Oh
00:31:59
Natalie Richards
But then his, but so then of course they bring him more medications. They bring him a beta blocker to bring the, the pulse down. They bring up like all this stuff.
00:32:11
Natalie Richards
And I don't even remember at that point. Oh, started him on a heparin drip. because that's their protocol. I'm literally sitting in this situation and i'm I'm about to lose my mind.
00:32:23
Natalie Richards
Like I'm actually losing my mind because in my soul, i still believe that it was a created experience.
00:32:25
Felicia Devine
my gosh.
00:32:32
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:32:33
Natalie Richards
from being in the hospital and medication.
00:32:34
Felicia Devine
Medication.
00:32:36
Natalie Richards
Now, I'm not going to deny that maybe he has had AFib before, and maybe that's where this clot came from, from the stroke. I don't know. It's very possible. And because he has no symptoms while it's happening, he could have been having it for a very long time.
00:32:47
Felicia Devine
a
00:32:51
Natalie Richards
His brother has AFib.
00:32:51
Felicia Devine
Right. Mm-hmm.
00:32:53
Natalie Richards
There's a lot of people who have AFib. A lot of people who are also walking around in normal life in and out of AFib and they're A-OK.
00:32:58
Felicia Devine
With Ava.
00:33:01
Natalie Richards
All right?
00:33:01
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:33:01
Natalie Richards
They're not in a hospital.
00:33:03
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:33:03
Natalie Richards
Okay?
00:33:05
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:33:05
Natalie Richards
so So he's still like... Basically, they're they're doing all this stuff to like try to control his vitals, and his body is just going back and forth.
00:33:16
Natalie Richards
It's yo-yoing. At one point, they gave him a blood pressure med again that brought him then down to 90 over...
00:33:18
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:33:25
Natalie Richards
90 over 50 or some crap like that. It just was like, oh, maybe we shouldn't have given him that much right away.
00:33:28
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:33:32
Natalie Richards
They gave him like a double dose because it was, you know, in the 160s again.
00:33:35
Felicia Devine
Hi. Yeah.
00:33:37
Natalie Richards
And they're like, oh, well, we'll just give him a double dose right now.
00:33:41
Felicia Devine
Oh my God, Natalie.
00:33:42
Natalie Richards
I truly, truly, and I know that they're used to people coming in there that have that are on eight medications and they're trying, you know, they are used to doing this stuff.
00:33:43
Felicia Devine
He's like a science experiment.
00:33:53
Felicia Devine
Yeah. They had to like figure out the, yeah.
00:33:55
Natalie Richards
But like, this is a body who is physiologically working and they are going against the physiology of the body.
00:33:58
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:34:02
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:34:12
Natalie Richards
upsetting, frustrating, unaligned. I, there is no word. Like there's no word for what I was feeling because we are so not of the medical fields.
00:34:17
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:34:21
Felicia Devine
Like that. yeah
00:34:23
Natalie Richards
And we're so just like, we were asking questions.
00:34:24
Felicia Devine
is it
00:34:27
Natalie Richards
We were definitely like pushing back against the doctors a little, but not in like a bad way at all.
00:34:33
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:34:33
Felicia Devine
Right. You were just like, give me the reasoning.
00:34:34
Natalie Richards
but they knew.
00:34:35
Natalie Richards
Yeah. And he was just an unusual patient.
00:34:36
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Right.
00:34:38
Natalie Richards
Like they were like, he's really fine.
00:34:39
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:34:40
Natalie Richards
And I mean, don't understand why all this is happening. who And I'm just sitting there. It's because he's in the freaking hospital for now, the fifth day in a row. and he's.
00:34:48
Felicia Devine
And God forbid he's going to get a freaking infection just sitting there.
00:34:50
Natalie Richards
No kidding. So he's sitting there at truly the whole time.
00:34:52
Felicia Devine
and Yeah.
00:34:55
Natalie Richards
He was normal. Like he's sitting there completely normal. And that was probably more upsetting than anything because I'm like, this is truly for no, he's in here for not really any reason right now.
00:35:04
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:35:09
Natalie Richards
And they're not going to let him go. I'm thinking that this whole time.
00:35:13
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:35:13
Natalie Richards
I'm like, this feels like a jail situation, at least to me.
00:35:15
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:35:16
Natalie Richards
And he was feeling that too. Every nurse who would come in, he goes, okay, can I go home now?
00:35:21
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:35:21
Natalie Richards
When can I go home? How's this going to help me get home? When can I when can i get out of here?
00:35:23
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:35:25
Natalie Richards
Like he's...
00:35:26
Felicia Devine
They're going put him on the psych ward.
00:35:27
Natalie Richards
literally And he's literally perfectly fine, like perfectly fine. And they just keep coming in and they're just like, you know, we just want to make sure that everything is good.
00:35:37
Natalie Richards
This is really, you know, like this is really not a good thing for your body to be doing right now. And we're just really trying to, you know, make sure that we're doing the right things and get you on the right medications.
00:35:48
Natalie Richards
And then, you know, since you've been estranged from the medical field for a long time, we need to just make sure that we're that we're doing all of this and that you bring your cholesterol down to a 70 that they said, you really, sir, you really need to get your cholesterol down.
00:35:53
Felicia Devine
No. Well,
00:36:03
Natalie Richards
70 is like death. That's like,
00:36:09
Felicia Devine
and also like cholesterol is what is a precursor to your like sex hormones.
00:36:12
Natalie Richards
no kidding. To every hormone in your body, to your brain, to brain healing. I'm like, you
00:36:20
Felicia Devine
Are they sponsored by Cheerios, General Mills?
00:36:20
Natalie Richards
are kidding me. You're kidding
00:36:23
Felicia Devine
who's Who's paying them?
00:36:25
Natalie Richards
So these conversations that I'm sitting through, I actually feel my brain exploding as they're talking because I just can't actually do it.
00:36:33
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:36:37
Natalie Richards
And thankfully I was in the car on the phone with, for one of them, because I actually, my face in person would have been actual shock and
00:36:43
Felicia Devine
Was in shock. Yeah. Yeah.
00:36:47
Natalie Richards
Where they're telling him, you know, we just, oh gosh, I forget what that one was. That was before the AFib had happened. They were telling him all this stuff about like, you just need to be on a blood thinner and a beta blocker and and a statin for the rest of your life.
00:36:59
Natalie Richards
And that's just going to be that's going to be your your life.
00:37:01
Felicia Devine
Oh no. Story.
00:37:03
Natalie Richards
That's what we do.
00:37:03
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:37:04
Natalie Richards
That's just what we do. They're not actually looking at him as a person at all.
00:37:10
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Mm-mm.
00:37:11
Natalie Richards
and looking at his blood work at all because his blood work is pristine, at least from their perspective.
00:37:13
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right.
00:37:17
Natalie Richards
I'm going to run my own, but there's a lot of things I'm going to do for him after the fact.
00:37:19
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:37:21
Natalie Richards
But okay.
00:37:22
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:37:23
Natalie Richards
So then we're basically in the realm where he's not coming out of AFib on his own.
00:37:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:37:31
Natalie Richards
So he's like stuck in AFib pretty much, I think for three days.
00:37:36
Felicia Devine
Yeah, his body's like, hello.
00:37:36
Natalie Richards
And it, And, and I'm sitting there, I'm like, we're having so many conversations and it's just like, I don't think he's coming out of this if he's in the hospital.
00:37:39
Felicia Devine
i can't help myself.
00:37:47
Natalie Richards
And also, can you just, can you just leave and see what your body naturally does?
00:37:50
Felicia Devine
They're not gonna let you go though.
00:37:55
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:37:55
Natalie Richards
And just like, let's just see, you can always come back in and do a cardioversion procedure as an outpatient. That's how they usually do it. It's an outpatient procedure.
00:38:02
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:38:05
Natalie Richards
so that's that was what they were dangling in front of him at that point was like, okay, you can get the shock procedure and everything's going to be good and you'll be fine, blah, blah.
00:38:14
Felicia Devine
That's insane.
00:38:14
Natalie Richards
blah And I'm like, okay, yeah, it's intense, but it does work a lot of the time. it has like a 90% efficacy. I know all this stuff because I know what the risks the risks are and there are risks.
00:38:27
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:38:28
Natalie Richards
You're sedated. There's a risk of being sedated.
00:38:30
Felicia Devine
They literally jolt you with an AED.
00:38:31
Natalie Richards
like and they Yes. And he still has he has like the burn marks on his chest.
00:38:33
Felicia Devine
Wait, he did it?
00:38:36
Natalie Richards
like it's Yeah, he did it. So, okay, we're getting there. Yeah.
00:38:42
Felicia Devine
my god.
00:38:43
Natalie Richards
So they're dangling this carrot in front of his face, right? Like, okay, you could get this shock procedure, but we we don't want to do it till Friday. We want to try these meds to try to get you out of it, you know, on your own.
00:38:54
Natalie Richards
And I'm just like, just do the freaking shock procedure at this point. Like if that's going to get him out of here, then get him out of here.
00:38:58
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Scare the guy. Boo.
00:39:01
Natalie Richards
Literally.
00:39:04
Felicia Devine
It's like hiccups.
00:39:04
Natalie Richards
I'm like, you cannot be on any more of these medications. It's crazy.
00:39:08
Felicia Devine
Oh, no.
00:39:09
Natalie Richards
So they tried to do oral metropylol first to bring the pulse down. And I go, why are we doing that when it's going to do nothing for the AFib? Who cares if his pulse...
00:39:17
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:39:19
Natalie Richards
He's fine. He's sitting here fine.
00:39:21
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:39:21
Natalie Richards
Obviously, we don't want his pulse to be in the hundreds forever. I get it.
00:39:25
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:39:25
Natalie Richards
But once you do the shock procedure, if it gets him out of AFib, his pulse is coming down.
00:39:30
Natalie Richards
Why are we just giving him a medication in the meantime? just because. i did I just was like, this is dumb.
00:39:30
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:39:33
Felicia Devine
yes
00:39:36
Natalie Richards
was being very nice. Like I'm not being nice right now because I'm so annoyed.
00:39:39
Felicia Devine
Right. Right.
00:39:40
Natalie Richards
But like I was being so nice.
00:39:40
Felicia Devine
You're in hindsight. Yeah. Right.
00:39:43
Natalie Richards
And they're just like, this is just what we have to do. It's just what we have to do. b bla oh my God. I just can't. I have these these doctor's faces like burned in my mind. i just can't even, can't even handle it.
00:39:54
Felicia Devine
And you're trying to like keep it together.
00:39:58
Natalie Richards
and then that wasn't working. So then they said, oh, we're going to start him on a drip beta blocker medication. And my mom told me that and I come into the hospital and they hadn't done it yet.
00:40:12
Natalie Richards
And she goes, they're going to start him on a drip. And I go but like, if you're trying to get out of here, that's a bad idea because he's then going to be physically connected to something.
00:40:18
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:40:22
Natalie Richards
And once that happens, he's not coming off until they say he can come off.
00:40:26
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:40:27
Natalie Richards
And I don't like that.
00:40:28
Felicia Devine
No.
00:40:29
Natalie Richards
You can refuse an oral medication, but like once you're hooked up, it's it's a lot harder, right?
00:40:29
Felicia Devine
Mm-mm. Right.
00:40:34
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:40:36
Natalie Richards
So I'm just like, I don't feel right about that. That was like my turning point. I was like, I don't feel right about this at all.
00:40:41
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:40:41
Natalie Richards
Like this is, I was like getting emotional. I'm like, this is not aligning with anything that we have going on right now. I don't like it.
00:40:50
Felicia Devine
Right?
00:40:52
Natalie Richards
So the nurse then comes in as we're having this conversation, as we're talking about it, she comes in, she goes, okay, I have the drip to start for you. And I'm, I just ask her, I say, can we just have like 30 minutes just to discuss a little bit more about like what our next steps are going to be? Can we just have 30 minutes before we start the drip?
00:41:12
Natalie Richards
She goes, okay, you can have an hour. Cause I'm going to go to my lunch. I go, okay, fine. Great. Thank you.
00:41:17
Felicia Devine
Great.
00:41:18
Natalie Richards
Amazing.
00:41:18
Felicia Devine
don't have time to escape. don't have time to pry the the window open.
00:41:19
Natalie Richards
Amazing. Yeah, I know. like, okay, let's go. Let's get out of here.
00:41:26
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:41:26
Natalie Richards
So, so she says, sure, I'll go to my lunch and I'll come back. 10 minutes later, the cardio, the, I think he was a cardiologist. He comes in with his nurse practitioner.
00:41:37
Natalie Richards
First thing out of his mouth, he says, don't piss off the nurses. Don't piss off the nurses because if you, I'm going to write a formal complaint about this. If you tell them to go away, they're not going to come back. If you have a real problem,
00:41:54
Natalie Richards
And he said, he said this we are the experts. This is a place that you listen to the experts. There's there's a few places that you listen to the experts. The hospital, the police station, and the courthouse.
00:42:06
Natalie Richards
You listen to the experts because we know what we're doing.
00:42:10
Felicia Devine
Oh, Natalie.
00:42:11
Natalie Richards
And I literally... I'm sitting there. I go, trust me, that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm not trying to piss off the nurses. Really, I'm not. I might want to piss off you. I didn't say that. But really not No.
00:42:22
Felicia Devine
But the nurse didn't seem mad at the time.
00:42:24
Natalie Richards
no So he goes into this whole thing and we set we get into another conversation about about the shock procedure. And we say, okay, are you going to like tell us the risks of that procedure now? Or like what are the risks of this medication that he's going on?
00:42:43
Natalie Richards
What is going to happen with that shock procedure? Do we actually think that's going to work?
00:42:48
Felicia Devine
okay
00:42:48
Natalie Richards
And what are the risks for him? And she goes, oh, there are no risks for you.
00:42:56
Natalie Richards
And I'm sitting there like, hold on, what are you talking about?
00:42:56
Felicia Devine
I'm sorry.
00:43:00
Felicia Devine
There's risks in walking across the street.
00:43:02
Natalie Richards
Correct.
00:43:02
Felicia Devine
I can list them out.
00:43:03
Natalie Richards
I go, i know what the w risks are because I already looked them up.
00:43:03
Felicia Devine
There's risks involved with everything.
00:43:06
Natalie Richards
So can you verbally tell me what they are, please?
00:43:08
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Legally, you're responsible for telling me what risks are.
00:43:11
Natalie Richards
They go for him, for him, we're not, we're not concerned about anything.
00:43:11
Felicia Devine
It's called informed consent.
00:43:14
Natalie Richards
We're more concerned about him staying in AFib and having a pulse this high. We're really concerned about that. It makes my pulse go really high. to That's what she said. It makes my heart rate increase to have your heart rate like this.
00:43:26
Natalie Richards
So you really just need to be on these medications. I just was like, old
00:43:29
Felicia Devine
what? You almost want to laugh at her.
00:43:33
Natalie Richards
kind of, it was comical.
00:43:36
Felicia Devine
And this is the same doctor that started the conversation with like, don't.
00:43:38
Natalie Richards
This this was no this was then like part of the team. There were like multiple people of the team who were saying these these various things.
00:43:42
Felicia Devine
Okay. Okay.
00:43:46
Natalie Richards
so Nobody would tell us what the risks of the procedure were. Nobody did. And they said, when we go in for the procedure tomorrow, if it happens, if this medication doesn't work to get him out of AFib, then we'll tell you then.
00:43:59
Natalie Richards
Okay. Okay. okay I kind of, that doctor left who said that stuff about being the experts. I started crying because I just was like, A, I'm a people pleaser.
00:44:12
Natalie Richards
And that was, this whole situation is just really hard for me.
00:44:13
Felicia Devine
really hard to hear.
00:44:16
Natalie Richards
Yeah. For me to go in here and not say, okay, yes, yes, I trust everything that you're saying is really difficult, but I also know what feels right.
00:44:20
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:44:22
Felicia Devine
Well,
00:44:27
Felicia Devine
but and you, you're just asking for time to make a decision, which is legally what you're allowed to do.
00:44:30
Natalie Richards
Correct. We're just asking questions.
00:44:34
Felicia Devine
You're not refusing anything at the moment. You're just asking questions and asking for time to discuss.
00:44:36
Natalie Richards
No, just asking questions. And asking for time. So we said, okay, we'll consent to this drip because maybe that will get him out of AFib and maybe he doesn't have to do this cardioversion procedure at all. That was the allure. Okay. so we said, okay, fine. Sure.
00:44:53
Natalie Richards
Put him on the drip, whatever. I wouldn't have, but that was, that's what they decided to do.
00:44:58
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:45:00
Natalie Richards
and that pretty much was like, you're going to do the drip or you're like, we're not going to it pretty much like it was, there wasn't really much of an option.
00:45:09
Natalie Richards
They're like, you're, you you could kind of have to try this.
00:45:12
Felicia Devine
Oh no.
00:45:12
Natalie Richards
If you want to do the procedure tomorrow, like you have to do this drip, which was, kind which was silly, but it must've been an insurance thing.
00:45:15
Felicia Devine
Oh, in order to the procedure, you had to start there. Okay.
00:45:20
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:45:21
Natalie Richards
which I get, I get that there's like all these, these protocols, there's these
00:45:24
Felicia Devine
Protocols.
00:45:27
Natalie Richards
factors in the background that are dictating all of this stuff. I do understand that. I really do. But that makes it even more frustrating to me that these doctors can't think for themselves and look at this patient in front of them as an individual, that is crazy.
00:45:38
Felicia Devine
That's insane.
00:45:43
Felicia Devine
and
00:45:46
Natalie Richards
So when we were in the room talking about the drip and that doctor, that horrible doctor came in, I should say his name, but I'm not going to.
00:45:56
Felicia Devine
He doesn't deserve any credit.
00:45:57
Natalie Richards
he doesn't deserve He doesn't deserve anything. there was a patient care advocate that was in the room talking to us, kind of like in the midst of the nurse leaving.
00:46:08
Natalie Richards
And that 10 minutes she came in and took my dad's blood pressure and sat down and was like, okay, get how's the food? Like how's, she's just like asking us the experience.
00:46:15
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:46:16
Natalie Richards
We were like, at that point it was good. Like every, everybody's very nice, very respectful that we're asking a lot of questions there. I know they think we're annoying, but like,
00:46:25
Felicia Devine
We just want to know.
00:46:26
Natalie Richards
We kind of want to know.
00:46:26
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:46:27
Natalie Richards
And she goes, honestly, it's good for the residents to hear these questions so they can learn. They learn how to respond and they start thinking a little bit differently. i think she goes, that's really good.
00:46:36
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:46:37
Natalie Richards
She was an older lady. She's retired technically, but she like works at the hospital here and there. So she's like talking to us and we say, you know, we're really just very uncomfortable with this whole this whole situation because this the hospital and medicine is just not what we do, right?
00:46:54
Natalie Richards
Not that anybody wants to be there, but it's so far away from like
00:46:54
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:46:56
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:47:00
Felicia Devine
Your true north.
00:47:00
Natalie Richards
who we are as a family our like internal values, right?
00:47:04
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:47:05
Natalie Richards
It just doesn't align. So she's like, I totally get that. Like it's a a very hard thing. And she goes, yeah, he doesn't have all the things that all these other patients have.
00:47:15
Natalie Richards
He's not on 10 medications. They don't really know what to do with that. I go, yeah, they really don't.
00:47:19
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:47:21
Natalie Richards
They really don't. So that was really nice to hear from her. She hears that whole conversation
00:47:24
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:47:27
Natalie Richards
with that doctor that came in. And she came back the next day and talked to my mom. I think it was right before he was going to be discharged. And she goes, just so you know, like that, I don't even know actually who that doctor was. I don't think he's like actually employed by the hospital. He's like a contractor. somehow.
00:47:46
Natalie Richards
And she goes, just so you know, a nurse would never do that in this hospital, what he said. and like the nurse came back in too. And she was like, oh, I like that you guys are asking questions. I think it's great.
00:47:57
Natalie Richards
We said, I'm sorry if that was like a bad thing to do offensive to you.
00:47:59
Felicia Devine
offensive
00:48:01
Natalie Richards
She goes, oh no, I have no problem with it. I think it's great that you're asking questions. It's way better than not. It's really interesting. So it truly was just like a doctor problem.
00:48:12
Felicia Devine
His perception of what happened.
00:48:12
Natalie Richards
It was his perception of the situation. Yeah. So then the next day we were still all going to go to the lake because I had to remove myself at that point.
00:48:23
Natalie Richards
After that, after that experience, I kind of was like, you know what, dad, you get to make your decisions at this point.
00:48:24
Felicia Devine
John, I'm leaving.
00:48:30
Natalie Richards
I'm, I'm out.
00:48:30
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:48:32
Natalie Richards
I'm out. Not really, but like, I was like,
00:48:34
Felicia Devine
No, but like you were like, I've tried to intervene.
00:48:36
Natalie Richards
You're good.
00:48:37
Felicia Devine
We're not making much progress.
00:48:37
Natalie Richards
You're going to, they had planned that cardioversion procedure the Friday we were going to go up to the lake.
00:48:38
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:48:42
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:48:42
Natalie Richards
It was what it was.
Post-Hospital Care and Holistic Approaches
00:48:43
Natalie Richards
I was putting it all like up to God at that point. Like it, it was going to be fine.
00:48:47
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:48:49
Natalie Richards
And, so he was supposed to go in for that procedure at noon.
00:48:54
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:48:55
Natalie Richards
We were going to go to the hospital on the way to the lake at 10, just like right when visiting hours started. Okay. My mom was also getting there kind of around the same time at 930. She calls and she goes, they already took him in.
00:49:11
Natalie Richards
Which at that point didn't surprise me at all because they didn't want to hear from us at all anymore. However, i did ask my father, i said, what did they tell you before you went into this procedure?
00:49:24
Natalie Richards
Because they just
00:49:25
Felicia Devine
As far as risks.
00:49:26
Natalie Richards
did I'm afraid did they give you an informed consent he goes yeah they gave me a consent form
00:49:33
Felicia Devine
Basically signed his life away.
00:49:33
Natalie Richards
to sign uh-huh and I go did they tell you any of the risks and and benefits or anything did they talk to you about it he goes no they came in they said here we're taking you for your procedure here's your form right yeah isn't that interesting
00:49:44
Felicia Devine
Before visiting our start, we're going to get you in there before your family shows up
00:49:50
Natalie Richards
It was bad, bad, like, like bad, bad.
00:49:52
Felicia Devine
He has an asterisk by his name in that hospital.
00:49:55
Natalie Richards
So they gave him the procedure, got him out of there. He got him out of AFib, thank God. But he was, he was sedated and he had, he definitely had like symptoms of that, like coming out of sedation for the next few days.
00:50:10
Felicia Devine
Well, Anne was literally electrocuted.
00:50:12
Natalie Richards
and was electrocuted. Oh, so then they get to recovery and he goes, I have this like tingling by my elbow, like my left elbow. There's like, it's tingling.
00:50:22
Natalie Richards
And I'm just like, oh God, what's happening now? this just was great. But I go, okay, that's the, like the meridian from the heart.
00:50:29
Felicia Devine
is
00:50:30
Natalie Richards
Like your heart meridian goes right by your elbow.
00:50:30
Felicia Devine
okay
00:50:32
Natalie Richards
they They couldn't figure it out for the life of them at the hospital.
00:50:35
Felicia Devine
Of course they couldn't.
00:50:35
Natalie Richards
Of course, my mom's like telling everybody and she goes, I taught all of them the but I go, I'm sure they wanted to be taught that that was the acupuncture meridian for the heart.
00:50:41
Felicia Devine
I'm sure they thought, oh sure, it's the meridian. These bunch of cuckoos. Oh, my gosh, Natalie.
00:50:51
Natalie Richards
Like, thanks, mom. That was good. That's good. I'm sure they wanted to know that. But anyway, if anybody else now has tingling post-cardio version, they're going to know that, oh, it's the heart meridian.
00:51:00
Felicia Devine
heart meridian. Whoa.
00:51:03
Natalie Richards
Isn't that, so thank God.
00:51:05
Felicia Devine
So when did they discharge him? They give him the cardioversion?
00:51:07
Natalie Richards
Right after, right after.
00:51:08
Felicia Devine
No, you're joking.
00:51:09
Natalie Richards
I'm not even kidding.
00:51:10
Felicia Devine
They didn't even monitor him.
00:51:11
Natalie Richards
Barely. They were like get this guy the heck out of here.
00:51:16
Felicia Devine
Don't let him back here.
00:51:17
Natalie Richards
He was there for maybe like a couple more hours, but they were just like checking. Once that happened, he was gone. I couldn't believe it. Couldn't believe it. So anyway, was a lot.
00:51:26
Felicia Devine
Wow. That's insane.
00:51:32
Felicia Devine
Anyway, my nervous system's fried.
00:51:34
Natalie Richards
Pride. That whole week, I just was like, it was consuming my entire being. Like it was, oh my God, I cried 10 times a day.
00:51:40
Felicia Devine
You probably haven't cried that much in years.
00:51:43
Natalie Richards
Oh, meanwhile, through this whole thing, I'm doing like three emotion codes on him every day. Like I'm literally releasing every trapped emotion that my dad has.
00:51:49
Felicia Devine
Oh my gosh.
00:51:53
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:51:54
Natalie Richards
Just because it was the only thing I could do. I couldn't do anything. I did adjust him in the hospital.
00:51:59
Felicia Devine
Good. Hi, Jean.
00:52:02
Natalie Richards
Here, buddy, this is for you. Can you say hi to Felicia? Hi, everybody.
00:52:07
Felicia Devine
Hi.
00:52:08
Natalie Richards
hi I know you can't hear. i have the headphones in. Sorry. Can you go take those to dad? You want to sit with me? We're almost done.
00:52:18
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:52:19
Natalie Richards
So, yeah, it was like the most it sounds dramatic because he really was totally fine, but it was like one of the
00:52:25
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:52:28
Felicia Devine
You were so out of your element and out of control.
00:52:29
Natalie Richards
hardest. Yeah.
00:52:31
Natalie Richards
It was, it was, it really did feel like every cell in my body was screaming that this was not right.
00:52:31
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:52:37
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:52:39
Natalie Richards
And I knew it from that second day when I left him and I had that feeling, i was like, this is bad.
00:52:39
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:52:42
Felicia Devine
Yeah. You knew.
00:52:45
Natalie Richards
This is going to be bad.
00:52:46
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:52:47
Natalie Richards
So still to this moment right now, there still are a lot of conversations going on because it's like, okay, what does this mean now?
00:52:53
Felicia Devine
oh
00:52:56
Natalie Richards
Like, does he have AFib all the time? We don't have a clue.
00:52:59
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:52:59
Natalie Richards
We don't have a clue. So like they want him to, of course, be on a blood thinner the rest of his life. Is that necessary? I don't know because we don't have any data. So we're trying to to formulate that data over this next month.
00:53:10
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:53:15
Natalie Richards
And it's like, trust me, I am not going to do nothing.
00:53:16
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:53:18
Natalie Richards
like that yeah We will be doing the opposite of nothing.
00:53:20
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:53:24
Natalie Richards
But are we going to be going the cardiovascular route? I don't know.
00:53:28
Felicia Devine
Well, maybe a private clinic would be better anyway than like the emergency room.
00:53:30
Natalie Richards
Yeah, we're going to find something else. But right now he has a follow-up with that horrifying cardio cardiologist.
00:53:36
Felicia Devine
Oh
00:53:37
Natalie Richards
And I said, anyone else, literally anyone else, anyone else.
00:53:41
Felicia Devine
my God.
00:53:44
Natalie Richards
So yeah, it's fair it was very interesting. But it's just like still my mom is thinking something is still very wrong. And I in my gut really think that there's not.
00:53:56
Felicia Devine
Okay.
00:53:57
Natalie Richards
So it's kind of tough for that reason.
00:53:58
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:54:00
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:54:01
Natalie Richards
Thankfully, I've told her the reasons why he does not need to be on a statin for the rest of his life and why he does not need a beta blocker bring down the pulse that naturally is at 55 still.
00:54:06
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:54:11
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:54:12
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm. Right.
00:54:14
Natalie Richards
That's what they want him on.
00:54:15
Felicia Devine
Okay. Currently?
00:54:16
Natalie Richards
That's what they left. Yes. That's what they left him with. They said, sir, you need to be on a beta blocker, metropolol, and a statin and a blood and eloquence for the foreseeable future. And his pulse rate is at 50, between 40, honestly, and at all times the past two weeks.
00:54:37
Natalie Richards
And they want him to be on beta blocker.
00:54:37
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:54:40
Natalie Richards
And if we didn't know any better, we would have he would be.
00:54:43
Felicia Devine
You would have been. His pulse would be 30.
00:54:45
Natalie Richards
and he he's supposed literally be like, are you alive, John?
00:54:45
Felicia Devine
He's
00:54:49
Natalie Richards
I don't know.
00:54:50
Felicia Devine
<unk> hibernating turtle.
00:54:50
Natalie Richards
so like I feel really bad for other people because they don't know...
00:54:52
Felicia Devine
Oh.
00:54:58
Natalie Richards
this side of physiology. And I really do trust the physiology of the body.
00:55:01
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:55:04
Natalie Richards
And I say, you know, if he, i don't know, we're going to try to get the AFib figured out.
00:55:04
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:55:11
Natalie Richards
If he actually gets into AFib, I don't have a clue.
00:55:14
Felicia Devine
Yeah, yeah, that's crazy.
00:55:14
Natalie Richards
don't have a clue. So and that's kind of where we're at right now. It's like, does he have a problem or was that a hospital induced problem?
00:55:22
Felicia Devine
Driven problem, yeah.
00:55:25
Natalie Richards
I don't know. It makes sense that the stroke originally was from a clot from AFib.
00:55:30
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:55:30
Natalie Richards
That's reasonable, but it happened immediately after very unusual activity, very unusual that he would never do on a normal day.
00:55:35
Felicia Devine
Activity. here Right.
00:55:41
Natalie Richards
And I just don't believe that that's going to happen to him again.
00:55:44
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:55:44
Natalie Richards
But would I put him on natural blood thinners for a while? Yeah, I would.
00:55:48
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:55:49
Natalie Richards
I would put him on natural options.
00:55:52
Felicia Devine
Saffron.
00:55:52
Natalie Richards
star anise, star anise works the same way as Eliquis.
00:55:54
Felicia Devine
o Yeah. but that Yeah.
00:55:58
Natalie Richards
who So it has the same, same mechanism of action, just not the side effects.
00:56:03
Felicia Devine
Nice. Yeah.
00:56:05
Natalie Richards
turmeric is also natural blood thinner, which he cannot take with
00:56:07
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:56:10
Natalie Richards
the real blood thinner because it actually works so well that it it would be far too much between star anise and the turmeric.
00:56:12
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:56:14
Felicia Devine
You'd have so slippery. Your blood would be so thin.
00:56:19
Natalie Richards
Like it actually would would kill him probably.
00:56:23
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:56:23
Natalie Richards
So they really do work.
00:56:23
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:56:25
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:56:26
Natalie Richards
Tons of magnesium.
00:56:27
Natalie Richards
He's going to be on like eight different forms of magnesium because that
00:56:30
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:56:34
Felicia Devine
Right. Smooth muscle. Mm-hmm.
00:56:37
Natalie Richards
We're going to work on vagus nerve. We're going to work on all kinds of stuff because it's an electrical conduction problem.
00:56:39
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:56:43
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Problem.
00:56:44
Natalie Richards
So we just need to work on the electrical conduction and he's been chronically dehydrated probably for the last 30 years of his life.
00:56:51
Felicia Devine
Yeah. He needs a conductor. He needs assaults and yeah.
00:56:52
Natalie Richards
So he needs salts and and all of that. So that's kind of the plan, at least in my mind.
00:56:57
Felicia Devine
okay Yeah.
00:56:59
Natalie Richards
So I feel very good about that plan, truthfully.
00:57:01
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah.
00:57:02
Natalie Richards
so there we are. it was, it was wild.
00:57:06
Felicia Devine
That's crazy.
00:57:06
Natalie Richards
It was really, really wild, but he did come up to the lake with us. He, heed the whole time he was like, I have to get up to the lake with my family.
00:57:10
Felicia Devine
Oh, he did. Oh, yeah.
00:57:13
Natalie Richards
i just want to be up there this weekend with my family. How do I get up there with my family?
00:57:16
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:57:17
Natalie Richards
So he came up for the last like day that we were there.
00:57:18
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:57:20
Natalie Richards
So, and he stayed a couple more.
00:57:20
Felicia Devine
Good. Good. Yeah.
00:57:24
Natalie Richards
So they're trying to take it easy.
00:57:24
Felicia Devine
Good. Yeah.
00:57:27
Natalie Richards
They're very concerned about him doing any sort of activity right now, which I don't know that I really agree with either, but whatever.
00:57:31
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:57:33
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Maybe he just needs to be supervised.
00:57:37
Natalie Richards
He does. He needs to not do maybe what he used to do for a while, just while he's monitoring himself.
00:57:42
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
00:57:44
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:57:45
Natalie Richards
But then i don't know. What does that do to somebody then too?
00:57:50
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:57:50
Natalie Richards
Like, does this create more of a problem or is ignorance bliss?
00:57:52
Felicia Devine
Right. Like sedentary lifestyle lead to, yeah. i
00:57:58
Natalie Richards
That's kind of how, like how he just doesn't have a worry in the world and he's been great.
00:58:00
Felicia Devine
isn he
00:58:03
Natalie Richards
And I just like, why bring in worries?
00:58:03
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:58:06
Natalie Richards
I don't know.
00:58:08
Felicia Devine
Thoughts, traumas, toxins.
00:58:08
Natalie Richards
We can, it is, and it's a very real thing.
00:58:11
Felicia Devine
It's a thought.
00:58:11
Natalie Richards
Like it's a very real thing.
00:58:12
Felicia Devine
And he, he was, he was, Categorically traumatized by thoughts, traumas, and toxins.
00:58:18
Natalie Richards
1 million
Navigating Medical Challenges and Learning
00:58:19
Natalie Richards
percent.
00:58:19
Natalie Richards
So now he's like still coming off. I'm no kidding. So i did I adjusted him in the office and his blood pressure and pulse were like beautiful right after, which was great.
00:58:19
Felicia Devine
So the homie has a subluxation.
00:58:25
Felicia Devine
Wow.
00:58:30
Felicia Devine
Good.
00:58:31
Natalie Richards
so
00:58:32
Felicia Devine
Good. Okay.
00:58:33
Natalie Richards
So he's monitoring himself, but he doesn't have a good way to know whether he's in AFib.
00:58:34
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:58:37
Natalie Richards
They didn't give him a heart monitor upon leaving the hospital. They said they were going to and they did not. So he needs to get one.
00:58:43
Felicia Devine
I'll text you after.
00:58:44
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:58:45
Felicia Devine
We have someone in our family that has some electrical issues and we have we have something.
00:58:48
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
00:58:49
Felicia Devine
So I'll text you after.
00:58:51
Natalie Richards
Beautiful.
00:58:51
Felicia Devine
Yeah. I don't want to say it online because i don't want to like give medical advice to people who are like, I don't want other people to listen to what I'm saying.
00:58:54
Natalie Richards
No, that's fine.
00:58:57
Natalie Richards
Right. Right. Right.
00:59:02
Felicia Devine
Not what I'm trying to do.
00:59:03
Natalie Richards
Also, none of this story is medical advice.
00:59:05
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:59:05
Natalie Richards
It's just...
00:59:06
Felicia Devine
Again, like my story, don't listen to what we did just listen to our story.
00:59:11
Natalie Richards
Just, you know, I will be treating this in a very very holistic way and a more comprehensive way than anyone would ever treat it and the medical realm.
00:59:12
Felicia Devine
Don't do what we did. yeah
00:59:22
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:59:25
Natalie Richards
And maybe that does involve some medications.
00:59:25
Felicia Devine
Right.
00:59:27
Natalie Richards
I don't know.
00:59:28
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:59:28
Natalie Richards
Maybe it does. If anything is warranted, i can understand it.
00:59:33
Felicia Devine
hu
00:59:33
Natalie Richards
I really can.
00:59:34
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Right.
00:59:35
Natalie Richards
i do not understand a beta blocker.
00:59:35
Felicia Devine
You're like, give me the science and I can get it. Mm-hmm.
00:59:38
Natalie Richards
I do not understand a statin and I kind of understand aliquist, but I would rather do something different.
00:59:46
Felicia Devine
Right. Right. There's like natural ways of doing what that's designed to do.
00:59:47
Natalie Richards
There's other options. Yeah.
00:59:50
Natalie Richards
Right. Correct.
00:59:50
Felicia Devine
That's not synthetic.
00:59:52
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
00:59:53
Natalie Richards
Correct. And he is having some Some side effects from that too. So, but we don't know if that's even just side effect coming out of the hospital.
00:59:56
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:00:00
Natalie Richards
I don't know.
01:00:01
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:00:01
Natalie Richards
I don't know. He's like traumatized. I'm traumatized.
01:00:05
Felicia Devine
yeah I'm traumatized for you. That's very scary.
01:00:07
Natalie Richards
It's crazy. So we're done with these situations now.
01:00:08
Felicia Devine
Yeah. I know.
01:00:10
Natalie Richards
Okay. No more things for you.
01:00:12
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:00:13
Natalie Richards
no more things.
01:00:14
Felicia Devine
Well, that's for another day because I had another terrible event.
01:00:16
Natalie Richards
Yeah. What in the world you did?
01:00:19
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:00:20
Natalie Richards
you want to talk about it?
01:00:22
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Cause it's really short cause it's like depressing.
01:00:23
Natalie Richards
Let's do it. what the heck let's just bring it down bring it down a level bring it down
01:00:25
Felicia Devine
So so
01:00:30
Felicia Devine
let's just bring it down even more. So i waited three months to get an iron transfusion.
01:00:35
Natalie Richards
who
01:00:37
Felicia Devine
Okay.
01:00:37
Natalie Richards
oh yes yes yes yeah
01:00:39
Felicia Devine
So I finally got scheduled. I got scheduled like It was like six weeks out. So by the time it was scheduled, so like when it came down to like actually getting the infusion, it was three months post-procedure.
01:00:50
Felicia Devine
Now, the iron transfusion is supposed to help me get more oxygen capacity into my body because I lost so much blood.
01:00:55
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:00:57
Felicia Devine
It's not because I'm like inherently anemic.
01:00:57
Natalie Richards
Yeah. No.
01:00:59
Felicia Devine
It's because I had a blood loss issue.
01:01:01
Natalie Richards
Yeah. To help bring your energy levels up a little bit.
01:01:03
Felicia Devine
Yeah. So like I exert energy and I literally just tank. Like I went on a 10 minute bike ride the other, like a couple weeks ago with Giuseppe and I literally got back to the house.
01:01:07
Natalie Richards
Oh,
01:01:14
Felicia Devine
I was like laying in the lawn. i was like, Dan, I'm going pass out.
01:01:15
Natalie Richards
oh
01:01:16
Felicia Devine
Like it was so bad.
01:01:16
Natalie Richards
no. No, it's so bad.
01:01:19
Felicia Devine
So bad. So I was hopeful that like this transfusion would just like get me a little further along in like oxygen capacity because like I'm fine at baseline, but I know like at the end of the day, i just don't have the capacity that I could.
01:01:27
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
01:01:34
Natalie Richards
Right.
01:01:34
Felicia Devine
i was like, okay.
01:01:35
Natalie Richards
And that may not come back for a while.
01:01:37
Felicia Devine
Yeah. And they said it could take up to six months for you to start to feel better.
01:01:41
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:01:41
Felicia Devine
and I'm like, okay, but like, could I try sooner?
01:01:43
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Right.
01:01:47
Felicia Devine
Felicia.
01:01:47
Natalie Richards
Can we hack this? Because I think i think we can.
01:01:49
Felicia Devine
Felicia, don't get ahead of yourself.
01:01:51
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:01:52
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Now I will say I'm like doing other things.
01:01:54
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:01:55
Felicia Devine
I'm taking like iron and copper liquid. I'm taking beef liver. I'm taking, uh, lifeblood, which is another blood pill anyway.
01:02:01
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Are you doing spleen?
01:02:03
Felicia Devine
So yeah.
01:02:04
Natalie Richards
Do you have anything with spleen in it? You do, right? Is that, does lifeblood have spleen?
01:02:08
Felicia Devine
Uh, the, yeah, I think it does. Yeah.
01:02:12
Natalie Richards
It must.
01:02:12
Felicia Devine
Something has, something has spleen in it.
01:02:14
Natalie Richards
Something has spleen. Okay.
01:02:14
Felicia Devine
Yeah. One of the few.
01:02:16
Natalie Richards
Okay.
01:02:17
Felicia Devine
So i get to this long-awaited three-month appointment, right? I'm like, today's the day.
01:02:24
Natalie Richards
Oh, here's Kyle.
01:02:24
Felicia Devine
i get to the...
01:02:25
Natalie Richards
Sorry.
01:02:26
Felicia Devine
Hi, Kyle.
01:02:26
Natalie Richards
Sorry.
01:02:27
Felicia Devine
oh my gosh.
01:02:27
Natalie Richards
but She says, hi, Kyle.
01:02:28
Felicia Devine
Kyle's first experience on the pod.
01:02:29
Natalie Richards
The pod. His first appearance. okay sorry.
01:02:35
Felicia Devine
What's so funny is that was like identical to Jean, just like a floating head.
01:02:35
Natalie Richards
First of one. I know, right? It's the same head.
01:02:41
Felicia Devine
So I get to this appointment. I've been waiting for it for so long and they're like, okay, so there's this like
01:02:48
Felicia Devine
high risk that you could have an allergic reaction. So we do a five milliliter test dose before we give you the actual hundred, no I'm sorry, five milliliter test dose before they give you a thousand milligram bag, which is like a normal size, like bag.
01:02:52
Natalie Richards
Okay.
01:02:55
Natalie Richards
Oh, my.
01:03:02
Natalie Richards
What would the allergic reaction be coming from?
01:03:05
Natalie Richards
Just.
01:03:06
Felicia Devine
it's from the preservatives inside the bag or like inside the, it's like the fillers, right?
01:03:08
Natalie Richards
oh okay.
01:03:11
Felicia Devine
Okay. Great.
01:03:13
Natalie Richards
Interesting.
01:03:13
Felicia Devine
So if there could be a reaction, guess who has it?
01:03:16
Natalie Richards
do we have filler free? Do we?
01:03:18
Felicia Devine
Yeah. I'm like, can I just chew on a bar of iron? Like what is going on?
01:03:21
Natalie Richards
Oh, my God.
01:03:23
Felicia Devine
So they are like, yeah, like here are the risks and here are like the things you should, they literally gave me a laminated sheet of symptoms to look for. Like during this five.
01:03:32
Natalie Richards
Isn't that interesting?
01:03:32
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:03:33
Natalie Richards
This is proper informed consent. Huh.
01:03:35
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah.
01:03:35
Natalie Richards
Funny.
01:03:36
Felicia Devine
I know. So they're like, okay, so look at the sheet.
01:03:36
Natalie Richards
Funny.
01:03:38
Felicia Devine
Do you understand everything? I said, yes. They're like, okay, we sit with you and they push a milliliter a minute for five minutes.
01:03:41
Natalie Richards
Wow. Okay.
01:03:45
Felicia Devine
For the testos. Okay.
01:03:46
Natalie Richards
For the testos.
01:03:46
Felicia Devine
So it's, yeah.
01:03:47
Natalie Richards
Oh, God.
01:03:47
Felicia Devine
So it's all in the IV.
01:03:48
Natalie Richards
Yes.
01:03:49
Felicia Devine
So we're sitting there, we're sitting there, chatting. I'm like, oh, like today's the best day of my life. Like I'm going to feel better.
01:03:53
Natalie Richards
I'm going to be great.
01:03:54
Felicia Devine
Like i was like, tomorrow I'm going to new woman.
01:03:55
Natalie Richards
Oh, no.
01:03:57
Felicia Devine
She's like, all also this takes three weeks to kick in. And I was like, oh that you should have filled me in on that first.
01:04:00
Natalie Richards
o shoot
01:04:04
Felicia Devine
So we're doing it and we get four minutes in and I start getting an allergic reaction. And I'm like, okay. And she's like, like anaphylaxis.
01:04:12
Natalie Richards
Of what? Like, oh, you were. So you started like having a hard time.
01:04:15
Felicia Devine
Yeah, so I was getting like flush.
01:04:17
Natalie Richards
but Yeah. Okay.
01:04:18
Felicia Devine
I like started sweating profusely. I started getting super itchy everywhere.
01:04:21
Natalie Richards
And you do have history of anaphylactic reactions.
01:04:24
Felicia Devine
Anaphylaxis. My ears just went like full of fluid.
01:04:25
Natalie Richards
So, oh God. Yeah. Yeah.
01:04:29
Felicia Devine
Like it was like, you know, my hearing started to go dim.
01:04:30
Natalie Richards
Classic. Yeah. Yeah.
01:04:33
Felicia Devine
So she like immediately pulls the testos, flushes me with saline, and then gets me three rescue meds. IV steroid.
01:04:40
Natalie Richards
Oh, great.
01:04:41
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Love this.
01:04:42
Natalie Richards
Good. More.
01:04:44
Felicia Devine
Yeah. IV steroid, IV pepsid, which is supposed to be an antihistamine and then oral Tylenol.
01:04:48
Natalie Richards
Oh, yeah. I've heard that. Why?
01:04:53
Natalie Richards
What?
01:04:53
Felicia Devine
I have no idea. She's like, here you go.
01:04:55
Natalie Richards
What?
01:04:56
Felicia Devine
Gives me all of it. And I'm like, okay. I literally told her at the beginning, I said, have to give me Tylenol, I might cry. Like, I couldn't tell you the last time I took a Tylenol.
01:05:05
Natalie Richards
Right?
01:05:05
Felicia Devine
My poor liver trying to detox what just went in and now you're just dunking it up.
01:05:06
Natalie Richards
Oh no. All of that stuff all together?
01:05:10
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:05:10
Natalie Richards
no.
01:05:12
Felicia Devine
So i'm like, okay, get if that's like the protocol. See again, following suit with the experts.
01:05:15
Natalie Richards
Hold you, but come around here. Jeannie. Hold on, Jeannie is here. Come here. Come around here, Jeannie.
01:05:20
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:05:22
Natalie Richards
You can sit here and you can watch with it Okay. Mommy, I just want to hear.
01:05:25
Felicia Devine
Hi.
01:05:27
Natalie Richards
You want to hear for just a second? Yeah. Okay, then Felicia has to tell a story, okay?
01:05:31
Felicia Devine
Hi, Jean. I love your haircut.
01:05:34
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:05:35
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
01:05:36
Natalie Richards
Can you hear?
01:05:37
Felicia Devine
yeah yeah
01:05:38
Natalie Richards
time, took me to Petsmart and my grandma. And then we went to Petsmart and
01:05:55
Natalie Richards
unbety dragon my us And his hands up for me so he wanted me so so so you wantned meat So you want me to take that little guy home.
01:06:08
Natalie Richards
Oh, yes. The bearded dragon was telling him.
01:06:09
Felicia Devine
Oh, the bearded dragon wanted you to take him home?
01:06:11
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Okay.
01:06:12
Felicia Devine
Okay.
01:06:12
Natalie Richards
That was a good story, Jean. Thank you.
01:06:13
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Thanks for being on the pod.
01:06:15
Natalie Richards
Thanks, honey. Guest speaker.
01:06:19
Felicia Devine
So I trust in the experts, right, Natalie? We're trusting in the experts.
01:06:23
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:06:23
Felicia Devine
And they said, take these three medications and it will be fine.
01:06:26
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:06:26
Felicia Devine
I said, gotcha. Great.
01:06:27
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:06:28
Felicia Devine
Take the three medications. They're like, okay, now we have to wait 20 minutes for them to kick in and then we can try again.
01:06:34
Natalie Richards
I'm sorry. what
01:06:36
Felicia Devine
So they're like, so we just complete the test dose. And then if you don't have a reaction, then we just continue. And I'm like, complete the testos.
01:06:44
Natalie Richards
I'm sorry. The test dose created a reaction. Wouldn't you just stop?
01:06:50
Felicia Devine
No, because apparently this happens all the time. You give the three rescue beds and it covers you for the duration of the rest of the drip.
01:06:54
Natalie Richards
You're kidding. God, what else does it do to you?
01:06:59
Felicia Devine
Right.
01:06:59
Natalie Richards
Sheesh.
01:06:59
Felicia Devine
So, so they're like, oh, we just finished the testos.
01:06:59
Natalie Richards
Okay. Okay. Okay. okay okay
01:07:02
Felicia Devine
And I said, that's interesting because it's only one more milliliter.
01:07:03
Natalie Richards
Gosh, I love this yes so much. So my.
01:07:09
Felicia Devine
So they gave me the one milliliter and I was fine. And I was like, okay. So then they're like, now we can start you on the 1000 milligram bag, which is a full bag. Like it's, it looks like Coca-Cola.
01:07:18
Natalie Richards
Yeah. Yeah.
01:07:19
Felicia Devine
It's dark brown.
01:07:21
Natalie Richards
Dark.
01:07:21
Felicia Devine
They're like, yeah. So they're like, okay, so now we start you on the bag. Okay, great. They start me in the bag. It's an hour drip. I get 10 minutes into it.
01:07:29
Natalie Richards
Oh, my. Oh, no.
01:07:30
Felicia Devine
All our reaction. They're like, oh, this shouldn't happen.
01:07:33
Natalie Richards
This is asinine.
01:07:36
Felicia Devine
No, literally. there Yeah, this shouldn't happen. You're like on those. You have those rescue meds in you like that. should You shouldn't have another allergic reaction.
01:07:42
Natalie Richards
However, they do not know who they're talking to.
01:07:44
Felicia Devine
Yeah, I'm like the queen of if something could go wrong, it does.
01:07:45
Natalie Richards
guys Problems. Are you kidding me?
01:07:51
Felicia Devine
So, Natalie, I burst into tears. I burst into tears.
01:07:56
Natalie Richards
Of course.
01:07:57
Felicia Devine
And they're like, we understand you're frustrated. I was like, no, I truly don't think you understand the level of frustration here. I thought today was going to be the end of the story.
01:08:06
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
01:08:06
Felicia Devine
thought today was going to be the chapter turning. I thought today was going to be marking when I start feeling better.
01:08:09
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
01:08:12
Felicia Devine
Like I was so deeply, deeply disappointed.
01:08:13
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
01:08:16
Felicia Devine
And so just, I felt like I just couldn't get over it.
01:08:18
Natalie Richards
Oh.
01:08:22
Natalie Richards
Yeah.
01:08:23
Felicia Devine
And I'm just so upset. And i I had waited so long.
01:08:25
Natalie Richards
Gosh darn.
01:08:28
Felicia Devine
It had been so traumatic. And then to go into two allergic reactions, to be told you can't get this.
01:08:31
Natalie Richards
Mm-hmm.
01:08:34
Felicia Devine
any Like, I just was at my, like, wit's end.
01:08:35
Natalie Richards
That's so awful.
01:08:37
Felicia Devine
I was so mad.
01:08:39
Natalie Richards
Yes.
01:08:39
Felicia Devine
And I just was like, fine. Okay, whatever. And I had to pay for it.
01:08:43
Natalie Richards
Wow. And you left? Of course.
01:08:47
Felicia Devine
I was there for three and a half hours.
01:08:49
Natalie Richards
You were okay after that second reaction?
01:08:51
Felicia Devine
Well, they, nothing, they can't.
01:08:52
Natalie Richards
What did they have to do then? it oh my
01:08:54
Felicia Devine
So they just flush you with saline and hoped, and they send you on your way. So I ended up getting a raging headache. I don't usually get headaches.
01:09:04
Natalie Richards
Interesting, really from the medication.
01:09:04
Felicia Devine
I had a raging headache for four. Well, I got it done Tuesday. Today is the first day that I really, truly don't have any symptoms.
01:09:11
Natalie Richards
Wow.
01:09:11
Felicia Devine
But like the first three days post whatever, I don't know if it was a headache from the preservative. I don't know if it was a headache from the steroid. I don't know if it was a headache from a combination of everything.
01:09:22
Felicia Devine
But it was like I couldn't even like see
01:09:23
Natalie Richards
I'm sure everything. oh my gosh.
01:09:26
Felicia Devine
I was so down and out. So anyway, I'm very flustered. dan and I are weighing the odds of like, do we even try another brand or do I just like live with fatigue and call it a day?
01:09:35
Natalie Richards
Oh, God. i don't think it's possible for it to last forever. But the fatigue.
01:09:44
Felicia Devine
What? No, I know. But I'm just saying like, I was hoping to close the book.
01:09:47
Natalie Richards
But to just, right. You were really hoping that that was going to be the deal.
01:09:52
Felicia Devine
And like, how many people do we know that just go and get iron transfusions are fine?
01:09:54
Natalie Richards
e Yeah, they're totally fine.
01:09:57
Felicia Devine
Why do I have to have?
01:09:58
Natalie Richards
Are there other brands that exist that don't have preservatives?
01:10:00
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah. No, they all do.
01:10:02
Natalie Richards
No, they all do.
01:10:03
Felicia Devine
But some are like gentler versions.
01:10:04
Natalie Richards
It's just some are different.
01:10:05
Felicia Devine
Like this was supposed to be the like mega monster of like biggest dose, longest lasting, like heaviest hitter.
01:10:05
Natalie Richards
yeah
01:10:09
Natalie Richards
I see. yeah I see. I see.
01:10:13
Felicia Devine
Well, with that apparently comes more symptoms.
01:10:14
Natalie Richards
Maybe that's a lesson.
01:10:19
Felicia Devine
Okay. Lesson learned.
01:10:19
Natalie Richards
yes
01:10:20
Felicia Devine
But I didn't know.
01:10:21
Natalie Richards
To ease it. Right. No. and
01:10:23
Felicia Devine
Like the doctor just ordered the prescription.
01:10:24
Natalie Richards
And they find it not to be a problem because it's just they're doing what they usually do.
01:10:28
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Yeah, so highly frustrating.
01:10:29
Natalie Richards
Yeah. I get it. i get it. But man, are we individual. Holy crud.
01:10:34
Felicia Devine
Yeah. So I've given up on hope that it's going to be a quick end because it's not a quick end and that just is what it is.
01:10:37
Natalie Richards
oh okay.
01:10:44
Natalie Richards
Oh, that's awful. Hi, Jeannie.
01:10:46
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:10:46
Natalie Richards
You say, I'm sorry, Felicia. Oh, Jeannie is so, mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
01:10:50
Felicia Devine
Oh, he's sleeping. Yeah, that's how I feel, Jean. can't even open my eyeballs.
01:10:53
Natalie Richards
Felicia is so tired.
01:10:56
Felicia Devine
I'm the most tired girl.
01:10:57
Natalie Richards
He's so tired. who
01:11:00
Felicia Devine
Jean, are you still napping?
01:11:02
Natalie Richards
No.
01:11:03
Felicia Devine
Really?
01:11:03
Natalie Richards
No. Only if, yeah, I'll get you strawberries in a second if you're good boy. Okay. I'll get you some. I want strawberries right now. I'll get them for you in a second.
01:11:14
Felicia Devine
We're almost out.
01:11:14
Natalie Richards
Okay.
01:11:15
Felicia Devine
Actually, we've gone so long.
01:11:15
Natalie Richards
We're almost done. We are almost done.
01:11:17
Felicia Devine
People are probably sick of us.
01:11:17
Natalie Richards
Oh, we have. We are. Oh gosh. What was I going to say?
01:11:23
Felicia Devine
We were talking about napping.
01:11:24
Natalie Richards
Oh, napping. Yeah, no, he doesn't nap anymore. Bye, Kyle. they're Sorry, there's a lot of things going on. I'll let her out. Mel's coming to get her? At three. At three, okay.
01:11:37
Natalie Richards
Yeah, he doesn't nap. In the car, if it's like 5 p.m., then maybe he'll fall asleep, which I would rather he didn't because he is up till at least midnight.
01:11:40
Felicia Devine
Yeah. Right. Yeah. eleven 11. Yeah.
01:11:46
Natalie Richards
really, really.
01:11:48
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:11:48
Natalie Richards
He's up till 11 on a normal night. It's ridiculous.
01:11:51
Felicia Devine
Jeepers.
01:11:52
Natalie Richards
But he doesn't wake up till 9.
01:11:54
Felicia Devine
Right. Right.
01:11:55
Natalie Richards
So it's fine.
01:11:55
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:11:56
Natalie Richards
i i will I will take that.
01:11:56
Felicia Devine
Yeah. You'll take it. Yeah.
01:11:58
Natalie Richards
Yeah. So, yeah.
01:12:00
Felicia Devine
All right. Well, that was a long-winded, depressing podcast, but I'm
01:12:04
Natalie Richards
I'm a bird. Mama bird. It was kind of a sad one, wasn't it?
01:12:07
Felicia Devine
Hopefully, we can turn the corner and go have some like more lighthearted conversation soon.
01:12:08
Natalie Richards
Mama bird. Hopefully. bird. Hopefully we have all learned lessons. I see the bird. I see the bird, Jean. Hopefully we've all learned lessons. I know I have.
01:12:18
Natalie Richards
And I do know that everything happens for a reason and happens to teach us lessons.
01:12:18
Felicia Devine
Yes.
01:12:21
Felicia Devine
Mm-hmm.
01:12:23
Natalie Richards
Mama, mom.
01:12:23
Felicia Devine
Yeah.
01:12:24
Natalie Richards
So I've learned a lot. I am so convicted to never find myself in a situation like that ever again.
01:12:34
Felicia Devine
Right.
01:12:37
Natalie Richards
And it really solidified my she solidified my decision to certainly not have a baby in a hospital. That's for sure.
01:12:47
Felicia Devine
Right.
01:12:47
Natalie Richards
Holy moly.
01:12:48
Felicia Devine
Right.
01:12:48
Natalie Richards
I would have lit that.
01:12:48
Felicia Devine
You're a victim.
01:12:49
Natalie Richards
I would have lit that place on fire.
01:12:51
Felicia Devine
Right.
01:12:52
Natalie Richards
Oh, my gosh. so Oh, it's a robin, honey. It's a robin. so it's got the big really a big head.
01:13:00
Felicia Devine
Well, until next time.
01:13:01
Natalie Richards
prude head. Okay. Okay. Bye, Felicia.
01:13:05
Felicia Devine
Bye.
01:13:05
Natalie Richards
Bye.