Life With My Soldier

My grandma asked me last Friday morning if we would be able to come down to where my Grandpa was in the hospital and stay with her if she needed us to. I, of course, told her yes. Well she called later that day and said that she was going to stay so if we could come down it would be appreciated. So, when Eric got off work we went down to the hospital. When we got there my grandpa wasn't doing too well. He had to have surgery before we got there, because they had to put a tube in his chest to drain the fluid that was building on his heart. Well, we stayed and talked to him for a while, but when he was getting tired we decided to leave and let him rest. So, we went to a motel for the night. The next morning we got up early and went in to visit him. He was up, but his blood pressure was really low it kept falling to about 55/46. It went up a few times to normal, and towards the afternoon Grandma was tired and asked the nurse if he was stable enough for us to leave, he said yes. Well, we took her back to the motel and went and piddled around town for a while. When we got back, she was up and we sat and talked a while before heading to the hospital again. When we got there they had the curtain in his room pulled and a ton of people were in there working on him. A guy asked if we were the family, and then said that somebody would be out to talk to us soon. Grandma kept asking if something had happened, but he wouldn't answer. Well, a lady did come out and gave Grandma the phone, and the person on the phone told her that Grandpa's heart was trying to give out. So, they had us go to the waiting room so we couldn't hear everything that was going on. A few minutes later the dr came out and said they had one option left, to put in a pace maker and see if that would work. Grandma said to do it and try and give him every chance. Well, they had to put him on a respirator and when tried to put the pace maker in. They didn't even get the pace maker in before his heart gave up. It was so sad being there with Grandma when the dr told her that her husband of 32 years was gone. I'm glad, however, that we were there, because at least we were there with her to give her a little bit of comfort and so she wasn't alone in her time of need. I had the task to make the phone calls to tell everyone he was gone. Grandma asked me to call Grandpa's son. That was the hardest thing I have ever had to do in my life. I don't know the guy and I had never talked to him, and it was so heartbreaking to have to tell him his dad wasn't with us anymore, but at least it took some weight off of Grandma's shoulders. We were with Grandma all week, they let Eric off for the week too. We had Grandpa's funeral yesterday, and it had military honors. Eric got to present the flag to Grandma, which was very special to both of them. I've lost both my grandpa's in a 9 month period. I have one left, my mom's dad, but he has never been in our life and so this Grandpa was my Grandpa. I loved him so much, and he will be missed.