MAY TOMORROW BE (THERE IS A FOREVER SOMEDAY)
"Today ended with a gratitude that we thought would be entirely and tragically elusive. Essentially we thought we were losing Dad. Again. Or at least the onset of the journey to it.
Last night Dad lost his balance and fell smashing his ribcage against the table next to his chair and couldn't get up and naturally refused all efforts to help him. For as long as I can remember he has stubbornly eschewed all forms of help. Always. Once when I was young he came in from working on the car as blood coursed down his arm looking like slow crimson lightning and with the common refrain of "I'm fine." Well, last night he wasn't fine. I did a once over. Sharp pains in his ribcage but no abdominal pain, swelling, discoloration or trouble breathing. He clearly broke a couple a couple of ribs and even with my propensity to catastrophize or dismiss everything equally and in that order, we decided to wait till the morning and get him in for an evaluation just to be safe.
But this morning he was so weak that he couldn't stand or walk on his own. Even sitting he would pitch to the side grasping at wallpaper for a grip. We have never seen him like this and knowing he could not even make the stairs for me to get him to the clinic, I called the ambulance. It was a good call. The EMT's were compassionate and gentle but couldn't find anything abnormal where he injured himself. But it was the sudden unprecedented weakness that alarmed us the most.
As Mom and I drove to the hospital the conversation whirlpooled around the notion that this may be it. The slow wind-down as his body unforgivingly and finally gives way after years of dodging near-fatal medical events. Most people with aging parents are familiar with the disconcerting nonchalant discussions of funerals and what to do with their possessions and pets, but when all of that appears potentially imminent, the tone is altogether different. It's a river you don't want to set out upon but have no choice over. And in all instances like this, I think to call my brother Shaun in the fraction of a second that he is still alive in my mind.
Once in the ER we discovered that Dad indeed had badly broken two ribs which were now wildly out of place and the ensuing damage had caused a swelling hematoma that pressed against his lung and may require a catheter to drain away the blood. They moved him to the trauma center at Prespy where there was an infuriating lack of answers and an interminable wait. Mom grew increasingly upset. I knew for all of the obvious and some non-obvious reasons this holiday would be especially brutal, hence my long stay. For all the factors in play this season (and for this last 21 months) it is a journey that has no appreciable corollary or touchstone for comparison. You count all the precious things you have in your life, but you count them as precious things that ultimately will be taken away too. You rage pace the porch, prayers the length of cigarettes. All things of value and beauty held together now with a distraught fragility that can unjustly be unmade at any moment.
But some days find their victories. You never want calls from the ICU at 1:12AM but one came tonight. It was the nurse saying that Dad was doing great and they've chosen to not put in the drain for how well he's doing. Dad enthusiastically tells you what he had for dinner as he jokes with the nurses as if he were ten years younger. I can hear Mom smiling on the other line from her bedroom where an anticipated descent suddenly became a reprieve. Despite all efforts to the contrary Dad pulls through yet another crisis.
You crazy, infuriating old man, I love you more now than ever..."
MAY TOMORROW BE (THERE IS A FOREVER SOMEDAY)
"Today ended with a gratitude that we thought would be entirely and tragically elusive. Essentially we thought we were losing Dad. Again. Or at least the onset of the journey to it.
Last night Dad lost his balance and fell smashing his ribcage against the table next to his chair and couldn't get up and naturally refused all efforts to help him. For as long as I can remember he has stubbornly eschewed all forms of help. Always. Once when I was young he came in from working on the car as blood coursed down his arm looking like slow crimson lightning and with the common refrain of "I'm fine." Well, last night he wasn't fine. I did a once over. Sharp pains in his ribcage but no abdominal pain, swelling, discoloration or trouble breathing. He clearly broke a couple a couple of ribs and even with my propensity to catastrophize or dismiss everything equally and in that order, we decided to wait till the morning and get him in for an evaluation just to be safe.
But this morning he was so weak that he couldn't stand or walk on his own. Even sitting he would pitch to the side grasping at wallpaper for a grip. We have never seen him like this and knowing he could not even make the stairs for me to get him to the clinic, I called the ambulance. It was a good call. The EMT's were compassionate and gentle but couldn't find anything abnormal where he injured himself. But it was the sudden unprecedented weakness that alarmed us the most.
As Mom and I drove to the hospital the conversation whirlpooled around the notion that this may be it. The slow wind-down as his body unforgivingly and finally gives way after years of dodging near-fatal medical events. Most people with aging parents are familiar with the disconcerting nonchalant discussions of funerals and what to do with their possessions and pets, but when all of that appears potentially imminent, the tone is altogether different. It's a river you don't want to set out upon but have no choice over. And in all instances like this, I think to call my brother Shaun in the fraction of a second that he is still alive in my mind.
Once in the ER we discovered that Dad indeed had badly broken two ribs which were now wildly out of place and the ensuing damage had caused a swelling hematoma that pressed against his lung and may require a catheter to drain away the blood. They moved him to the trauma center at Prespy where there was an infuriating lack of answers and an interminable wait. Mom grew increasingly upset. I knew for all of the obvious and some non-obvious reasons this holiday would be especially brutal, hence my long stay. For all the factors in play this season (and for this last 21 months) it is a journey that has no appreciable corollary or touchstone for comparison. You count all the precious things you have in your life, but you count them as precious things that ultimately will be taken away too. You rage pace the porch, prayers the length of cigarettes. All things of value and beauty held together now with a distraught fragility that can unjustly be unmade at any moment.
But some days find their victories. You never want calls from the ICU at 1:12AM but one came tonight. It was the nurse saying that Dad was doing great and they've chosen to not put in the drain for how well he's doing. Dad enthusiastically tells you what he had for dinner as he jokes with the nurses as if he were ten years younger. I can hear Mom smiling on the other line from her bedroom where an anticipated descent suddenly became a reprieve. Despite all efforts to the contrary Dad pulls through yet another crisis.
You crazy, infuriating old man, I love you more now than ever..."