Two Month Anniversary

On July 17th Rich was admitted to the hospital from ER. Today, September 17th Rich was admitted to the hospital for what was not resolved from the previous admission.

What a struggle to get him to his 11:45 appointment with Dr McGee today. The original plan was to get the chest x-ray and blood work first because what little energy Rich has peaks in the morning. Every half hour hour I tried to wake him, he begged for more sleep like to break my heart. So finally I get a bit of breakfast and his new anti-biotics down him and urge and cajole and prepare and warm his rice pillow in the micro-wave, make sure I have his urinal, his puke bag and a bottle of water in my bag; his cane, an extra jacket and a blanket in the car. For some reason I cannot explain I was fully graveled up by the time I pulled out of the drive and started out. I tried desperately to talk myself out of it, but some car pulled out in front of me not a ¼ mile up the road (and there was NO ONE behind me), at about the same time Rich turned on the heat, and I realize I have to stop for gas AGAIN, and I must reconcile myself to driving a sauna to yet another doctor's appointment with a man who may or may not be able to negotiate the journey, who's only words to me in days have been those of needs or complaints.

I am so tired. I am tired of fighting, begging, pleading and kissing ass. I'm driving like I'm on auto pilot. I'm trying with all my might not to surrender to the flaming desire to pull over, step out of the van and just walk away. (Like Forrest Gump when he just started running because Jenny had left him.) Instantly followed by the mental flagellation of what an awful person I am for wanting to escape because the man I adore has left me and a stranger inhabits him with the faintest scent of familiar.

I want to shake him, shake him, shake him back to me. Is this what “shaken baby syndrome “ is? The last ditch effort to … ?

Our ETA is seven minutes. I feel my anxiety rising. I hear words coming out of my mouth.... “Richard...you have to have the chest x-ray and blood work the doctors ordered, so if you're not able to do that after this doctor's visit, I'm taking you to the ER. That's it. It has to be done.” And Rich agreed and told me he felt good. I love it when a man lies to me.... it makes me feel like a woman.

We finally make it to the waiting room, and Rich is sitting like a whipped pup. I know it's because I was rough on him—not just in words, but in the energy he feels pouring from me. I feel so totally crappy that I have to be rough on him to be heard, and then I have to feel guilty for how it makes him feel. I feel a brief surge of anger with that thought. I swallow it down and feel the love wash in. I lay down my knitting and take his hand. I tell him I love him, no matter what. He says he's sorry. His name is called and we continue the gauntlet.

Rich sits on the exam table in four layers of clothing clutching his blue plastic puke bag, shaking so hard we can hear the exam table rattle. Dr McGee asks how he feels and nods like he already knows, and says all the right things in all the right ways so that we are shortly waiting for transportation to take us to admitting. (Many blessings on Dr McGee!!)

We check in with admission and then sit in the hospital lobby for an hour and a half waiting for a bed to become available. Rich is now exhausted beyond all reckoning. This is a man who is so patient that he makes me look like a screaming banshee. He sits in his wheelchair looking about to pass out from sheer misery, but every now and then looking around like he's ready to rip flesh with his bare teeth. While we wait I get a voice message on my cell phone. It's the NEW Infectious Disease doctor. He's letting me know that the culture from Rich's drain is spilling all kinds of bacteria not sensitive to vancomycin. I tell him we're waiting for a bed. Everyone's on board. I'm trying to believe.

Finally frickin' Floyd, they come and tell us the bed is ready. For hours I've been begging this man to hold on for the comfort of lying down, and now we're finally on our way. So the slow elevator is tolerable, and the maneuvering and pausing through hallways of gurney and wheelchair traffic is still blessed movement forward. FINALLY we reach his room and... there is no bed. I swear to God, I can't make this shit up. There is NO bed. I feared he would pass out. I couldn't look at him. I stood in the center of the bedless room and turned slowly like a special effect in a movie, trying to comprehend, wondering if I had found the key to my parallel universe. Shortly the nurses create a bed and comfort and understand and help us through these final steps towards relief and rest.

I leave way too soon. As soon as he's laying in his freshly made bed, and I've confirmed all I know with his nurses, and he's nearly passed out with exhaustion I slither away. From his room to my van is a long labyrinth that I maneuver with experience. I want to cry but I can't. The shame of guilt and relief is clogging my tear ducts. I never should have allowed the idiots to drive the bus this far. Now I'm just relieved that the inevitable won't drag us into the same ER that asked me to sign the papers to let him go.

I want Rich back. I want the laughing, joking, ebullient man that taught me how to be better than I was before I met him. I want Rich, not the stranger that's taken his place. I want him back so hard and so deep that when I creep into the bedroom to confirm the rise and fall of his breathing I become paralyzed with the confusion of holding on to what is now, what was, what could be....

Tonight I'm working towards laying it down and taking a break from a long haul. I know he's in excellent hands. I'm trying not to think about the fact that I should not have allowed things to come to this....I'm trying to believe that tomorrow will be better. That somewhere inside the shell of the man still exists the spirit of the man. I'm trying to believe he will come back to me. I'm trying to remember that what I want or need is only a whisper on his path. Still...Come back to me.