Hello. I'm still alive. So is my Mom, I'm happy to report. I've spent the last few days living at the ICU in a Shreveport, Louisiana, hospital, along with my brothers and their families and assorted cousins.
My Mom knocked on Heaven's door, but they said: "Go away and come back later."
The doctors officially said she turned the corner, but she remains in ICU. My older brother, my cousins, and I will be alternating hospital duty until further notice. I'm just having to work mine around the medical appointments for my daughter. So today I'm scheduling who will be at the hospital when. Tomorrow, I pack. Monday, I drive 4 1/2 hours back to Shreveport for my turn.
I'll be taking my laptop with me since I discovered the ICU has free WiFi. I can work, email, etc. So feel free to comment or email.
Takeaway Truth
Life throws a mean curve ball sometimes.
(Cross posted on my other blog.)
Glad to hear your mom's turned the corner. I hope she continues to improve and that you don't wear yourself out.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Bill. Unfortunately, this is a brief respite - perhaps a gift of grace to allow all of us to accept the inevitable. We'll take each day as it comes and be grateful for it.
ReplyDeleteMy late first wife, a crackerjack RN, told me that a lot of dying people have an Indian Summer. She said it was God's way of giving us a chance to say goodbye. And when she died, she had an Indian Summer, and she told me that's what it was.
ReplyDeleteA few years later, I was in an auto collision, and spent almost two weeks in ICU. Nobody spends more than about 3 days in ICU. Either they get better and go to a regular floor, or get worse and go to the morgue.
But I survived anyhow. My girlfriend at the time, another RN, told me there was no human explanation. I had been expected to die at any moment for the first week. After that week, she warned me that I needed to *tell* the doctors that I wanted to live, because some of them thought I wanted to die. Apparently, it worked.
God must really have plans for me, my girlfriend said, and I'm still trying to suss them out, a decade and a half later, but part of it, I think, is to tell people that if they're in the ICU, be sure to tell the doctors that they want to live - if, in fact, they do. And to give them permission to die, if that's what's needful.
I hope your Mom gets what she wants, and I hope you realize that no matter what happens, there are many people you'll never meet who care about you and your mother.