The Canyon Overflows

I spent the last six Thursdays with some of the sickest kids I've ever seen.  Tracheostomy tubes hooked up to ventilators, CPAP forcing in air that is 80% oxygen, twenty-four hours a day.  Continuous EEG monitoring because she had seven seizures in two days.  Cranial skull fractures so bad that the subarachnoid hemorrhage is causing his spinal cord to swell in its bony casing and he may never walk again.  Sick upon sicker upon sickest, and every single one had a mother.  I met them all.  I talked to them all.  I wrote my name on their white board, explained I was a student nurse and that I'd be helping out their little one that day, and I tried hard to remember their names so that I wouldn't have to call them "Mom" when asking questions or explaining procedures.  

Mothers who knew every medication their child had ever taken, who knew more about his G-tube feedings than I did (by a long shot), who could push an antibiotic and antacid cocktail into it with a smile on their face while they told me about the last 18 months of having a son born chronically ill.  

Mothers who sat anxiously by the bed of their toddler who had bounced around inside the car the night before, unrestrained by a carseat when they were T-boned at 2 AM.  Who rocked back and forth and yelled at me for not giving her baby more pain medication for the craniotomy she'd just had and then apologized in the next breath and told me it wasn't her fault and she was so scared because the DCF worker had just been here and what if she can't take her baby home with her.

Babies who fall out of third story windows.

Babies who weigh thirteen pounds at fifteen months old.

Babies who took too much heroin at their prom last night and may never wake up again.

Babies who haven't woken up in five years and who will never learn to talk or walk or smile or eat.

Mothers at their side, every single one.

Mothers who did everything right, and whose babies were born with illnesses they cannot pronounce.  Mothers who made every mistake in the book, and whose babies fell at fate's hands in the most unexpected way.

Their love was fierce, and it filled the room.  It fought for its right to exist and hold sway in this strange place of plastic and metal and tubes and beeping monitors and no privacy and none of us knowing their child the way they do.  It made them protective and questioning and demanding and sometimes difficult and utterly incomprehensible but it was holding us all in an orbit around the tiny body in the bed and it made me stagger in the face of its enormity, every single week.

And every week, I would escape to the medication room and lean my head against the racks of IV fluids and think to myself, somebody loves you like that, too.  What do you do with a love that big?  Every braid, every bath, every school form signed, every batch of brownies stirred with her hands over mine, each one a hospital bedside vigil.  Every act as filled with a canyon of love as the next.  Sometimes I lay awake at night and wonder, panicked, if she knows how much I love her.  I want to fly through the night air home to hug her and whisper in her ear that I love her bigger than the moon and the ocean and the dirt and the trees and how I can never say it enough and please don't ever leave me because you won't hear it enough times before then.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers of the world.  But especially to mine.

Going Viral

The Friday before last, the little guy I babysit had a runny nose.  And so this past Friday when I woke up with a runny nose I thought oh jeeze, here we go.  So I packed some tissues and got on with my life.  Until now, that is.  My preceptor took one look at me tonight at clinical and said, "I hope you haven't gone anywhere near your patient," - I hadn't - "Why are you here?!" - because making up clinical hours is insanely difficult and calling in sick is deeply frowned upon - and, "GO HOME!"

So I'm in bed, with Lucy curled up under the covers with me and every time I pause the crappy television I'm watching online I'm surprised by how loud I'm wheezing.  Fun times.  How does a runny nose on an 18-month-old turn into a hacking cough, pounding headache, throbbing sinuses, body aches, and wheezing cold on me?

Class tomorrow is going to be awesome.  Don't worry, I'll sit in the back and wear a mask.

Okay, enough complaining.  I took some pictures this past week.  Spring has finally come to Connecticut!

 

So Many Good Things

Three months old, she has never left the hospital.  There is a hole in her heart and that is the least of her problems.  Her kidneys look like Swiss cheese and her esophagus has scarred from the surgery to close the hole that connected it to her trachea.  So they cut a tiny incision in her belly and snake a gastrostomy tube into her stomach and feed her from the outside.  She is three months old, she has just learned to smile but will only really do it for her mom, and when she cries, she makes no noise.  Her tracheostomy  is hooked up to oxygen twenty-four hours a day, it bypasses her larynx and so when she wails, all that comes out is a breathy wheeze and the insistent beep-beep-beep of her monitors that tick out her escalating heart rate - 148, 162, 210.  All she does is fight.  She doesn't know how to do anything else, and so I change her diapers and learn how to suction, and research her condition.

He is 85 years old, and his health is failing quickly.  He still speaks clearly and articulately, though he takes a breath every few words.  He has lived long and well and he tells me that his trusty body is giving out and that that's okay.  I sit by him and I'm supposed to be asking questions but all I can do is listen, rapt, while he tells me that this is the greatest country there is and that I should never forget that and that I should use my skills and be an achiever and a lone tear slides down his cheek as he tells me that his wife of sixty years, who died one year ago, was a magnificent woman, and a woman of great wisdom.  He tells me his children are the best thing that ever happened to him and he tells me that I should have a plan, but that I should always remember, there are so many good things.  I shake his son's hand when he comes to visit and I bring him more ice water and a new stack of paper cups.

I bounce my neighbor's baby on my hip tonight, in the seventy degree evening air.  We're chatting and laughing, there are four of us on the porch and there are families walking down the sidewalk and I have soup on the stove in my little yellow house across the street and the baby is drooling and so unremarkably healthy that I feel as if the world is splintering in my hands when he blows a bubble.  The horizon slides away and then springs back against my eyes as they fill with tears and I want to lay down in the street and sob because there are so many good things and even though things are so good they can still be so hard and what is hard for a baby who can't make noise or eat or breathe on her own?  And what is hard for a man who is dying with his mind fully intact?

I lay in my bed, the window is cracked and the spring air comes in and I soak my pillow with tears for them all, and still in my head I can hear him saying, There are so many good things.

Dodged A Needle

Modern medicine has declared...that they have no idea what's wrong with me.  I don't care, because for the first time in almost a week, I woke up this morning without a fever.  You know what I noticed when I took Rupert out for his morning walk?  It was chilly outside!  With my temperature reigned in below 100 degrees, my light sensitivity and headache were both much improved.  The cough and trouble breathing - nothing I'm not used to with my asthma.  I will take a mysterious infection that has responded to antibiotics over potential meningitis any day of the week.

So I know that bad things come in threes.  But I'm gunning for some good fortune coming my way, in triplet form.  Dodging this health scare was round 1.  A friend came through for me yesterday with an offer that just might save my sanity from the brink it's been teetering on, and if it all works out, that will definitely qualify as round 2.  (I promise I'll explain once things are settled.)  Any takers for round 3? 

Rupert and I watched the sunset over NJ tonight.

Not my best day

Just like with any couple, there are things that Alix is good at and things that I'm good at.  I remember to buy toilet paper before we have to start using tissues, for example, and she calls the super when the pipes are so hot they're melting the paint off of them.  Unfortunately, when you're on your own, you don't get to divvy up the chores and beg the other person to do the ones you hate to do.  Which is why I haven't called the super about the kitchen faucet that has slowed to a trickle over the last three days.  It's also why I spent fifteen minutes clipping Tucker's claws tonight.  Alix is cool, calm, and efficient when she's on pedicure duty.  I am, in a word, not.  I have to wrap Tucker in a towel and it takes me at least five minutes to wrangle each toe from the growling, writhing, terry-cloth-and-cat bundle clutched on my lap.  Against all my wishes, I needed to take on this onerous task tonight because our screen is in danger of ripping down the middle if Tucker gets his claws stuck in it one more time when he's pursuing our fire escape pigeons.  So there I am, squinting in the dim light, sweat pouring down my face, hands shaking too much to hold the clippers, idly wondering how high my fever is now, and I actually hear how crazy I am:
"No, Rupert, stop, STOP! STOP JUMPING ON ME!!"
"Tucker, NO! Just. Hold. Still. Please."
"Rupert, I swear to god, if you don't sit down right now, I will put you in your crate.  Don't think I won't!"
"Tucker, you don't act like this with your other mother, so don't start this with me. Just HOLD STILL!"
and so on
until we were done
and this day got the best of me
and I burst into tears.

I tried for four days to convince myself that a constant fever, a headache that never eased up, and an ever-worsening cough were just a common flu.  This morning though, when the dim sunrise made me wince and set my eyes streaming, I knew it was time to give up the ghost.  Three appointments later, and the top contenders for a diagnosis are pneumonia and meningitis.  I never thought I'd be praying to have pneumonia, but that's exactly what I'm doing.  The countdown is on for tomorrow morning: if I don't feel better by then, it's off to the hospital for a lumbar puncture.  NOT FUN.

I've felt adrift and disoriented without Alix here, but today was the first day I felt truly lost and alone.  I rushed home in between my appointments to walk the dog and nearly passed out each time on the stairs.  I couldn't afford yet another cab ride at the end of the day so I had to take the forty-five minute subway trip home.  Thankfully, a kind and alarmed-looking gentleman gave me his seat after I sagged dangerously against the pole when I started to black out.  I talked to myself in the mirror for ten minutes tonight, convincing myself to eat dinner, knowing that my body needs nourishment in order to get better.  (That logic didn't sit well with the eating disorder, but I told it to go to hell, at least for tonight.)  I can't help thinking back to this time last year when Alix was sick and I took care of her.  I sat in the dark kitchen one night, too scared to sleep, and prayed silent, desperate pleas for her to get better.  I gently helped her from the bed to the bathroom and back.  I cooked up an enormous batch of chicken soup. I brought home trashy magazines from the pharmacy along with her medications.  I know (because I talked to her and she told me) that if she were here, she'd be doing all those things for me.  Not because she owes me, but because that's what you do for the person you love.  I desperately hope I don't need a lumbar puncture tomorrow.  Not because it will hurt.  But because I won't have anyone's hand to hold when it does.

Back in Action

It was completely my own decision to leave my computer at home while I went to Michigan for a week.  But you guys -  I missed you.  I managed to get in one measly blog post on a borrowed computer while there but other than that, I relied on my phone for email and was otherwise cut off from the internet world.  Now that I'm home, I've plugged back in and oh, it feels so good.  I managed to be the only person in the world who gets sick after a week of R+R so please excuse the lack of content or coherency in this post (or blame it on the fever I've been nursing) and instead enjoy the photo dump included below.  I promise more substantial writing once I'm no longer shaky and chilled.

In Sickness and In Health

Okay, so technically, Alix and I haven't said our vows yet (nor do we have a clue what we'll be saying on the big day) but this last week has been a grand experiment in the sickness category. My boss had a cold a few weeks ago. This happens less often than you might expect, given that she is a doctor. I thought, maybe, just maybe, I wouldn't catch it, since we don't spend a whole lot of time together and I wash my hands constantly. No such luck. The cold kicked in with a horrible sore throat, moved into my lungs and aggravated my asthma so much Alix almost had to take me to the hospital one night, and then settled comfortably into my sinuses and lungs ever since so that I'm fully decked out with a hacking cough and a stuffy head. Three days later, Alix got the same cold. And then....Friday night came around, and what I thought was just motion sickness on the train home from a concert in Brooklyn turned out to be a horrible stomach virus. I've spent all weekend running a fever, throwing up, and sipping water to try to combat dehydration. I had to call in sick to work at the bakery yesterday and today and Alix has been in caretaker overdrive, bringing me Smart Water and giving me ibuprofen around the clock to keep my fever in check. Finally, this evening, my fever had broken and I'd eaten a little bit of soup and was feeling up to a very minor adventure. There's a Barnes and Noble on the corner of our street and there was a book we wanted to get about (go figure) wedding planning. So I put on some sweatpants and my slippers and my long all-purpose winter coat that covers me to my knees and we sloooowly walked over and found the book. Just as we're about to leave, this asshole woman (I'm still in shock that people can be this rude) walks by me and says to my face, "Oh don't you look comfortable!" (sweeps accusatory gaze up and down, taking in my bedraggled appearance), "No, it's great, really, you look soooo comfortable!" (shakes head, giggling at her own wit while making waggly eyebrows at her friend). I stood there in shock, completely incapable of responding, not quite understanding just exactly this woman's prerogative was. Did I look like shit? Yes, of course I did. I'd like to see what anyone looks like after running a 102 degree fever for two days looks like. But you know what else, woman? You were fat. And your hair dye job? Not looking so good. Oh, and your karma? I can tell you right now, that if there is any justice in the world, one tiny pathogen jumped from me to you during your tirade and this time tomorrow, you'll be sitting on the toilet with a bucket on your lap, just like I was. So fuck you. No, I'm not comfortable. I'm really, really sick. And I hope it made your day, making me want to cry in the middle of Barnes and Noble.