Three Days to D-Day

When my two neighbors, Janet and Connie, came over to take me to the hospital, I think I was calm. Janet told me that she and her husband had been at the post office when Joe had begun to slur his words and walk unevenly. She had even joked with him, asking him if he had already started drinking that early in the afternoon. But, when he dropped the mail ad couldn’t pick it up, Janet knew something was very wrong. She followed him back out to his car and urged him not to drive. She said he was able to get into the car, but couldn’t get the key into the ignition. She told me much later that he must have realized something was not right because he even asked her if she thought that he might be having a stroke. Janet and her husband called 911. By the time the ambulance arrived, Joe was still fairly coherent. He passed the “raise both of your arms at the same time” test (standard test to see if a stroke has occured). But then, he slumped over in his seat, unconscious. He was rushed to the hospital and I followed approximately 20 minutes later.

I had the good sense to grab all his medicine bottles to give to the doctors in the emergency room. Connie told me that she had already tried to call my daughter, as they had not known immediately that I was even home. She had to leave a message on her cell phone. My daughter, Colette, called while we were still waiting to be allowed to see Joe. She was out of town at a wedding and was very confused about a strange person leaving a message about her father on her cell phone. She wanted to know if she should fly home. I told her to wait until I talked to the doctors and I would let her know. Connie put her hand on my arm and said, “Tell her to come right away.” At that moment, I knew there would be no turning back. So I told her to come as soon as she could.

We were allowed to go back to Joe’s room. Connie and Janet only stayed for a minute, leaving me alone with Joe. He was motionless, pale, with tubes running down his throat for the respirator and all sorts of IV’s and monitoring devices hooked up to him. The nurse told me that the doctor would be in shortly to talk with me; but they had already arranged for Joe to be flown to Charleston to a university hospital which had facilities to take care of him. She said that the transport helicopter had already landed on the pad at the hospital. The doctor came in and explained that Joe had suffered a cerebral hemorrhage deep in his brain. The transport team then came in and began to prep Joe for the 20 minute flight. They assured me that they would call me at home once he was settled in at the hospital in Charleston. I stayed in the room, looking for any sign from Joe that he was aware of what was going on. I commented to the nurse that his hands had already started to swell and that his ring was cutting into his flesh. She asked if I would like for them to cut the ring off. At that moment, I think I knew that he would never wear the ring again. I knew they would be cutting away a piece of our life together. Yes, cut it off. It took less than a minute for them to cut the ring away and hand me the broken circle of gold. I put it on my thumb.

The flight preparations were completed and they rolled Joe out. I asked if the hospital needed any of Joe’s insurance info; but they had it on file already from a visit to the ER when he wrenched his knee a few years back.

The ride home was pretty quiet. We talked a little about how I would get to Charleston. Neither Janet or Connie thought it would be a good idea to travel the dark road to Charleston at night. I agreed that waiting until the next day would be best. We didn’t talk about Joe. They dropped me off at my house, with me insisting that I was OK and would rather be by myself as I made some phone calls to other people who needed to know about Joe.

I called my best friend since childhood, Annie, to tell her the situation. I asked that she go over to the home of our son, Ryan, and tell him what had happened. We made arrangements for her and her husband to bring Ryan to Charleston the next day. I called other people who needed to know – Joe’s sister, my mother, my sister, close friends. Annie called to say they had gone over to Ryan’s and had brought him back to their house to spend the night before driving to Charleston on the following morning. My sister, Lila, called to say she was leaving the next morning to drive 12 hours to be with me. Our mother had decided not to come, as her own health was precarious. She thought she would be more trouble than help. She would just stay at home and be in charge of the prayer chain. Colette called to let me know that she couldn’t get a flight until early the next morning. She would have to pick up her car in Atlanta and she and her boyfriend would then drive over to Charleston – a 7 hour drive. I called a hotel and made reservations for rooms for me and my family and friends. Then I called the hospital to see if Joe had arrived. I talked to the doctor who said they needed permission to drill a hole in Joe’s head to relieve the pressure that was building up from the hemorrhage. I agreed. Then, I had to speak to 2 other people in the neuroscience wing, confirming that I agreed to the surgery. I didn’t even think to ask if this was a dangerous procedure and if Joe could die on the operating table. Just do it.

I hung up the phone and tried to think what I should do to prepare for the trip. What to take; how much to take; where to stay; what to do with our dog. Then, the phone rang. My two friends had been busy taking care of important details. Someone was going to drive me to Charleston in the morning. Another neighbor was going to take care of the dog. I was so grateful that I didn’t have to do all the planning myself. But I insisted on having my own car there. I wasn’t sure how long I would have to stay in Charleston and needed to have transportation. So it was decided that someone would drive me to Charleston in my car and someone else would follow to bring the driver back.

So I packed for 3 days. I figured that one way or another, we would know something definitive within 3 days. Then, I started straightening up the house. I knew deep in my heart that our home would most likely be filled with people over the next week or so. I knew that Joe would not live. So I cleaned, straightened and made sure that fresh sheets and towels were on the guest beds. Isn’t that crazy? My husband was going through life-threatening surgery and I was focusing on how our home would look to visitors. I wanted to make sure that, if anyone came in while I was gone, the house was as perfect as it could be.

The helicopter transport team called to tell me that Joe had made the trip without any problems. I went to bed sometime after midnight. I slept without dreaming.

THE WIDOW’S WALK

This blog will not interest many people; nor will it contain photos or even the names of the real people who are revealed within the text.  It is just a way for me to capture my thoughts and emotions about living my last phase of my life as a widow.  I guess it is just cheap self-directed therapy.  I just hope it works.

I always knew that I would, at some point, be a widow.  Actually, I thought it would most likely happen earlier, rather than later in my life.  My husband, who I will call “Joe” for the sake of anonymity, was only 5 years older than I am.  But he lived on the edge of poor health.  He was overweight and did no regular or even irregular exercise.  He had high blood pressure, high cholesterol and several other weight-related problems and had, in the past several brushes with health issues that could have certainly been fatal.  But, he didn’t live like he had health problems.  He rarely complained of feeling badly or begged off doing something due to his health issues.  So, after numerous “close calls” with medical issues like an elvated potassium level which should have put him on a slab in the morgue (so the doctor told him), congestive heart failure due to reaction to a new med for his high blood pressure (twice!), sleep apnea, and even kidney cancer, he still was an upbeat, outgoing person.  After all that, I came to the conclusion that he was going to outlive me!

It happened suddenly and not at all how I thought it would.  It was a nice Saturday in February.  Joe got up early, as was his habit.  He did his usual “stuff” in his office:  checked the performance of our investments, paid some bills online, read the newspaper and walked our dog.  At some point that morning, he went outside to work in the yard for a while. Around noon, he made himself some lunch and around 2 p.m., he laid down in our bedroom for his 30 minute “power nap”, which was his custom since he had retired. 

When he awoke – exactly 30 minutes later, he went back to his office to do whatever he normally does in there. He came into the kitchen about 3:45, where I was sewing, and announced the was going to Walmart & did I need anything.  I gave him a short list and he was out the door – happy to be out and about in his little sports car.  I don’t even remember if we kissed “goodby”; but we probably didn’t. 

Our dog, Digger, has some sort of built-in clock and by 4 p.m., he was whining to go on his afternoon walk.  So we set out on our usual afternoon 45 minute walk. 

I heard the ambulance sirens during the walk.  I could tell they were fairly close to our neighborhood, which is somewhat isolated.  But I couldn’t tell if the sirens were actually coming to our neighborhood or some place on the connector road outside our neighborhood.  I immediately thought of Joe in that sports car, wondering if he had been involved in an accident, as I always did every time he was in that car and I heard sirens.  I remember sending up my usual short prayer, “Please God, don’t let it be Joe in that car.”  The sirens stopped.  I walked on with Digger.  Then, pretty quickly, I heard the sirens headed back up towards town and the only hospital.  Upon returning to our street, I remember thinking, “Well, at least a police car isn’t parked out front, waiting for me.  But as I approached our home, a neighbor came up to tell me that Joe had been down at the central post office in our community and was “having some problems” and they had called 911.  He had been taken to the local hospital “just to check him out”.  Bless my sweet neighbor’s heart.  He is older than Joe.  But he didn’t want to scare me.  Then, two of my other neighbors came up to say they were driving me to the hospital.  One was a nurse and I could tell by the look on her face that whatever the “problems” were, it was serious.  In retrospect, I think I knew even then that this was the beginning of the end of my married life.