more reflections/remembries/braindump

going through and reading the old emails, inserting them into the blog...

one thing i'm noticing is my sort of brave tone... i refer to (but don't talk much about) hard things in the emails. i remember that. it seems like a clean, clear lack of self-indulgence.

as i recall, it was kind of a necessity: i couldn't afford to wallow. each moment's challenge was all that that moment could hold and i had to just stay in the moment, deal with its challenges, and not think too much.

but one memory that's almost funny now, and was really quite almost-funny at the time: in an October 30 email, i wrote, "I had a bit of a meltdown yesterday (Sat) because the surgeon listed all the terrible things that could possibly go wrong and it was just a bit overwhelming..."

I know when that was - I was at the gym, doing my stretching exercises, when I became irrationally convinced that Loopy was going to die during surgery and I only had a few days left with her, and I better get back and be with her. I started to cry rivers, though I kept doing my stretches and finished my workout (keeping to one of the major tenets of that period: maintain adequate self-care).

so at one point during this soggy workout i was walking briskly down a small flight of stairs to refill my water bottle. up the stairs came a large group of prospective members taking a tour of the facilities. the tour guide was describing all the wonderful things they had at the gym, but the incongruous sight of me coming down the stairs with tears streaming down my face made the tour guide lose his train of thought and all the tour people fidget. (that is such a Madison thing, too - to be unnerved by any show of emotion. heh.)

Another memory, or elaboration on an email from the middle of the night between Nov. 1 and Nov. 2: i wrote that "there was an acute episode." A brisk and brave (?) way to brush past something really awful. (There's no obligation to read all this, I'm just hoping it will be kinda therapeutic for me).

I had slept at home (home home, out in our small town 25 miles from the city, 30 miles from the hospital). It seemed like a good thing to do, a self-care thing to do. But it wasn't at all.

I hated being so far from Loopy, not being able to help her, take care of her. People told me "the nurses will take good care of her" but they don't. That's why you stay with people who are in the hospital. Even good nurses can't do and see everything.

So in the mornings, she always used to wake up in terrible pain. The horrible pain would wrench her awake and though pain pills were administered immediately, it would take us an hour to get it back down. (Some nurse eventually got the hang of it and would give her a pain pill a half hour before she usually woke in agony, and we LOVED that nurse!)

However, the morning I wasn't there, the nurse who came to [Loopy] in her hour of need refused to give her her pain pills until she 'calmed down' and got a 'better attitude' if I remember the phrases accurately. (The nurse never actually apologized for that episode but later explained that she was accustomed to patients in 'neuro' who did not have the rationality to decide when they should have their pills).

For those of you who know Loopy, you can imagine the fury this provoked. She was screaming at the nurse and all hell was breaking loose... she was saved by a lovely man in pink scrubs who came in and calmed everyone and told the nurse to give her her pain pills. We love that man to this day... I still have his business card floating around my car for some reason... makes me happy.

So obviously I didn't spend another night away from her for... I think 17 days.