Learning To Say Goodbye

It seems like just yesterday but it wasn’t, when I called you to ask you to stop and buy some fireworks for New Year’s Eve.  Joshua and Krista and the kids were coming over and I wanted to make sure we had enough to last until midnight.  That was when you told me you weren’t feeling well and had chills all day at work.  I felt so bad for asking you to stop anywhere and told you not to worry about it but you, being the kind and sweet soul that you are stopped and bought them anyway.  When you got home I could tell how bad you were feeling and though you tried to stay up with us you finally gave in and went to bed.  I checked on you every now and then and you were fast asleep.  I remember thinking that was the best thing for you, to get some rest.  We missed you that night, baby.

Then on Tuesday you were still not feeling well so you stayed in bed all day.  This wasn’t the first time you had felt like this.  It was last April when you went through the same thing with the chills and fever but you kept trying to go to work every day.  Finally, when I took you to the doctor we found out that you had pneumonia pretty bad but it all cleared up with the antibiotics that they gave you and the rest you got when you took time off from work for awhile.  So when you got sick this time I thought you had the flu and thought if I could take care of you here at home that it would not get bad like it did last year.  Then, as luck would have it I seemed to had gotten what you had by Tuesday night with the chills and the fever and we both spent the day in bed on Wednesday.  By Wednesday night it seemed you were better because you sat up in bed, had some ice cream and then we watched some tv together.

Who would have known by Thursday morning it would have gotten so much worse?  By noon, I knew I had to get you to the doctor even before you said anything but when I called them they said it would probably be best if I took you to the emergency room instead because they were booked for the day and wouldn’t be able to fit you in.  I just assumed that they would see you at the hospital and give you the antibiotics and then all would be well.  But by the time we got you there evidently things had gone from bad to worse with your chest now hurting and the fact that you were now coughing up blood.  But still I never dreamed it would turn out to be as serious as what everyone was telling me.  Your heart rate was far too high and your blood pressure was way too low.  I was getting pretty scared by then but tried not to show it because I wanted to be strong for you.  Thank goodness Joshua and Jason had come to the hospital to be there with us.  I guess they were more than a little concerned when they heard that I was taking you to the hospital. 

After the doctor took x-rays and informed me that you had double pneumonia and asked me what seemed like a hundred questions he told me that what was going on was more than just the pneumonia.  He asked me questions like did you have any heart problems or did that run in the family.  I had no idea why he was asking that - all I wanted him to do was make you better.  Then he told me about renal failure and septic poisoning.  I had no idea what he was talking about but when he said they were going to admit you to ICU that really did frighten me but still I didn’t let on to this because I wanted you to be able to look at me and see me strong so that you would be too. 

Once they took you upstairs they told me I couldn’t go with you because they had to get you settled in but that someone would be able to talk to me in a while to let me know what was going on.  In the meantime, I went to get Corey from work and brought him back to the hospital with me.  By the time I finally got to see you again was when I found out that they had sedated you and put you on the ventilator to “give your body a rest” while the ventilator did the breathing for you.  Still, I thought all would be well soon.  I trusted them to take good care of you.  After all, that’s what the doctors and nurses at the hospital do, right?  I believed them when they told me you would be okay and when they encouraged me to go home and get some rest.  Why did I ever leave you that night?  Why did I have to listen to them?

I went home, Corey had school the next day, and thought - okay, I’ll get him off to school and be back early to be there with you.  But then I was awakened during the night at 2 a.m. by the nurse needing my permission to put you on dialysis because your kidneys weren’t functioning properly.  Of course I said yes because I wanted them to do anything they needed to do to get you better.  I loved you so much and wanted you to come home soon.

By the time I got there the next morning, I was greeted with discouraging news that you hadn’t responded to the doctors or nurses.  I thought to myself that you would respond to me, I knew you would, I just knew you would.  By then, you were no longer sedated but they still had you on the ventilator.  The nurse told me that if you weren’t on the medication they had you on that you would have no blood pressure at all.  The doctor said they were getting ready to put you on a feeding tube and another medication and then he told me that they would have done all that they could do for you.  None of these things were phasing me because I just knew you were going to respond to me.  I so believe in miracles and I just knew you were going to be okay.

As I stood there and talked to you and stroked your forehead, held your hand and kissed your sweet face I just kept on believing all would be okay.  For a half an hour to 45 minutes I talked to you and told you how much I loved you, adored you so very much…  Right up until, all of a sudden all of these people entered your room and asked us to step outside.  I had been watching the monitor up until now as I talked you and didn’t notice anything change but evidently the nurse had seen something… I heard them call for “Code Blue” and heard your room number and I guess I just went numb at that point but still I believed it was going to be okay.  All the way up until the doctor came to tell me you were gone.  I said nothing - but my mind screamed no, no, no… This is not happening, not my sweet Dean.  The boys were with me except for Corey.  Todd had to go to school to get him.  Poor babies, all of them - none of us expected any of this.  What happened?  I thought you only had the flu…