Remembering while I can (part 3)

I grew up a lot in those three weeks. I was the baby, afterall. What did I know? For years I had tried to grow up, to gain influence and maturity with marginal success. Now I sat with my mother making what were possibly life and death decisions concerning my father’s health. After each discussion she and I would attempt to communicate al we knew to both my brother and sister over the phone. It was incomplete at best. I tried to be strong for mom and attempted to appear mature for my siblings. Inside I was shaking like a leaf.

The vigil wore on. Once dad was moved from a regular room to ICU the levels of care for him and our concern about him both increased. In those days family visited the ICU on 4 hour intervals for a 15 minute visit each interval. Each day on an 8, 12, and 4 o’clock round the clock rotation we would visit. In an ICU waiting room a family evolves. They are strangers thrown together by their need for the highest level of medical care. You get to know one another very quickly in that place. A new family arrives and takes an open seat and immediately they are asking about the way things work in this sanitized city of couches, blankets, and soft lighting. You become accustomed to the faces of happiness as a family packs up to move to a “regular room” and also to the faces of silence as a family walks out of the hospital forever without the company of the one they brought in for care. It was a holy place. Mom and I would plan our time with dad carefully. She would always check to see if he needed anything. We would confirm what he had heard from doctors and he would confirm what we had heard from outside the ICU about his condition.

Fifteen minutes before each visit to the ICU they would quietly announce the upcoming opportunity. People would begin to gather belongings, use the restroom, sanitize their hands, and scurry about in quiet activity before being allowed to enter the ICU. From time to time there would be a much different announcement. If as the time for visiting came and there was difficulty with a patient or a “code blue” the visitation would be postponed and in rare cases cancelled until the next appointed time. Those were silent times, filled with prayer. No one knew whose family was to be touched by the delay, but we shared the time in prayer knowing it was one of “us”.

One of the most difficult decisions my mom and I wrestled with was about a ventilator. Even in the offer to place my dad on a ventilator was the inference that he would likely not ever come off of it. His lungs were filling with fluid. His breathing was labored. He would soon either die or have to recover, if we did not consent. He was drowning. To this day I question our decision. With each visit the hope in his eyes was waning. His strength was diminishing. It became obvious that he was holding on for our benefit.