That appointment with TAB's oncologist's nurse practioner yesterday? The one I was so scared about?Yeah, that one.
Briefly, because I'm in mondo levels of shock still, turns out the cancer is now rampaging through his system. Those fucking Mantle Cells are now in his kidneys. They brought us down to the ER for an emergency hydration.
First they gave him an EKG. Afterwards, the love of my goddamned life had the biggest heart attack he's ever had. It was monster. The tech was fiddling with something and I was behind his wheelchair when it happened. I shouted "he's in enormous pain!" To which she responded by wheeling him over to, I guess, be checked in. Dunno. I shouted again and then TAB collapsed. "He's passed out. HELP NOW!"
At that point the tech jumped behind the wheelchair and sprinted with my man into the bowels of ER where the amazing, heroic docs performed an amazing dance. They brought TAB BACK TO LIFE! Yes, TAB had flatlined. He wasn't breathing and his heart wasn't beating.
I watched as this superhero in scrubs pumped away until my Hunny Pie gasped and his ticker started tapping out a beat again.
Obvs, I couldn't bring him home last night. The cats miss him terribly. Also too, bed's too big without him.
I don't know what's going to happen next. Why isn't this like one of my cheesy sci fi novels where I can flip to the end and see that everyone lives happily ever after?
Dear Donna,
ReplyDeleteI was going to do a clever 'time-travel' post where I put all of my comments on your 'Nailed It' post (June 12) and comment on East Cambridge (I lived there ahem, THIRTY years ago), then many of the 'future' posts that I caught up on after I returned from a 7-day Silent Meditation retreat in Barre, MA. Instead I'll just say this for now:
YES, you did Nail it! I swear your photos have been extra extra good since you took away any ambivalence about bringing your camera. Each of those sunrises are inside of you right now, even on murky sun days like today. While, as you already know, we can't actually hold the actual real moment smell of the sea and sights of the play of light and wavelets, by making it part of our visceral bodily experience over and over (like you do), we can actually call upon the body and let it remember as you breathe deeply and perhaps smell the Charles River making its way into the hospital. Grace is there wherever you are. (I know you have already experienced at some point.) You don't need the special beautiful conditions of the sunrises. It doesn't take away our pain, it makes room for it, and the side effect is the depth of our capacity for true love and wisdom.
That's all Buddha Wendy can say right now. (I'm already running the risk of preaching which I sincerely do not want to do.) Just know that I'm thinking of you and TAB and I wish I could offer more.
-Wendy
Thank you Wendy. Thank you so much!
DeleteDear Donna,
ReplyDeleteHow horribe.
And my thoughts and sympathies are with you!
Thank you Victor.
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