By my third day of hospitalization, I had it down. I had learned how to unplug my own iv pump and wheel my little stand into the bathroom (where I was secretly emptying my own pee monitoring cup), found a way to sleep my way through large portions of the night (thank you, morphine), and knew that the chocolate cake was the best thing on the menu. There were more than a few bumps in the road to get there, though. I broke down crying when I dropped my dinner off my fork, into my lap. So frustrated that I was so weak, and helpless. Keith took the brunt of that tantrum. Every day he would come in. Everyday, drove an hour to be with me, and then an hour home. I could tell that he wasn't eating well, but he's not good at eating well anyway. He's one of those people that forgets to eat. I don't think I've ever missed a meal in my life because I forgot, but more than once I've come home from work to find a single coffee cup in the sink, and that's it. Food is unimportant to him. It's a foreign concept to me.
There are things that ARE important to him, however, and it seems like he's barely holding it together with those. He's one of those people that must be well dressed at all times. He can't even run down to the market wearing sweats - despite the time - he changes into pants that button, and shoes that tie, for all public appearances. So I know that he's not holding it together as well as he pretends, when he comes in one day wearing two different shoes. Not vastly different, mind you. They are both white shoes, but they are not a matched pair. Unheard of. And this is how I know how worried, and distracted he really is. Because when he's there with me, he tries not to let on. He brings me cold bottles of diet coke, and crawls up on my bed, and we talk about the things that we're going to do when I get out of there. Digging for diamonds, blizzards from Dairy Queen, seeing the Northern Lights. I feed him bites of my chocolate cake, and I look at his mismatched shoes, and I know that he's holding it together by a thread. But he's pretending beautifully. And I don't think that I could love any one any more than I do in those moments.
I have visitors everyday. Keith tries to come in the evening, after everyone else has left, so that I'm not alone for very long. My uncles show up randomly at all times, with books, and stories about fishing trips. My mom and my sister are constants that float in and out, and bring me nice smelling soap, and clean underwear, and sunflower seeds. (For months I've had an addiction to sunflower seeds. Shelled salted sunflower seeds. I eat pounds of them. Everyday I eat thousands of calories worth of sunflower seeds. I fantasize about them, about swimming in a vat of sunflower seed kernels with my mouth open. I crave them. And then...all of a sudden...I don't want them anymore. I don't crave them like I did. Was it the cancer that made me want them in the first place? All I know is that something has changed.)
I'm not myself. I don't want food, and I'm hot. I'm so hot that I'm sweating buckets. Everyone comes in wearing sweatshirts, so I'm pretty sure that it is not hot, but I can hardly abide my bed and my gown. When I lean forward Keith fans my back, and wipes me down with a cool wash cloth. But it's not enough. I'm burning up. I hate to be a pain in the ass, but I ask the nurses for a fan. "We'll see if the lift crew can find one." The lift crew? Is this their crew of men that lifts heavy objects? How big is this fan? And then a slight girl in scrubs brings one in, and I realize that the lift crew is called the "lift crew" because they "lift" aka steal items upon request. It makes me giggle. And finally I begin to cool off. Thank you lift crew.
One of my most traumatic experiences happens when no one's there. When I'm all alone. Every 8-12 hours I need a new iv bag. An alarm beeps when there is an hour left, no matter the time. Two am? Beep, beep, beep. Midnight? Beep, beep, beep. 10 o'clock in the morning - beep, beep, beep. So it has to be my fourth morning in, I'm guessing 4 am-ish and beep beep beep. Isabel, my favorite nurse, comes in to replace my bag. But something is wrong this time. It looks like the vein in my arm has collapsed. She pulls my needle, and attempts a new line in the top of my hand. Twice. My skin tone is so fair, that my veins are usually visible to the naked eye, but I'm so full of fluids, so puffy, that they keep eluding her. And I start to cry. Silently, but I can't help myself. She tries one more time, in my elbow crease, but that needle does not want to go in. She calls someone else in to do it. They're trying to stay in my left arm, since I've got so much going on my right side, what with the port in my neck and all. The new nurse gets it in on her first attempt, in an awkward spot on the inside of my wrist on the same side as my thumb. I bleed onto my medical identification bracelets. She apologizes, and I try to be strong and tell her that it is okay, but I cry the whole time, because it hurts, and I hate this. I never thought I would be here long enough to need another IV. They come in everyday and take my blood, so you would think that I'd be used to being poked and prodded by now, but for some reason this is just the straw. You know the one. The last straw. The final straw. The straw that broke the camel's back. And all of my sadness, my fear, and utter despair comes flooding out of me, and I cry into my sheet, huge, loud, wrack my body sobs, while everyone passing by in the hallway is kind enough to pretend that they can't hear. And thankfully, after a few minutes, I pull myself together again.
A momentary lapse.
I have no idea when I'm getting out. I have no idea how much longer I'll need to be here, and every time I ask when they think I might be able to go home, they tell me "Maybe tomorrow."
I wish tomorrow would come already.
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