| A Sudden Death In The Family |
[Nov. 10th, 2008|05:31 am] |
Some of you might recall me mentioning that my main job in the real world is taking care of the three elderly family members I live with - my mom, my dad and my aunt. Tonight my aunt departed this world after about a month of battling some mysterious disease that the doctors say is so rare they'd never seen a case before, and which I haven't even been told the name of yet.
It was about 4:30 this morning that I signed off Second Life and went downstairs to find my folks sitting in the living room acting like they had something they wanted to lay on me. This, I assumed was some job they needed done, which is what I'm here for.
So they proceed to tell me that they just got a call from the hospital wanting authorization to put my aunt on a respirator. And, what they wanted to tell me was that they had denied permission, as this would have been against what my aunt had requested.
This seemed to me to have been a bad judgment call on their part, being as it seemed to me she had had a lot of life left in her before this mysterious so called disease cropped up. And I still wasn't sure this mysterious disease wasn't really an adverse reaction to a medication that the medical system wanted to cover up. So I figured there was every chance that if they kept her breathing for a while she could have made a full recovery. But while we were discussing it the hospital called to say she had died before the discussion had even begun.
It was 6 or 7 years ago that we brought my aunt to Baltimore from PA because she was having some kind of trouble, and doctors determined that she couldn't live alone anymore, planting in our minds the idea that she probably wouldn't be around much longer. So we all shoved our lives aside, moved her entire apartment full of stuff into our already over crowded little house and made every sacrifice possible to buy her some extra time, and to make that time as comfortable as possible. It was not long before it became obvious that not having to live alone was making all the difference in the world, and apparently we bought her an additional 6 years.
Early on, after she came here, there was this dread in my mind that one day she would inevitably die, and I would come down the stairs to find my mother in tears after having found her that way. But, once her vitality came back that fear passed, and I stopped living in dread of this day.
The disquieting thing for me at this point is that the scene I feared is not happening - not even close to it. My folks are being all business like, looking up legal papers and making arrangements at 5 o'clock in the morning. Nobody's crying or acting as if they've been immobilized by heavy thoughts. Heck, my mom just called up to remind me to take out the trash. I'd better go do that. Be back in a minute.
Ok, that's done. My dad is on the phone with my brother. More technical stuff about arrangements. And my dad has the TV tuned to a lite jazz music station. Presumably to insure no silence in which reflective thoughts might take over.
He stopped me on the way back to get my reassurance that I thought they did the right thing. I made no move to indicate I thought otherwise, and will most likely keep my mouth shut about any misgivings I have about allowing someone to die before their malady has even been properly diagnosed to anyone's satisfaction. Don't worry, my folks don't read my journal.
My aunt was somewhat like me in certain ways, but this did not mean we were close. We both suffered from a life long affliction of extreme shyness and reclusiveness. Also, she was something of a Furry, having an obsessive interest in cats and a special fondness for animal entertainment. I think the last movie we watched together was The Fox & The Hound.
Unfortunately, 2 extremely shy people living in the same house do not always develop a special feeling of security around each other. So we almost never talked, and our relationship was based mainly on the idea of not crowding each other's space. The only upside to that is that we never had an argument nor any animosity between us. Still, most of the time if she needed something done she would not ask me directly. I'd get the request second hand through my mother.
There was one thing about her that was a potential problem. She was just way too into The 700 Club. And there were times when it would have been impossible for her to have kept from invading my space with that. But, if ever I felt like swearing at Pat Robertson, I made sure to do it when she was out of earshot.
In spite of that situation, this was someone that I loved and cared about a great deal. But nothing was ever said about that. I could see that she was as uneasy as I was about being fussed over that way. So there was never any mushy stuff. If she felt the same for me I'll probably never know.
Anyway, about a month or so ago she came down with some kind of skin affliction. It took us forever to get anyone to even look at it. When they finally did they passed it off as sunburn. And I'm like, she never goes outside. How could it be sunburn?
Then she developed extreme weakness and an inability to move her arms. Again it took forever to get her seen. The diagnosis, rheumatism. So they gave her some drugs to take, at least one of which is noted for having some very serious side effects, and she just continued to deteriorate, until one day we found her unable to get out of bed. We called an ambulance, she went to the hospital, and that was the last I saw of her.
Days after going into the hospital I was still getting no clear definition of what was wrong with her. All I was hearing was that she had developed a soar throat that was so swollen that she couldn’t eat. And that she had not been fed for a week before they decided to put in a feeding tube. And I'm like, What? ! What credible hospital lets a patient go for a week without nutrition? Next thing I hear is they're cutting a piece out of her shoulder muscle to test for this ultra rare disease. And before the test results even come back she's dead.
Now, I wish to hell that I had such faith in the medical system around here that I could feel sure that there was no malpractice involved in this. But the system has done me dirt in the past, giving me drugs that they shouldn't have and going to the most extraordinary lengths to cover it up.
So, yeah, I have my misgivings. But they are useless. No good can come of them, because there comes a point where you have to depend on doctors. And if the so called experts let you down, what are you going to do, sue them? Who’s got the resources for that? And who really wants to know?
Holy cra . . . Now my dad is reading her will out loud. Seems she didn't leave anything to my parents. She left it all to me and my brother. Well, I guess that answers the earlier quandary about if she felt the same. That's good news for me, but my mom seems a little vexed.
Anyway, the thought I sat down to express was this strange, unexpected, professional atmosphere that pervades this house on this day. I wonder what it says about this family - a generally loving family, so well practiced at keeping it's deeper emotions to itself. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad nobody’s crying or breaking down. But somehow it just nags at me that we shouldn't be handling this quite so well.
I wonder, at some point after all the arrangements have been made and life tries to resume it's normal course around here, what will happen when idol eyes fall upon the empty chair in the living room, or the disused cane left leaning against the front doorway. Will the reality of it all finally fall on us like a ton of bricks. |
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