another day
2 minute read
now what?
After John's breathing tube was removed the incredibly competent ICU team also removed his catheter and started running more tests to see how his organs were doing. My husband immediately notified the small army of family and friends who were praying for John to let them know that he was responding - a complete miracle in every sense of the word. By evening I'm not sure who was more exhausted but John wasn't really interacting with us, although we could tell he knew we were there. I managed to drag the recliner close to his bed so I could lay next to him and hold his hand, hoping that we'd get some rest overnight and not having the slightest idea of what the next day would hold. Turns out, a restful night was not in the forecast.
The good news was later that evening John actually opened his eyes and recognized me - although he didn't know where he was or why he was there. I’d asked one of the nurses what information I should give him when and if he did come around and she said to tell him the truth, that he needed to hear it. So later, as I was drifting in and out of sleep, I felt John squeeze my hand and I looked across at him in his bed. At this point he wasn't restrained with the wrist cuffs and he was pulling himself up, trying to sit up in the bed. He was very agitated and seemed angry. I told him to relax and asked if he knew where he was - again. And again, no - he didn't know where he was or why he was there, so I started the story again. His voice was a very quiet, hoarse whisper because of the ventilator’s damage to his vocal cords and his lips were swollen, blistered and chapped from breathing through the tube for three days. It looked excruciating and I rubbed vaseline on them constantly...such a mom thing to do.
He calmed down a bit and I explained he was in the ICU because he had overdosed on Fentanyl and Xanax three days ago...to which he looked stunned and completely confused. "Three DAYS ago?!" he softly pushed out of his damaged lungs and throat, in total disbelief. I explained what I knew of his trip to the hospital and time in the ER, and now the time he'd been in the ICU. He couldn't believe it, but he was clearly confused and not processing normally.
I left the chain of events high level and tried to get him to rest but there was none of that. "I'm gonna kill him! I'm gonna kill Parker - he sold me heroin, I'm going to kill him, he knows I don't do heroin." John was trying to shout but his throat only let out puffs of air with words attached. It sounded pathetic to hear him be so angry about such a serious thing but be barely able to get words out. While I was ecstatic beyond belief that he was alive and functioning, to some extent, my heart started to feel the dread of the old life coming back - if these were the first words out of his mouth after being clinically dead, I assumed things might not just bounce back to normal, pre-drug life, for any of us.