After the usual sponge bath, it felt great to unsnap and untie the lovely "flour sack print" cotton gown supplied by the hospital, the only type of garment I’d had on for a week. My mother stared back at me from the bathroom mirror only she was 105 years old; amazing since she died at age 90. I looked like Yoda as a rock star. My dirty-spiky white hair was going in every direction but camouflaged the bandages located behind my ear from temple to neck. The doctors take special care these days to leave as much hair as possible to hide incisions. I noticed even the patients with huge incisions, brads and staples going every-which-way, had hair.
I inserted my body into sweats, pulled a floppy hat over my tresses and I was ready to go home, to my bed.
I inserted my body into sweats, pulled a floppy hat over my tresses and I was ready to go home, to my bed.
I opted to walk, no wheel chair, so Mark held on and away we went, down the long hall where I had practiced with the physical therapist earlier. “Wide wheel base; focus on a stable point; keep posture straight; right foot, left foot.” We turned right, another long hall.
“Fast, fast, fast. Slow, slow, slow.” “Now put your feet parallel and stand,” the PT had said. I tilted. “It’s okay, just practice this maneuver.” “Now, walk steady and count backwards by seven,” he said. “What?” “Start with 97.” “Hummmmm, 97.” I stopped. “What comes next?” After a few attempts with sevens, he settled on 3’s explaining, “This is to show you can’t walk and think at the same time right now. Your only job when you walk is to focus on walking, nothing else, or you will fall.”
“Fast, fast, fast. Slow, slow, slow.” “Now put your feet parallel and stand,” the PT had said. I tilted. “It’s okay, just practice this maneuver.” “Now, walk steady and count backwards by seven,” he said. “What?” “Start with 97.” “Hummmmm, 97.” I stopped. “What comes next?” After a few attempts with sevens, he settled on 3’s explaining, “This is to show you can’t walk and think at the same time right now. Your only job when you walk is to focus on walking, nothing else, or you will fall.”
Each step into the real world brought back fleeting memories of the experience. The gurney rides, the pain, the voices and lights, tubes everywhere, injections into the IV’s, ice packs for my head, pillows fit here and there for comfort, bed up and down, head always elevated, more pain, more meds, a midnight MRI, nurses, housekeepers, getting up, getting down, the screaming lady down the hall, Andrew the amazing Aussie night nurse, doctors, doctors and doctors.
Mark and I continued. I was “me” leaving the hospital. My body shivered and tears filled my eyes. I began crying, sobbing, as we got on the elevator. “What’s the matter? Are you okay?,” Mark panicked. I was fine, great, but everything had changed. I came into the hospital on one side of life only to be rebirthed into a new world. I survived. It is done.
The ride back to Sonoma was beautiful but I viewed it from “underwater”, head stuffed and floating. For my homecoming, Mark filled my room with all shapes and sizes of Valentine’s balloons, vases filled with flowers, stuffed animals and a stack of greeting cards. No floral shop could have looked more “Valentine’s Day.” More tears! I cried off and on for the next day. I am grateful, blessed, wondering how to use this gift of new life.
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