It's Saturday....

It's Saturday.  The day before Sunday.  Today, most people will be running errands, working in the yard, spending time with family, or doing a myriad of mindless tasks to check off their lists.  For me and my family, this is the day before Sunday.  Before the Sunday that changed our lives forever.  So, a year ago, we rose early, went to the hospital, sat vigil at the side of my daddy in ICU, welcomed guests, giving hugs and weak smiles and hoping to make them feel appreciated for their visit, all the while longing to be sitting vigil by his side.  We talked to each other in hushed whispers, made phone calls to give updates, and held on to hope. That Friday changed everything, as we left for a quick lunch at Carey Hilliards, urging him to drink his protein shake and that we would see him in just a few minutes. What a shock to get a phone call from Casey, "hurry, please.  I don't know what's wrong with dad.  I need you."  Rushing upstairs, the man that we gave quick kisses and admonishes about eating to was no longer there, replaced with someone talking incoherently and agitated. When the doctors came in on Friday and put him on that ventilator, we hoped to believe them when they said that it was only going to give his body a chance to rest, to not fight so hard, to recoup.  When the kidney doctor came in with that big dialysis machine, we hoped to believe it would only be temporary. We hoped to believe them when they said there was a chance he would be able to come off all of it.  We hoped to believe them when they said they've had patients stay on them for two weeks, and still come out of it and recover. We hoped to believe and only heard what we wanted to hear.  We approved those things with the hope to make him better not knowing it would be the beginning of the end.  With a fear in his eyes that I'll never forget, I sang "glory glory hallelujah" to my daddy as they sedated him on that ventilator.  Hoping and not yet knowing that would be the last time I would ever see his eyes.  Hoping he knew how much I loved him.  How much I desperately needed him to get better.  Naively, we spoke of the ventilator and dialysis as a good thing.  A chance for him to rest.  To give his body a break.  Naively, we were relieved that there was a break from his struggle.  Naively, we were comforted by the stillness of his body and the higher numbers on the monitors, showing his oxygen levels and breathing to be stable.  We didn't even realize that we would never see his body move again.  It was the beginning of the end and yet, we focused on the positive, not even realizing that death was only two days away.

Its Saturday.  It's been 364 days since my daddy died.  This time last year, we still didn't know that it was our last full day of normalicy.  I stayed home that morning, resting and spending time with Rhett.  It was a pretty uneventful day.  This vitals were stable, normal even.  We ate lunch with our family at Applebee's.  I brought Rhett to the hospital.  He watched The Wiggles with Aunt Michelle 100 times and provided some much needed entertainment in the waiting room.  There was another family there.  Their father was about the same age as daddy and had complication from a heart procedure.  I remember listening to them talk about him getting better.  I was resentful and yet happy that they didn't have the same suffering that we did.  People came and went.  Same weak smiles, hugs all around, half listening to their stories, half dead brained and numb.  We left early that Saturday night.  He was stable the nurses said.  They would call if something changed.  Go rest.  He's in good hands.  Kisses on his cheek, "I love you daddy." I drove mama home, how, I don't know, as we were both in a dense fog that I'm not yet sure has lifted. 

Sunday we get up and get dressed.  Another day at the hospital.  A phone call from the nurse ~ "you can come on up if you want."  What does that mean?  Another race to Savannah, with the flashers on.  Here we go on that roller coaster again.  I don't remember alot about Sunday morning after our meeting with Dr. Bottner, a sweet but blunt cardiologist on call.  He brought us into that little room I had grown to hate.  We hear "his body is shutting down.  Kidney failure.  Heart failure.  Not going to get better.  Vegetable state. Your choice is to leave him like this or to cut the machines now.  Nothing will save him.  Nothing will make him better. We've done all we can.  His body is too weak for the fight.  Too much fluid.  He is drowning.  I'm so sorry.  What would you like to do?"  What would we like to do?!?!?  We would like to not be having this conversation.  We'd like for him to open his eyes.  We'd like for this to be a bad dream.  We'd like to take him home now.  But those are not our choices.  Our choices are to let him live or help him die.  It's probably not really like that, but that's how it felt.  How could we choose to turn off those machines?  How could we choose to end his life?  I know all the while, he wasn't waking up.  It was a matter of time.  We were helping him not to suffer.  Rationally, I know all of this.  At the time, there is no rational, only pure, raw emotion, that rocks your body to the core, physically and otherwise.  My grandparents, his parents, weren't even there yet.  How long do we have?  Not very long.  Ok.  It seemed like they were asking something as inane as would you like paper or plastic...except this was life or death.  By now, you know the choice and it's not something I can really even talk about for somewhere deep inside, it still feels like we chose to kill him.  Again, rationally, I know it's not so and I don't need for everyone to tell me such, but it's my raw human emotion, the kind you know isn't true, but you can't help but feel. 

So, Sunday morning while the majority of our friends were in their respective church services, praying, lifting hands, worshipping, listening to a sermon, thinking about lunch, we all gathered in a small hospital room and listened the heart stop of the man we loved more than life itself. It was almost too cruel to hear that monitor beep, beep, beep, slower, slower, slower, then one big breath, then...nothing.  One by one, people left.  Cousins, aunts, uncles...I don't even remember who all was there that day.  It was almost scary how quickly the change from his living body to his dead body took place. And in those moments where our hearts almost audibly broke in two pieces, his was restored.  While our lives were torn in half, his was put back together, healed, and brought to the living God for a complete wholeness to which we will never know until we too, have that experience.  I couldn't watch that transformation from life to death and had to leave the room, yet couldn't bear the thought of leaving my daddy, which left me collapsed on the floor outside his room, not knowing what to do next.  How do we leave him here?  Where do we go after all of this time spent at the hospital?  What are we supposed to do for the rest of this day, what we thought would be another day of vigil?  The rest of this day, this week, this year?  What to do now? 

What we did was nothing short of pure survival.  We planned a funeral. I wrote the obituary for the paper.  We were shocked by the number of people who came to love on us at the visitation and the burial site.  The names and the faces of these people are continuously in my mind and we speak of them often.  "Do you remember so and so coming?"  "I saw his name in the book, but I don't remember seeing him."  Or, "wow, they came all the way from ____ for us."  I didn't know if that line on Tuesday night would ever end and in a strange way, I didn't want it to.  What a testament to my daddy and our family that we would be loved on so completely.  It was a very real way of God pouring his love out on us when we needed it. 

In the days, weeks, and months to follow, we have been stretched, pulled, bent, and tried, but we have survived.  It hasn't been ideal nor in the way that people thought we might have reacted, but it's the way we have chosen to fight, to survive.  I believe that God has shown us an extraordinary measure of grace and love.  In Matthew, it says "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted."  And, I believe we have experienced that comfort.  Sometimes it is hard, especially when we feel the expectation of others, but we must keep our minds focused on the fact that this has been our cross to bear.  This is the path that God has chosen for us and no one else will be able to understand our unique path because it is not their own.  Even our own individual paths are different ~ I react to situations differently from my mom, my brother, my grandparents, or aunts and uncles because each of us was touched by daddy in a different way.  To me, he was a wonderful daddy, to my mom, her helpmate, her best friend, to my grandparents, a literal piece of them that is missing, my aunts and uncles, he was a brother, a friend, a constant.  So, we each have a different reaction, but are yet united in grief and our intense love for him.  It binds us like never before and makes us even more grateful and appreciative for those in our own lives.  It has been an unbearable year, but we have survived.  We have made it.  We are stronger and closer than ever before.  And we will continue to grow as we travel this path laid out before us.  I will never understand why we were chosen for this task, but I do know one thing.  I know that if he could bear witness to our journey, my daddy would be so proud of each of us as we have perservered through this dark, mostly uphill journey with strength, grace, poise, and determination.  And even if there are bumps along the way, we know we will make it and keep going, because really, not going forward it not a viable option.  So, forward we go, as we pause this weekend to honor the life of a beautiful man and each other's long journeys, and then keep walking this road, together and united in our fight and love for the Lord, daddy, and each other.