just breathe....

Maybe I want to write to let others know how life can be both precious and devastating and we can’t question why things happen ….. and unfortunately just accept them and know that things happen for a reason…. We may not know/realize the reason for years to come but in the end it all comes together…

Goal # 2 – just breathe… and treasure every single moment and person in your life…. (already working on this one…)

As I mentioned in my previous post I probably would be writing about my mum… I think today will be that day, but before I start I want to “remember” Graham’s dad first…. And with the story of these two gorgeous people in our lives I would like you to think about the “issues” that come to your mind…. I will not formally mention my struggle with these two situations but I hope they leave you with something to think about…..

Graham and I married in September of 2006.  We had known each other for about 3 years and decided that at our “stages” in life we did not want to prolong the whole “trial” period of dating/courting/seeing if this was the right person, because we knew, and tied the knot! 

Around the time of the wedding Graham’s dad had been having some pain and had been seeking and going through medical treatment but doctors could not pin-point the exact cause of what was causing the pain….

In April of 2007 he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and passed 3 months later…. 4 months before he could have met his first grandson.  I will not go through the time that Graham’s dad and family knew he was sick and knew what the inevitable was because that is a private issue that is not for me to share, but I can tell you that it hurt.  I can only tell you how I felt and how I think my husband felt…..

During the last few days I was scheduled to go for an ultra-sound (about 5 months pregnant by now) because one of my tests showed positive for possible Spina bifida (is a birth defect in which the backbone and spinal canal do not close before birth - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002525/ ).  We travelled from Kingston, where my in-laws lived, to Toronto on Thursday for the test but before I left I sat down with Graham’s dad and asked him to make a deal with me…… We did not tell the others what we had been going through since it seemed insignificant compared to what the family was dealing with…. although I was quite scared about my baby….. I told him that we were going to check if Ewan was going to be alright and that he had to wait… wait for us to come back and wait for the answer to let him know our baby was going to be okay…. I didn’t get any acknowledgement from him as to whether or not he heard me, because at this point he could not move at all anymore, but I knew that he made that deal with me…..

We got back from Toronto later that day and I went back in and whispered that he was going to be fine… his grandson was going to be perfect…. early the next morning Graham’s dad past away with his whole family be his side…..

Ewan was born November 03 2007, 5 lbs 6 oz…. not a big boy at all but he has definitely made up for that now…. He is a great, smart, funny little man that keeps me on my toes while his daddy is away at work….

Ewan was only 17 months old when I mum was rushed to the hospital one Saturday… April 25, 2009… and that was the last time we saw my mum, the mum that I grew up with, the wife my dad married and the Baba (grandmother) that Ewan was starting to know and love…. She was in the ICU for almost 2 months under heavy sedation and kind of a medically induced coma….

OK, let me back up a bit… the week previous to the hospitalization we were all sick at home… for those of you who do not have kids, prepare yourselves… when you have a child in daycare or school you will be exposed to the most horrific colds and flues and sicknesses ever!  That week Ewan developed and ear infection that quickly spread to my mum since she was our main caregiver during the day… She went to the doctor’s and got an antibiotic and was on it for a few days… That Saturday morning my dad went to work, and Graham and I wanted to go out shopping with Ewan and went downstairs to ask mama if she needed anything…. She started to complain about pain in her neck and a bit of nausea and since I knew she was on medication already I didn’t pursue any other course of treatment other than some Gravol for the nausea and that would help her sleep for a while….

We got home around noon and she was still napping so I left her to sleep, because we all know that your body regenerated while sleeping…. Before dinner I went down again (we live in the same house, THANK GOD) and she was still sleeping and by this time I was getting a little worried….. While I was trying to slowly wake my mum a huge wind storm blew through our neighbourhood knocking over trees and power lines and, my ever-brave-helping husband ran outside to the house that got crushed by a tree to see if anyone was hurt… by now I really couldn’t wake my mum and started shouting and shaking her… I was screaming for Graham to help me but he thought I was just worried about him getting hurt outside…. until he saw the horror in my eyes….. I put Ewan up in his crib, he was hysterical, and I was yelling at Graham to get an ambulance. I was on the phone with my dad and ordered him to come home immediately… Because power lines were down it took 20 minutes to talk with emergency services to get an ambulance…. The operator was now on the phone with me telling me to turn her on her back…. I did. And when I saw what was coming out of my mum’s left ear I stopped breathing….. I though part of her brain was melting out of her head….. Yes that is where my mind was going…. It was actually the infection coming out of her ear…. But sadly it was not only exiting her ear, it had reached its way to her spinal cord…

Bacterial meningitis is a medical emergency.
Untreated, it can be fatal in a few hours. Even survivors can have severe consequences including varying degrees of blindness, deafness, paralysis and mental retardation. Suspected cases of bacterial meningitis require immediate medical attention.  http://www.meningitis.ca/en/what_is_meningitis/bacterial.shtml

It felt like for the next 5 months I did not breathe at all…..
We did not know what this was and for the next 24 hours my mum was quarantined and everyone at the hospital was trying to figure out what was happening. My dad told me that he will never forget the night after my mum was admitted into the ER… even though she was not coherent she was screaming in agony from the pain, the pain from the meningitis attacking her spinal cord, her brain, her body…. Doctors were nowhere to be found… nursed paged and paged and called and called and all were terrified to deal with my mum… she had scans and tests and blood work done and finally they diagnosed her…. But my dad will never forget the screams or terror and horror in her voice and her calls out for her own mama to help her….
She was finally taken to the ICU and was there for almost 2 months…. Through a dense haze… I remember going to visit her, sitting beside her, singing to her the song both her and I sang to Ewan, making sure to keep letting her hear our voices. 
I remember teaching…  and taking Ewan to daycare … and picking him up after the hospital visits … and talking to family and friends… and doing daily tasks that needed doing… but I don’t remember breathing…. I remember holding my breath sitting in the waiting room by myself crying hysterically NOT breathing and thinking that I am not ready to NOT have a mum. I am NOT ready to raise my boy without her advice… I am just NOT ready for this!  The other deeply embedded memory is of one day either talking or singing to her, while she was unconscious and hooked up to a million tubes and a breathing machine, and seeing one tear slowly fall down her right cheek…. The side what I was sitting on… Those are the two most vivid memories of my mum in the ICU….
I am not going to talk about the next few months… of our struggles to get her into a rehab facility and our fights with doctors and directors and policy makers cause what matters most is that she is home… right?
RIGHT?
It has not been easy the past almost 3 years since I lost MY mum and had to meet my new mum…
Our second child was born November 24, 2010… God blessed us with her and he blessed us with keeping me here to come home to care for my two babies and my new mum….