Okay, let's start with the bad: she's still in a coma. The pneumonia came back, she passed a clot from her legs to her lungs, the blood thinners for the clot could cause a bleed out in the brain, the brain stem is pretty swollen, and on a function level she's about where a newborn baby would be.
The good: her functional levels on the neuro tests are getting better, the bleeding where the tumor was is starting to get re-absorbed, the pneumonia is starting to clear, and she took a swing at a nurse last night.
She's day-to-day as you can tell. There's a lot of scenarios which have to play out in our favor to get her through this. And it could take months for the swelling on the stem to come down enough for us to see if there's any damage enough for me to have to put her living will into effect.
She's never been afraid of dieing. She's always been afraid of having to continue her life severely impaired. As an occupational therapist she's worked with enough brain damage cases to know that's not what she wants.
In the meantime I have the neuro-surgeon guiding me through the process of the need for patience and an ICU doctor "guiding" me into going ahead and calling it quits. Guess which one I'm listening to?
Sarah's leading this dance, I'm just following in her footsteps, being her voice for her, and doing what I think is best for her. As long as she's fighting on the inside, I'm gonna fight for her on the outside. In the scheme of things two months or so isn't that long a time, especially when we don't have any definatives as to know if there's any damage or not.
On a side note, my mother-in-law came to town and it did my father-in-law a world of good in helping him pull things together, especially when she explained to him that the marital relationship is more important than the parental relationship and why. (She's very Biblical.)
He pulled me to the side and told me that I'm twice the man he is. He was coming apart at the seams just a few days into all this when he perceives me to be as strong as the Rock of Galbralter.
Truthfully, I draw my strength from Sarah. I took a vow almost 11 years ago. Now I'm her voice - the only voice she has at the moment. She's put her trust in me, her life in my hands to do what's right, one way or the other, when it's time to do so. Sometimes on a moment by moment basis. How can I not stay strong for her?
It doesn't mean that I don't have my moments. I walked out of the diner at lunch today, almost in tears, thinking in my head, "baby, let's go home..."
Essentially, I'm homeless. I have a place to stay and money for food, but no place to be able to rest, to call my own. That's two hours away. I'm told where I have to go to smoke, have to rely on others to prepare my food, no place is familiar. Oh! For my own couch! My own bed! But it's not a sacrifice. I'll do what it takes to protect my wife.
The hospital staff is awesome. I've been around so long now (only two weeks to today, but it feels like a lifetime) that not only do the nursing staff know me by name, but so does most of the support staff at the info desk, the ticket booths for the parking garage, even the maintainence crews. And all of them inquire about Sarah when they see me.
