As I write this, a friend of mine is keeping vigil in a waiting room at a hospital. Her mother, never a drinker, contracted cirrhosis and her liver failed. As a result, she found herself on a waiting list for a new one. Late last night, they got the call, a donor liver was found. And this morning the transplant process was started.
Although the reality is, the process started a long time ago. When the young girl the liver is coming from started using the drugs that ultimately killed her.
Too meta?
Ok, how about this.
Over the course of the last week or so, when our text conversations started, my mind occasionally raced back to May 2003 and to August 2006.
Today, especially, I've been thinking a lot about August 19th through August 21st.
I remember vividly sitting in the waiting room that Friday, waiting for word on how Diane's bypass surgery went. When the nurses came out a little after 11:00 AM (right on schedule) to tell us they were closing her up, a wave of relief washed over me.
I started making phone calls to family with the update.
I think I was on the third call when I saw the nurse making her way across the waiting room towards me. I saw the look on her face.
I knew something had happened.
I was horribly correct.
Diane's heart had stopped and they opened her up again to find out what happened and why. And to make sure it didn't happen again. She was in the OR for about 12 hours all told that day. The surgeon didn't leave until about 11:30 that night. And when he told me she was a candidate for a transplant at that point, the gravity didn't register with me then.
I knew the words, of course. It just didn't sink in then. Not until Saturday afternoon when they told me her kidneys had shut down, did I realize what we were facing, just a little over three years after Caitlin's death.
I remember "sleeping" in a chair in the waiting room. Getting up and walking in to Diane's room randomly, talking to her over the course of those nights. Trying to pass the time by reading "Marley and Me" at least until it got to the point where I saw how it would end and I knew I was in no shape emotionally to read any further.
The kids were holed up in the smaller waiting room in the cardiac unit. But I stayed out in the general waiting room. Sometimes one of them would be in her room when I went to check on Diane. And, on Friday night, there was always at least one nurse and her perfusionist in the room. But as her condition deteriorated, the perfusionist was no longer needed and her nursing staff was cut back. On Sunday night she was mostly alone in her room.
It gave me a chance to talk to her. By that time I had, in my mind anyway, made sense of what was happening. She was only 48 years old and in good health otherwise. This shouldn't have happened to her. But what I knew in my heart, what got me out of bed for so many mornings when that was the last thing I wanted to do, was the belief that Diane saw the opportunity to be with Caitlin again.
To shop, work out, tan, and all the other things they so loved to do together. And it was too much for her to pass up.
Who was I to object? What right did I have to tell her she was wrong to miss her youngest daughter?
And so I leaned in and whispered in her ear, the hardest words I've ever spoken in my life...
"It's ok."
"I understand."
"Be with Caitlin."
One of the things that I've regretted from that weekend was that it didn't occur to me to talk to the hospital staff about donating Diane's organs once the outcome became inevitable. By the time we talked about it, all that could be used were her eyes and her skin. She could've helped so many more people if I had thought of it sooner.
In May 2003, we met with someone from at the hospital from Gift of Hope, the local donor group. They explained everything to us, how it would work, what organs they would "harvest" (btw that's an absolutely terrible term to use with a grieving family) and how soon it would start. They told us they would keep Caitlin "alive" for an extra 24 hours to keep her organs viable while the transplant team came in and the logistics for delivery were put together.
Ultimately Caitlin's heart, liver and kidneys were used. I wish I could tell you there were four happy endings as a result of our loss, but it doesn't always work that way. All we ever heard was that a 17 year-old girl got her liver.
I think what I'm really trying to do here is multifold. What I want you to do, if you haven't already done it, is please, PLEASE, agree to be an organ donor. You won't need any of that stuff when you're gone and you may, in fact, save someone else's life. Maybe several someones.
The other thing I'd like to accomplish today is; while you're reading this, take a minute to talk to whatever it is that gets you through the night and send some good vibes out to my friend and her family. They could use them. It doesn't cost anything and who knows, the karma may come back to you.
We could all use a little of that.
Peace.
PS - because, well, you know... Don't even ask cause I'm not saying.
PPS (or is it PSS?)
Here's the latest (as of a couple days ago) on My Friend's Mom (MFM henceforth) She was extubated on Tuesday as she was starting to fight the tube again. She was cleared on the blood clot check, and today they're starting to wean her off dialysis. It's not uncommon for the kidneys to shut down through all this, so it wasn't an unexpected thing.
She does have a little bit of ICU delirium, another not uncommon after-effect of being on a ventilator. Again, the doctors feel this will be a short-term thing and will resolve with time.
There's still a tough row to hoe (look it up) so I'm sure the family would still appreciate good thoughts and positive vibes, so if you have any you can spare, keep sending them!
Again,
Peace
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