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Recently I went through my posts and realized that they almost always start with "It's been a while since I posted..." And this post is no exception. It seems that life has a way of being so busy that writing takes a back seat. This is going to be a different kind of entry though. Most of my previous topics have just been about what's going on in my life at the time. Hopefully this one will be therapeutic for me.
A lot of great things have happened to me over the past year. The biggest being getting married and buying a house. This past March I went on a lovely trip to Venice, Italy with my family for spring break vacation.
It was a Saturday when I got back to Dallas from spring break. I was surprised when I checked my work schedule and discovered that I also had Sunday and Monday off, too. So, as I usually do, I went to Home Depot to get some stuff for a house project. My phone rang and I saw that it was my mom calling. I thought that she was going to ask for pictures from our trip to Italy, or something like that. I answered the phone and heard "I have some bad news." I could tell by the tone of her voice that something was very wrong. I stopped dead in mt tracks and asked what she meant.
I found out that my Uncle Rick, my dad's younger brother, had suffered a brain aneurysm. At that point they didn't know how bad it was. He was being life lighted University Hospital in Cleveland. Apparently Uncle Rick had not shown up for work on Thursday and also not shown up on Monday either. His boss called my dad to check and see if everything was alright. Since my uncle's birthday was on Monday my dad thought that he may have gone camping and there could have been a miscommunication between work. After doing some more digging, my dad decided to go over to my uncle's apartment and see if he was home. The police arrived at the same time as my dad.
When they opened the door they found my uncle laying on the floor between the bathroom and the living room. He was unconscious. 911 was called. I cannot imagine what it was like for my dad to open up the door and find his brother like that. They could tell that he had been there for a few days. He had sores on his head and back from where he was on the floor.
They found him on his 53rd birthday.
He was admitted into the Neuro ICU. Many scans were taken and tests were ran to find out the severity of the damage. At first the doctors were hopeful that he would recover. Uncle Rick still hadn't woken up. His brain was swollen from the trauma and had to have 2 surgeries to try and relieve the pressure. On the second one the doctors removed a section of his skull from ear to ear, like a headband, hoping that it would help. He would respond to pain, but in a very primitive way. His pupils would still dilate. The doctors were unsure if he could still hear but just couldn't respond in a meaningful way. Imagine being trapped in your body with all of these scary things happening around you with no way to communicate. That sounds like just about the most horrible situation I can think of.
While Uncle Rick was in the ICU he was visited by my grandma Mauch, grandpa Mauch, Aunt Sherry, and some very old friends from high school that he still kept in touch with. I'm glad that people were able to go and visit him.
All along the way I wanted to go back and visit too. My mom told me that then was not the time, and that she would let me know when a better time would be. At this point my uncle had just had his surgeries and his prognosis was still semi-positive. The biggest risk was strokes in the brain. I guess that's just what goes along with having an aneurysm. The "danger zone" is for about 10 days. The doctors monitored him and gave him special medicine to try and prevent strokes. After they thought the danger had passed, my uncle had a stroke at the base of his brain. After this point, the chances of recovery were gone. He was now in a coma. My mom decided that then would be a good time to visit him.
I took time off work to fly back to Ohio. We went straight from the airport to the hospital to visit. I knew it would be hard. I didn't think it would be as hard as it actually was. Before I went in to see him my dad went in to make sure everything was settled, and to make sure that we wouldn't interrupt the nurses doing anything. In the waiting area I was surprised at the people. A lot of them were on cell phones and talking about people like this was just another day and everything was fine. Nobody was crying or anything. There I was, sitting there barely being able to contain my emotions.
We went into the room. My dad announced to my uncle that I had come to visit with him. Every time people visited, my parents would tell my uncle who was there. The person lying in the bed didn't even look like the man that I knew. First, he didn't have his glasses. Second, he didn't have his mustache. He looked a lot younger than I thought he was. I guess when you're little all adults just look old. That mind set must have followed me to adulthood. Another thing that was very strange was the smell. Not that it was good or bad, it was just different that I was expecting. I guess I expected it to smell bad. It didn't. It was a clean/hospital/febreeze smell. I guess I had to mention that. My dad was in the room with me. Uncle Rick had lots and lots of IV medicine attached to a machine that was regulating the dosages. He had a tube in his nose for feeding and he was on the ventilator with a trach (a hole in the throat). The ventilator was breathing for him, but he would also breathe on his own. There were lots of monitors for heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing. he also had a blanket sort of thing that was pumping cold water to try and keep his fever down. It was very shocking to see one person hooked up to so many different things, let alone someone that you've always had memories of as far back ans you can remember.
My dad had been to my uncle's work to give them an update. Work gave my dad a get well card for my uncle. Since my uncle was in a coma he could not read the card. My dad opened the card and read it aloud to his brother. People had written personal messages. "We miss the big guy down the hall" was a memorable one. I completely lost all composure and started sobbing. It was so emotional to see my dad reading this card to his brother. I can imagine the sadness of seeing your brother in that state. If it were my brother there I would be beside myself. I wouldn't be able to read...I'd probably just be crying all of the time. My dad started to lose his composure and had to stop reading. It was the saddest thing to witness. We spent the day at the hospital visiting. My mom, dad. and I would go on walks and we went to the cafeteria. That hospital was huge!
On the car ride back to my parents house I started to not feel good. I had a really bad headache from trying to not cry all day. I hadn't eaten, I was tired, and I was very sad. I felt like I was going to barf. My mom quickly dumped her purse out and threw it back to me. There was no way I was going to barf in her purse! We were on the highway going about 70mph and we weren't able to stop safely. I rolled down the window, held my hair back, and let it rip. If anyone was following too closely behind the car I'll bet they backed off once they saw what was happening! I felt much better after I threw up. We made it home without another getting sick moment. At the time it was horrible to be sick, but looking back I find the situation funny. It's the one thing from that day that makes me chuckle somewhat.
The next day my brother and I went to see Uncle Rick together. Devon brought his guitar to play at my uncle's bedside. Devon told me that the last conversation that he had with my uncle was about playing the guitar. Uncle Rick wanted to hear Devon play but he didn't have his guitar at the time. They agreed that next time they got together that Devon would play for him. Very sadly, in the hospital was the next time. Devon played Stairway to Heaven and a couple of songs that he had written. I suggested that he play some Beatles. Uncle Rick loved the Beatles. My uncle's room was located right outside the nurses station. We closed the sliding doors when Devon played. Nurses and doctors that walked by looked in a I could tell that they were wondering what the sounds were. I don't think that many people had visitors there that would play live music for them. It was truly a special moment. Very heartwarming but also deeply sad at the same time. About half way through the visit alarms started going off to the machines that Uncle Rick was hooked up to. The nurses and doctors can monitor everything from the computers at the stations. Nobody ever came in and there were no emergencies. The conversation that Devon and I had after leaving the hospital was hard. He said to me that he truly thought Uncle Rick would wake up when he played the guitar. I thought the same thing about myself going to Ohio to visit. Somehow I thought that my sheer will and thoughts would travel like lightning bolts to make him better and wake up. That's the best way I can describe it. It's the primal urge that I had to make everything better. The strongest hoping that I've ever felt, the feeling in your heart and in every part of you. I really wish that all of our love and hope could have brought him back to us. I guess the world doesn't work like that. We left the hospital that day sad, as usual, but glad that the hospital allowed us to have such a special visit.
We visited again the next day. This time we had a meeting with team of doctors about options. Either we could transfer my uncle to a nursing home to live the rest of his life in a coma with no chance of waking up, or we could chose to have him go into Hospice. Hospice basically just means that you will be allowed to pass away without medical intervention, except for pain medication. Life in a nursing home would be feeding tubes, bed sores, and different kinds of complications from just laying there. I said goodbye to the Uncle Rick that I had known. I want back to Dallas the next day.
Ultimately the decision was made to transfer Uncle Rick to a hospice facility in Akron. He was transferred on April 17th. No ventilator or feeding tube. Just an IV for morphine. His mother, sister, and brother, and sister in law spent the days there with him. My parents were lucky to find a facility with suites for the family so that they could spend the nights there too.
Uncle Rick passed away on April 21, 2011, a little less than a month after his 53rd birthday.
Mike and I went back to Ohio for his funeral. The actual service wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I made it through with not so many tears. The moment when I lost it was when my grandpa started sobbing. It's just so heart wrenching to see a father crying for his son. After the service I gave my grandpa a hug and he started sobbing again. It was so hard and sad to go through. Mike was there with me so it made it a little easier to make it.
This whole experience has made me think about my own life more. I feel like I'm never going to be the same person. I was living in my own little world where nothing bad happens to me. I'm lucky. I have a great relationship with my family and I'm very close with them. I have a great husband and our own house. I have a good job. I realized that things can change in a blink of an eye. Things can go from living life to life coming to screeching halt. My uncle was getting ready for bed on Thursday night when his aneurysm burst. Boom, that's it. I always assumed that I would live a long life full of my own family memories. That may not be the case. It makes me so scared to think about death. Sometimes I feel like I'm going to have a panic attack just thinking about it. Other times I feel calmed by the thought that it's something that everyone goes through and that I shouldn't be scared. I'm not a religious person. This experience sure has shaken that up. Now I don't know what to think about anything anymore. These feelings make me want to have everything now, to be happy right now, in this moment. Because what if I'm not around much longer? I want people who know me to have positive memories of me, like I have of my uncle and my grandparents who have passed away. They are a part of me and they make me who I am. Mike says that ones we love aren't really gone. They live on in our hearts.
I have this great memory of going over to Grandma Mauch's farm in the wintertime as a little girl. I remember sledding down the hill in the front yard with my uncle. It was one of those old fashioned sleds. My uncle got on belly down so he could steer the front. He was not a small guy, prob 6' 4'' . I sat on his back and went flying down the hill with him. I'm sure that I was giggling with delight the whole trip down. I only hope that he had as much fun on that day as I did. I'll never forget it.
I'll never forget him.
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