The End

The End.

Or near it.  This woman before is fading away and she is ready to stop fighting and give into peace.  Allowing her body to rest and for her spirit to go home.  That's what she wants.  Home.  Not the lonely small house that she has occupied for years, but the one she's only heard of her entire life.

Her life.  No children.  No husband.  In her younger days she strived to become a pilot, but that didn't happen despite earning her commercial license.  And the idea of children was robbed from her when a complication took away the space for a little to form.  She was married for a time... but he too disappeared after becoming a paraplegic.  Alone and ready.  This is her ending.  This is it.  Years of life gone and now she no longer desires to breath this air and see these physical surroundings.  No one to say good bye to... no one to miss.  Another breath or two and then it is The End.

Nausea

There was a moment where the nausea was overwhelming...working as a detective combing through a chart to find a possible cause as the youngish man three feet from the computer was no longer fully here or there.  He was being pounded on the chest with an intensity that shook the bed, but effective as it circulated the blood...was it reaching his brain? Was there a chance? 

MUST stay in the detective compartment... the only choice to keep the trembling away.  This isn’t reality.  The physician near was incredible as she called out medications and orders and also looked for a cause of what happened.  Ten plus hospital workers gathered in action to save a life.  Strong men and women pushing on his chest ignoring the fact they would be sore in the morning while others started lines, gathered data, gave life saving medications, shocked the heart... but in the end he remained still with no breath of his own.  His mother sobbing...I gave her a chair as she grabbed my hand and wouldn’t let go.  Gone.  Sometimes it’s hard not to let the wall down and cry along with them.  He was alert and talking just a few hours before.  Totally unseen and unexpected, he might as well have been hit by a car.  I ache for this family, and you’d think through the years it would be easier to see this...especially after the havoc of COVID...but it’s not...it’s a life...a family...a shocking life altering event. 😔