Whiplash

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I get to the hospital this morning, after pouring out our family’s latest saga here, and I find my mother with monitors, and O2, and IVs like a regular hospital-type patient intent on getting well.  So I lean in to ask what might be going on, and she pats my arm.

“The doctor said I had to take care of myself.”

Out I go to the nurses’ station.  Come to find out Mom got pretty uncomfortable overnight, what with no pain medication and no oxygen to easy her breathing.  She decided suicide wasn’t worth it.  Then, her doc for the past thirty-five years read her the riot act.  No one seems to know exactly what he said, and Mom’s not telling, but I have never seen her so compliant.

I watched with my mouth agape when the nurse asked how she felt and Mom’s answer was, “Fine.”  She took her meds, ate a little breakfast, worked without complaint with the Occupational Therapist.  All of a sudden the Dying with Dignity bus got rear-ended by a semi full of Let’s Get Better.

I’m not complaining.  Okay, maybe I am.  As a former nurse and spiritual guide, I should know how to drive this vehicle.  I can balance the fight for life with supporting one’s final wishes, but the drama on this particular highway is of pea soup quality.  By the time I left the hospital today, my new motto was “Let The Professionals Figure It Out.”

With my sister’s blessing, I’m taking a day off tomorrow.  I’ll visit with my meditation buddies in Des Moines, see the new Star Trek movie, and go to my post-hospitalization support group.  No freeway pile-ups, no sudden lane changes.  Just a day to loosen up enough to take the next hit.  Because another one is bound to come.  And this highway is crazy enough without adding my own special brand.

Remember Drivers, hands at 10 and 2.