January 3....Forty Years and Counting

On January 3^rd 1976 the USA performed a nuclear test in Nevada.  It was called the Muenster test, which is funny because Marty and I lived in Muenster Texas.

On January 3^rd 1976 and Marty and I got married in Dalhart Texas.  It was a perfect blue sky day.  It was cold, clear and we had our first argument as a married couple.  I was driving too fast, she was right.

On January 3^rd 2006, on our 30^th anniversary, after surviving a ruptured brain aneurysm in 2005, after returning from a Christmas trip to Dalhart to see her mother, Marty had a devastating ischemic stroke.  It kind of takes the fun out of anniversary celebrations.

On that day, when she sat in her chair and slumped over, her face slack with no tone I wanted to drive fast, to the hospital.  It was dark and cold as I stood behind the ambulance looking in the back as they secured Marty’s gurney to the floor of the vehicle.  

The thought of it still makes me epically sad.

On January 3^rd 2016 (can you believe its 2016, as my son says, “Where’s my flying car?”) Marty and I celebrated two things, a long marriage and survival from a devastating illness.  I guess when you really get down to it if you do anything for 40 years it’s about survival.  I know for a fact if you make it ten years from a big stroke, it’s about survival. 

Marriage is all about love, caring for one another, self-sacrifice, partnership and acceptance of another person with other opinions in your life all day every day.  It’s about hard work, getting down in the dirt with someone, loving them past the anger and ignorance and accepting them in spite of what they may or may not do.  

Marriage is about relationship survival and it often isn’t easy but having a partner, that other beating heart is worth the fight.

Living through a cataclysmic illness is an endurance contest.  It is about love, it is about self-sacrifice and partnership and acceptance.  To live through strokes you get down in the dirt and find yourself doing things you never thought you would do.  You have to get through the anger, the denial, the resentment and you have to find a way to accept the care giver and the cared for in spite of what they may or may not do.  

Just like marriage, it is about survival and it isn’t easy at all but having your partner continue, having that other amazing beating heart next to you is worth the fight.

In 40 years of marriage I have learned a lot.  I know for certain if I had listened to Marty all of the time, if I had done what Marty had said all of the time, if I had done what Marty said when she said it all of the time….well who knows, that was never going to happen.  I have learned to ask about feelings, I have learned to identify my own feelings, and I have learned to not let “no” be my first reaction to everything.

In the ten years post stroke I have learned a lot and tried my best to make the changes necessary to survive and help Marty survive.  I’ve learned and try to live one day at a time and one issue at a time, I have learned to not over look or procrastinate about care giving stuff, I have learned to listen and to watch and to pay attention, I have learned to be nice to doctors and health care providers and I have learned to touch Marty’s cheek every day and say “I love you”.

Mostly, I have learned I have never loved anyone the way I love my bride, I have learned she is the most amazing person I have ever known, I have learned to understand and admire what real survival is and I have learned she is the person I was destined to be with for the duration.

The strange thing is, I knew most of that, it just really hit home the last ten years.  Walking the fine line between here and not here really focuses what you know.

Here’s to another ten…..

The Only Choice

I know exactly why I do it and it’s not because I’m a saint or a particularly self-effacing guy.  I’m not patient or generous enough to qualify for sanctification and I have a very healthy ego and really like to have my way in most everything.  

I do it, because for me, there was never really a choice, for me, caring for Marty became my sole focus because  doing anything else was failing at my most fundamental commitment, caring for the one I love the most.  

As with many daunting tasks in life it was less about choosing and more about just simply doing, not thinking, not analyzing, just doing one task, one procedure, one day at a time.

I didn’t choose the job of caregiver.  Marty didn’t choose the job of care receiver.  Shit happens, strokes happened and what happened gave no room for assessing, developing options and then choosing one of said options.  There was one choice, do what I could, develop skills I didn’t have, plan and take care of my wife.

Yes, the whole promise thing, you know the sickness and in health thing is a huge part of it.  It turns out that was a real live serious kind of commitment, not just some stuff you say at a wedding that you may or may not remember saying.  Who knew?

Marty and I joke for time to time that if the roles were reversed she would have chosen to slap my happy ass (her words) in the nursing home.  She grins and laughs and says, “I’d do it in a New York minute, I would put you away and take the rest of the money and play”.  

I’m not sure she got the rhyme.

I know different.  She is really the one who taught me about taking care of your own; she is the one who modeled caring for your family when they were broken.  She saw it from her mother, she saw it from her father as he cared for her mother and she modeled it with our children when they were sick or simply heart sick.  

If the roles were reversed I would have sat my happy ass at home where she would have clawed and scratched to take care of me. 

 

I’m not trying to speak for other people in the care giving business.  I’m sure there are many out there that sat down and made a conscious decision to give part of their life to caring for someone else.  There are millions of young and old alike who take care of hurt or ill children, parents or spouses.  We are legion and whether you admit it or not you will be confronted with the issue of either giving care or receiving it at some point in time. 

People live longer, we survive more traumas, we fight past more deadly infections, we live with debilitating events more frequently, we know how to extend life.  I’m not sure we have figured out how to care for and help people to have that extension of life be a quality extension.  It takes someone’s time, money, heart and effort to step forward and wrap themselves around the broken.

The point is that stuff happens to us all and how we immediately react to that stuff probably says less about our fortitude and righteousness than we would like.  Some people step up, not because they are somehow inherently more caring or just better humans, they do it because there are no other options, there are no other choices. 

I’m not better than, I’m no saint and it gives me the willies just thinking about how I drag down the curve for really altruistic people when I’m compared to them.

I love my wife, today more than ever.  I made a promise and it matters to me today more than it did yesterday.  Personally, I work better if there are no choices and if I only look at today and choose to care for Marty today.  

It’s not much of a choice when it’s the only thing you can do.