Finding Funny

When Marty and I first got together some 40 years ago we laughed, a lot.  We laughed with each other, at each other and we laughed at the world.  I don’t know if it was our new, young love, youth or our too often altered states but we did laugh a whole lot.

Somewhere along our journey we, meaning me, lost part of that laughter.  It didn’t mean we were unhappy it just meant we, meaning me, were too busy living and doing life to stop and laugh with each other.  We, meaning me, forgot to revel in the day, we, meaning me, forgot to look for the joy and humor life offers.  

I don’t think that’s particularly unusual.  You get focused on raising a family, developing and succeeding in a career while the verve of youth wanes and gets pushed aside by the realities of paying bills and doing yard work.

I mean really, life requires a serious and focused approach to everything.  Maybe……..actually that’s kinda bull.  A serious life requires laughter.

I think I got so consumed with living and with my own imagined self importance I lost myself.  My work, my career, my desire to raise perfect children in a perfect home with a perfect family made me take my own life and what I was doing too serious and I lost part of my laughter.  I was important and important people didn’t laugh very much because they had to think about some serious shit and you can’t laugh if you are thinking about serious shit.

Marty and the strokes brought me back to myself.  After living through impending death I found parts of me that I didn’t realize I had lost.  Marty’s survival helped me remember what was important.

Today, Marty and I laugh a lot.  We laugh in the face of irreparable brain injury, kiss my ass CVA.  

Our new life has many new issues, some more critical than any of the life issues of years past.  Being away from the work a day world makes life easier, having already raised perfect children helps, today we laugh not only at stupid stuff but the scary stuff.  

We laugh at the movies, we laugh at the TV, we laugh at our grandchildren, we laugh at our children parenting our grandchildren a lot and mostly we laugh at each other.  Marty is still the funniest person she knows and I have found the goofy part of my soul that I lost so many years ago and I love to make her laugh, even at my own expense, especially at my own expense.  

Marty loves to laugh and it’s seriously the best thing in the world when she gets really tickled and has a laugh that starts high and moves low and goes on so long we both end up coughing and laughing at the same time.  I have learned not to make her laugh when she has a full mouth, Gator-Aid burns when it comes out your nose.  

The strokes hurt, they hurt both of us deeply and we have lived through some very serious times in the last four years.  In a side miracle I have managed to find something in myself I didn’t realize I had lost, my sense of humor.  As strange as it may seem I somehow feel more whole, I somehow feel I am a better companion, I somehow feel I am a better human being than I was ten years ago.

Our journey, with Marty as my Sherpa, has taken me back to the very basic root beliefs that we all need to love more, forgive more, be more tolerant, laugh more and hug a lot. I have really tried to adopt the whole, “and the greatest of these is love” thing.  Our God seemed serious about that and it really feels a lot better than judging.

Hey, don’t get me wrong.  I can still be a supreme stuffed shirt and I don’t like to do things on the spur of the moment, it makes me tense.  I get anxious over some stupid things and some really important things and I can and do frown with the best of them.  I still like to occasionally tangle with a telephone solicitor or point out in as many derogatory words as I can to describe really crappy customer service.  

But, when I get off the phone or walk away from the offending clerk I generally look at Marty and laugh about it. 

The Last Ride for Maggie

We once lived with a big orange tabby cat named Bubba.  I can’t remember how long we lived with Bubba but I know he was kind of the bully of our block, came and went as he pleased and every time I thought it was time for Bubba to go to pet heaven he would deposit a dead bird or mouse on our back porch as if to say, “Kiss my ass you fool, I’m not done.”

I don’t remember when Bubba was euthanized; I just know that Marty, bless her soul, was the one who had the courage and heart to take Bubba to the vet the last time.  She relieved me of that burden, she was good like that, she was my partner, she was strong where I was weak. 

Today we have a 17 year old doxie named Maggie.  She was the runt of her litter and has outlasted her sister Phoebe by several years.  Marty took care of that dog too.  To my knowledge Maggie is the last of her litter.  She is very gray, very slow and surprised when poop happens.

Maggie has lived a pretty glorious life, she’s traveled the state, been on youth trips, worshiped in more than one church (much to the chagrin of some members, so sorry), chased squirrels, been sprayed by a skunk, sniffed an armadillo, eaten cobwebs, ridden on the back of our boat, stolen a lot of people food and snatched a stick of butter from the family Thanksgiving table.   

Maggie is a legend with family and care givers alike because she has stolen food from every one of them.

On the way to the lake this last trip Maggie had a pretty bad seizure while riding at Marty’s feet on the floor board of our car.  I stopped the car, cleaned her up, made her comfortable and finished our drive to our house at the lake, a place Maggie really loves.

When we got there she couldn’t walk and was clearly out of it so I made her comfortable, watched over her, got her up a couple of times to go outside and tried to get her to eat and drink.  She got better the next day but still had no appetite, wouldn’t drink and was clearly very confused. 

I think it’s time and I miss Marty and her ability to see the truth with our animals.

In a marriage you share.  You share the joy, you share the love, you share the happiness but you also get to share the burdens and the sorrows, that’s just part of the gig.  Marty was born to a meat packer and cattleman so she has a different, probably better relationship with animals, than I do.  She is not hard, but with our dogs she was the alpha, I was just a member of the pack.  Marty accepted the burden of loving enough to do the right thing.

After Marty’s stroke I became the lead dog with Maggie.  She looked to me for food, water, a place to sleep and an occasional rub of the neck.  Maggie was still Marty’s dog.  When Marty had one of her seizures and we laid her on the floor to recover Maggie curled up beside Marty and would not leave her side.  I finally had to put her outside so I could care for Marty.   Maggie was loud and insistent that she come back and be with Marty.  

That has been their relationship, Maggie, in her own way, watched out for her former pack leader.  She knew Marty wasn’t in charge of her anymore but she wasn’t going to abandon her alpha, she never has.

It falls to me to take Maggie on her last ride; it falls to me to pick up the burden of loving our dog one last time and helping her find relief from a long life well lived.  I’ve always said I would know what the right thing to do was but I don’t know if I will have the courage to do it.  

I suspect I will because it’s ultimately what Marty wants, it’s best for Maggie and it’s my turn to take up the burden of loving enough to do the right thing.  Its part of the covenant we have with those to whom we provide care.  Covenants can be hard.

May she always have soft grass, sunshine, clear water, good food and excellent companionship. 

Kissin'

We got home from our last hospital stay on Saturday, June 6.  It was a marvelous four night three day stay but it was a little pricey for the amenities offered.  We rolled Marty out cured of all that ailed her.  It’s something of a conundrum, you go to the hospital to get better, you would think rest is part of that.  You would think wrong, Marty was tired.

It took a few days for her to recover but she did and Marty is just spiffy right now.  We checked again for nasty bugs in the urine and she is nasty bugs free, let us all rejoice.

Marty’s healing is best exemplified in two very simple stories.  I find them fitting and more than a tad bit humorous.

On the second day in the hospital I wanted to get Marty out of the bed and into her chair, its part of our ritual.  Lying around in bed all day, even when a bit ill, is not beneficial to anyone.  Marty’s nurse came in and unhooked her IV and I swung Marty’s feet out of the bed and stood her up to transfer her to her chair and Marty says, “Why are we doing this?”

Me, “It’s good for you, besides, we might want to make out or something,” Now understand I say this stuff for Marty’s benefit, she loves it when I play the fool, and sometimes my mouth just says stuff, I can’t help it.

Marty looks at me, looks at the nurse, looks back at me and says with a note of seriousness, “I’m not doing that, I’m not making out with you.  I’m not kissing YOU.”

Well okay, shot down once again by my own wife.  She may have a teeny tiny bit of brain damage but she is not going to let me have my way with her.  

The nurse, who probably didn’t understand that Marty still had spice, wit and sand, busted out laughing at her somewhat indelicate response and I suspect I looked the part of the goofy old husband, which is type casting at its best.

The second anecdote is really the second verse to the same song.  

Marty has one of those lift chairs, she sits, you press a button and it moves her to a semi-standing position, maybe a little hunched over because the back of the chair pushes you forward.

When I get her up I hold the controller, stand in front with her wheel chair to my right.  I push the button and sort of tap my foot as I wait for the slow rise of the chair.  Sometimes I sing, “Up from the chair she arose.”  Yeah I’m the goofy old husband, we have established that.

Sometimes I lean forward and push my forehead on her forehead and we laugh a little, every now and then I will put my forehead on hers and reach down and kiss her on the lips (sorry kids).  This time I leaned down, touched my head to hers and puckered up for the peck and Marty turns her face to her left, dodging my puckered lips, leaving me in mid-pucker. I hate mid-pucker.

She turned and smiled and I thought, clever girl, giving me a bad time and puckered and went in for a quick peck, thinking I was going to get it in but no, she turned to the right and there I was lips on her ear.

I pulled back a bit and said, “Okay, what the hell was that?”

Marty laughed out loud as only she can at this point in her life and says, “It was the Dodge.”  She laughed more at my expense.

Now the moral of both of these stories is that Marty has still got it.  She has wit, she has humor and she still lives for keeping this goofy old guy in his place.

Next time I’m going to be faster.

She's Doing Five to Seven With No Chance of Peerole

Damn it.  We are back in the hospital.  Since Tuesday, damn it.

I never said it but I thought it.  I was driving and against my better judgment I thought it.  It was a fleeting thought but there it was, me thinking everything was normal, me basking in the glory of not worrying about the next shoe to drop.  That was Monday; I was riding high tempting fate.

Marty gets urinary tract infections, it happens with some regularity and it is part and parcel of her strokes.  To combat her propensity for UTIs Marty takes a daily prophylactic antibiotic that has helped but not completely stopped the infections.  UTIs can be debilitating, causing some pain, causing a general funky feeling and even causing a little cognitive impairment.  That’s why we take these infections seriously and react quickly.

Months ago, through the direction of Great and Wise we started working with a home health nurse that comes about every three weeks to get and test Marty’s pee.  The most recent test indicated a urinary tract infection.  That was last Friday.  We started the typical antibiotic and frankly Marty seemed to be doing great.  

Monday, the day I was driving, the day the thought of normalcy flashed through my melon, the home health nurse called and said the normal antibiotic was not going to work.  Marty had Pseudomonas Aeruginosa in her pee and we needed something different.  Okay, no biggie, I called Great and Wise, just change the antibiotic, we will be good as new.

Then it got a little complicated.  I talked to nurse Wendy and she said yep, Levaquin was not going to be our friend this time.  The only friendly antibiotic that Marty wasn’t allergic too required intravenous feeding, thus she is sentenced to five to seven days in the hospital with no possibility of peerole or pardon. 

After consultation with the Great Office of Great and Wise we delayed our check in just a tad.  I had a meeting with the fabulous Sheryl, our financial guru, and we badly needed haircuts.  We did both of those things and checked into Providence Hospital on Tuesday at 3:30, just like The Hilton but without the mini bar but a really cool moving bed.

This whole process is a little scary because it is exactly what happened five years ago when Marty had her last and worst seizure, a seizure so powerful she broke her left arm as she laid in bed being treated for the exact same illness we are dealing with today.  It’s a little déjà vuie and not in a good way, in fact, in a very bad way, that was a dark time.

That hasn’t happened this time.  We got past that first day and no seizures.  All of Marty’s blood work is coming back with good numbers, her chest is clear and she is actually feeling okay.  I give her about two days before she gets really stir crazy.  She will probably get a little nuts and her dirty hair will bother her because she is doing her five to seven days for possessing bad pee.

When the new nurse came last night she asked several Marty several basic questions to determine her cognitive functioning and orientation as to time and place.  She never knows the year and bless her heart she still thinks George Bush is President which is kind of like living in the Twilight Zone forever.  

She answered all of the other questions perfectly and with vim and vigor with just a hint of sarcasm.  

To conclude the visit the nurse turned to Marty and asked, “Do you know why you are here?”

Marty, without pausing, jerks her right thumb to me, the poor goober sitting to her right minding his own business and says, “Yeah, him.”

Okay, yes I brought her here; no I didn’t have anything to do with stinky pee.  I’m just glad we have good people taking care of her so I will take the rap and play the snitch, this time.

Naked in the Street

I was a basket case.  I knew I was, my kids knew I was, my family knew I was and the care givers knew I was.  I wasn’t going nuts; I was there, at the station, ringing the bell that says, “I’m NUTS”.

In June of 2006 I was walking a fine line between being a care giver and needing a care giver, or at least someone to keep me from running down the street naked with a blood pressure cuff. 

Those were the days of multiple illnesses, multiple hospitalizations and me learning how to live our new life.  I was obsessed with Marty and how she was feeling and if she was sick and if she was about to die, it never left my brain.  I would constantly take Marty’s blood pressure to see how low it was and then take mine to see how high it was.  Like I said, I was nuts.

I personally did nothing for it to get better except learn how to do my new job better.  Mostly it got better because Marty got better and we found some first class caregivers, you know the ones, the ones that kept me from running down the street naked with the blood pressure cuff.  I didn’t do that because I was afraid it would scare them off and freak out my neighbors.

Regaining some sanity didn’t happen overnight, there was never a road to Damascus kind of epiphany, it was more like a Darwinian evolution, it happened over a period of time and one day I saw myself in the mirror and I didn’t look quiet as crazy, I didn’t have the look of someone who would freak out the neighbors prancing naked in the street.

I learned to roll a little bit more with the punches, I learned to quit planning Marty’s funeral at every cough, I learned to trust our care givers and our doctors and mostly, Marty got better because she got stronger and we got better at providing quality care.  I keep saying that because it was the silver bullet, the number of infections was drastically reduced.  

All of this leads me to state unequivocally that we adapt, we learn, we change, we grow, we evolve.  I was not built for what I do today; Marty never ever had the potential of being a good patient.  

I do what I do, provide care for my bride, really well; it’s not something that was ever part of my native skill set.  I learned. Marty was head strong, always knew a better way and was a non-compliant rule-breaking patient; she was, in short, a patient that could try patience.  She is not that person today, she is accepting of her new normal, she is agreeable and likes a routine, she learned, she adapted.

Trust me on this; if I can make this kind of change, if Marty can make this kind of change, you can make this kind of change too.  You simply have to put your head down and take a step, the next step.  That’s exactly what I did several years ago instead of running down Sandalwood Drive naked.  I accepted, I adapted, I kept my clothes on, most of the time.

Let’s face it, people live longer, overcome more trauma, more life altering illness and spend more time recovering at home.  You will, if you are lucky, get to help care for someone at home or in the hospital or in a facility.  You will adapt, you will learn, you will figure it out and move forward and take care of that love one.  You will do it because that’s what we do for those we love.

 

When we left St. Catherine’s care facility nine years ago I was a basket case and worried about how I would learn to do what needed to be done.  I obsessed about taking care of Marty and told myself continuously I could not do it.  When one of the physical therapists was showing me how to move Marty to help bathe her I told her my secret, “I don’t know how to do this.”  She looked at me and said, “You will figure it out.”

She was right, it wasn’t easy, it still isn’t, I still, every now and then get the urge to abandon all decorum, drop my trousers and run screaming down the street.  And then I see myself in the mirror and realize I am well past the age when that made any good sense at all.