Back In Time

Memories 4 Minutes

I whispered to my great-aunt, “How’d he do last night?”

And she whispered back, “He was a little restless, but he settled down.”

We both gazed at my father, his six-foot-two-inch frame stretched out in the hospital bed.  The bed looked out of place in the lavender room where I’d spent my adolescence–we’d moved it in the day before, right before he was discharged from the hospital.

He hadn’t wanted to die in the hospital.  So, eleven days after I left him in the emergency room for pain management, an ambulance brought him home.  In prior days, my aunt had cautioned me, “What will you do?  You’ll have to go back to work sometime.”  But that night, I had wept in the dark and when my husband had reached for me, asking what was wrong, I sobbed out the words, “I want to bring him home!  He doesn’t want to die in the hospital.”

And my husband had said, “Then bring him home.  We’ll figure it out from there.”  So we did.

We drove in a makeshift caravan home from the hospital.  My stepmother brought a thick foam pad for the bed in her truck.  My husband and I followed the ambulance.  A friend of my dad’s brought the aunts with her.

The stretcher couldn’t reach the last bedroom on the right, so the ambulance driver yelled, “MR. MARTIN!  MR. MARTIN!  YOU HAVE TO WALK!” right in his face.  My dad, ravaged by cancer, finally said with annoyance, “I KNOW!” 

And he teetered one baby-step after another into the lavender room while I stood in his old room, the master bedroom, watching with tears in my eyes and a pillow clutched in my twenty-four year old hands.

We settled him into his bed.  The catheter bag hung on the side, dark urine collecting in a small puddle.  I could see his pulse beating fast near his collarbone.  His mouth parted, just a little, as he slept.  His face looked unfamiliar without his wire-rimmed glasses. 

His three aunts had flown out from Wisconsin to be with us.  We took turns sitting in the green recliner we’d moved next to his bed.  His friend stopped by to simply sit with him.  

In the evening, around dinner-time, I went in to the room with the list of medications he needed to take.  I pushed the buttons to move the head of the bed so he was sort of sitting.  I tried to wake him, but he responded with nonsense. 

“Dad!  You need to take these pills.”  And I placed a pill in his mouth.  “No, no!  Don’t chew . . . swallow.”  I stuck the tip of the straw into his mouth, but he chewed it, reminding me of a goat.  I laughed.  He chewed up his pills and I reclined the bed flat again.

When the night came, I went to bed, leaving my aunt, a nurse, to sit with him.  The next morning, when she reported that he’d had a good night, I said, “Do you think I should go to work?”  She nodded, so I showered and off to work I went.

I called around noon to see how he was.  He’s had a quiet day, she assured me, so I told her I’d stay until 4 p.m. 

I drove into my driveway at 4:30 p.m. and my aunt met me on the sidewalk.  “Go get your sister.  He doesn’t have much time.”  He’d taken a sudden turn for the worse.

My 17-year old sister worked at KFC a mile away.  She had worried aloud about who would get her or tell her or pick her up.  I told her I would.  I turned and drove straight to the fast-food restaurant.  I parked.  I walked in, asked for her.  When she pushed through the swinging doors, I couldn’t speak.  I just stared at her and she knew.  I choked out, “It’s time.”

And I held her in my arms and we cried a little by the case of fast-food delicacies.

We drove home.  Before we could enter the house, my aunt said, “He’s having seizures.  Don’t go back there.”  I pushed past and went straight to my old bedroom.  His body was rigid and shaking and his blue bloodshot eyes were opened. 

I turned and rushed my sister away, back down the hallway to the living room.  A few moments later, an aunt walked in and quietly said, “He’s gone.”

From the doorway, I saw my mother on the other side of him, crying and saying, “In Your hands, we commit his spirit.”  My aunts were hugging, crying.  I touched his bearded cheek and said, “Poor daddy.”  And then I went back through the house to tell my husband and my stepmother and his best friend that he was gone. 

I hadn’t even met the hospice nurse, but she soon arrived and began to make arrangements.  We called the funeral director.  My other sister arrived and began to wail when she heard he was dead already.

People filled our house.  Aunts, friends, family . . . we sat by the dining room table, uneasily making quiet conversation while the funeral director and his assistant tried to maneuver my dad’s hulking frame back out of the room, down the hallway and away from us. 

I imagined him zipped into a black bag, like a suit in a garment bag, but I never saw his body again, so I don’t know if this is imagined or true.  My husband helped them carried the body out while our conversation around the table grew more desperate and surreal with grim laughter.

And that’s what I was doing seventeen years ago today, when my 47-year old dad’s body fell victim to malignant melanoma and his spirit flew away, free.

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Published by Mel

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26 thoughts on “Back In Time”

  1. Bless your heart. It’ll be 18 years in April since my Mom died. She wanted to die at home, too, and we honored her wishes. Thank the good Lord above for the angels of hospice…I would never have made it through without them. Time makes it easier, but I don’t think the memories of when we lose them ever diminishes. May you find peace in knowing there are those of us out here in Blog Land who know and understand your pain today.

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  5. Mel, my heart goes all out to you. I believe he must be watching over you and he’s still around – in your heart and your memories.

    Like MissKriss says, our heartache may be dulled, but our memories never.

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  6. As I sit here with tears filling my eyes, I want you to know that I’ve taken a moment to send up a prayer to your father’s spirit and also one for you & your entire family. I am blessed to still have both my parents but I have lived through losing all of my grandparents & know the terrible emptiness that loss can bring. I also believe in a heaven, a better place than where we currently call home… and every time I look into the eyes of my daughter as her face is glowing & her cheeks are full from smiling, I think to myself, if Heaven is better than here, it must be one hell of a place!

    Thinking of you & your father today… *BIG HUGS ALL THE WAY FROM BOSTON*

    -Amy & Ruby Cate

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  7. Oh my goodness, I can’t even see the keyboard (or the screen) through all these tears. You got me girl…I am a daddy’s girl and I am blessed to have mine still here. But the day the Lord calls him home, I know will be beyond bearable.

    Great memory.

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  9. Oh Mel, that story really got me. I just realized my Mother died 9 years ago Tuesday, and I didn’t even realize the day had passed.

    Your Dad was so young, it scares me so much that I might die before I really see Kaitlyn grow up. I’m so sorry for your family’s loss.

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  12. What lovely tribute to your Dad. I lost my mother in much the same manner about five years ago when I was 22. She wanted to die at home too but we couldn’t manage it which is something I still regret at times. Surreal is a great way to describe the days afterwards – we went out for chinese with friends in the evening of her funeral and it was a most surreal (and lovely) way to end the day.

    All the best…

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  13. Your words made me feel like I was standing right next to you. I’ve never lost a parent, but my heart aches at the thought of it. (((Mel)))

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  14. Mel,

    I’m weeping right now, tears of sadness for your having to deal with it and tears of somber joy that you opened your home to your dad in his final hours. What a blessing it was for him and for you.

    Lovely, lovely words to recall the passing of your dad.

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  15. Thank-you for sharing such a personal memory with us. Having had to watch a loved one die myself (grandmother) I know what a hard thing it is, (though even the thought of going through that someday with my Dad brings me to my knees emotionally and physically). Then and now, my comfort came in knowing that it was not (will not be) good-bye forever, but “See you later…” and that after all that suffering she was now at peace in a much better, happier place. May God Bless and keep your family (especially you) as you remember that time.

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  19. I’m sorry. Ya know we lost my father in law a couple of months ago (he had been living with us since mother in law died in early Oct.) My dad is currenty very ill at the hospital now. I shall be spending most of the weekend with him as he is 3 cities over me.
    I’m sorry.

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  23. Thank you for sharing this with us. Reading it brought tears to my eyes … I am blessed to have both my parents still with me. I hope to be as strong as you were should the Lord wish to call them home.

    God Bless You

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  24. I wept too. I ache for you. Such a loss is difficult to deal with. I have walked with people through weddings, marriages, newborns and death. The latter always gets to me. It’s tough.

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