1st Day Off the Vent

 Most of the day was a blur.

I remember them telling me that it would be hard to talk for a while, but my voice would come back. They told me about the covid stroke, although I didn’t really understand it. I was so exhausted and drugged that I didn’t care that I couldn’t move. They ran tests and found out my left side was totally paralyzed, and I could only move my big toe on the right.

While they were running tests on me, my family was in the waiting room. A young male nurse came into the waiting room and sat down, visibly shaken, with tears in his eyes. My family had not been told that I was successfully off the vent, so they became anxious. Cassie, my oldest daughter, asked him if everything was ok. He responded yes, everything went well, and I was doing fine. He went on to explain that he was a traveling nurse, and he had been working covid units from the very start of it, and that I was the first one he had seen come off the vent successfully.

They let my family in, two at a time, and it was nice. I was still heavily medicated, so I don’t remember much of our first visits other than feeling very happy and thankful. When Zach came in, I squeaked, “Did you yell at me?” He looked surprised then he smiled and said yes. The rest of the day was mostly napping.

Debbie stayed with me that evening.  She, along with everybody else, had been asking me lots of questions; they were trying to see if I was still in there. The tv was on and “JAWS” was playing. It happens to be one of my favorite old movies. I know it by heart. There is a little ditty in it that I really like and always sing along with. I was not watching, mostly listening, my eye lids were very heavy. When it came close to that part of the movie, Debbie asked, “I bet you don’t remember what comes next?”  without missing a beat, I sang in a very rough, raspy voice, “Farewell and adieu to you fair Spanish ladies. Farewell and adieu to you ladies of Spain.”  When I finished the song, she cried.

It was a good day.