This post isnt going to be as morbid as the title suggests :) See! Smiley face :)
So I really was thinking about LIFE and TTC. Creating life is so frikkin amazing!
Less then a week ago I was at work and I had a particular patient who was palliative and we will call her Lucy. And for those who don't know.... it basically means she was dying. To paint a picture of what the past few years has been like; I first met her in 2009. She has end stage dementia, not mobile, not verbal, confused, delirious but she was very sweet. Harmless, otherwise oddly healthy and she LOVED baby's and boys [if a young man or baby came around she would perk right up, she even pinched a few butts lol]. So it's 3ish years later and I walk into her room. She's laying in her bed, extremely frail, extremely pale. Her lips are barely parted and her eyes open just a crack. I lower myself close to her bed and i call her name quietly. She doesn't move, she doesn't blink, her eyes don't turn my way, she doesn't even inhale. I called her again.... nothing..... and again. I stood there for 30-40 seconds - and they felt like the longest seconds I have ever felt. Waiting for someone to breath, move, show any signs of life seems like an eternity. As I was looking at Lucy I was thinking how f*cked up it was if she were to be dead and i knew that if she was that there was nothing i was allowed to do [she was a do not resuscitate]. With the back of my hand i lightly touched the back of her hand and she took the tinyest breath you have ever seen. *Whew* a sigh of relief... I took her vitals, covered her back up and left the room. She kept experiencing that apnea or episodes of not breathing but Luc didn't die while i was there. That evening after my shift she was finally put to rest and stopped breathing for real. I'm sure it came with a lot waiting like i experienced. I cant even explain how it feels to watch someone not breathe. Sit and think that after 30 seconds that maybe shes not going to take another breath "this" time. The last time i took her vitals that night, i talked to her regardless of the fact that she didn't respond or reply. I told her how my baby had been in just prior to that and asked if she remembers meeting him. She was a magnificent women full of life in her day who was overcome with Alzheimer's. I didn't know her in the days she would wonder, dance and go through everything people typically go through when they have that disease. Ill always remember her as the women who would laugh at everything i said, even if it wasn't funny, or whose eyes would light up every time Dancing with the Stars came on [she was a dance teacher in her day].
Life is so precious.... I can actually say that I've given someone their first bath.... and Ive given someone their last bath..... Lucy's death came with sadness but I am forever grateful that I could play a part in the last part of her life. These are the feelings that I know make me into a great mom. I so very much want to continue to share these types of feeling. Death doesn't have to be a bad and scary thing... everyone is going to experience it at sometime. In a wierd way the end of life is an amazing experience as well. I believe that everyone also has the right to experience the making of life as well....
These are just thoughts.... ramblings and such. I really, really hope that birth is my next experience <3 <3
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