March 2, 2022

Not a good day. I barely remember it, anything that happened that day, other than cleaning the mailbox when I got home. I don’t have any other notes from the day, just the two paragraphs I put on Caring Bridge. The end was coming at me like a truck I couldn’t even see, let alone stop.

There is a town in north Ontario
With dream comfort memory to spare
In my mind, I still need a place to go
All my changes were there

Not much going on today; a new nurse (Meredith) (it seems like we have a different nurse every day!). They’ll be doing dialysis again today, for three hours this time; I just spoke with Jennifer, the dialysis doctor’s PA, and she’s not sure what time it will start but most likely, like yesterday, around 2. She said he tolerated yesterday pretty well, and hopefully today or tomorrow, as they get his blood cleaner, that’ll clear up some of the constant fog caused by too many toxins in his blood.

Blue, blue windows behind the stars
Yellow moon on the rise
Big birds flying across the sky
Throwing shadows on our eyes
Leave us

Other than that, not much going on. Meredith said she was going to try to shave him, because the tape of his central line keeps coming loose – he’s too scruffy-cheeked for surgical tape! And it’ll probably make him feel better, too. He’s not really awake right now, not much. His eyes are open a little, but I’m not getting a response if I try to make eye contact with him. Of course, the TV is on, and he gets distracted by that easily, so….. oh, and he still has those dumb mittens on, because he keeps trying to pull things out, but they haven’t restrained him, so he can at least scratch his nose. You know. With a giant mitten. I wish they had the cuff restraints here, at least if he was in cuffs I could hold his hand. It’s really hard to hold a giant mitten.

I didn’t feel like there was anything I could do. I felt so… hopeless. I just wanted to go home and pull a blanket over me and never come out. I wanted to take care of him but there was nothing he needed that I could give. I wanted to protect him but it was already too late. I wanted to wave a magic wand and make all of this go away and have everything go back to the way it was. Even with us not getting along. Even with something between us that if we were going to keep making it work, we were going to have to work that out. Somehow. I’d take feeling that my feelings didn’t matter to him a thousand times before I’d want this to keep happening.

Helpless, helpless, helpless
Baby can you hear me now? (Helpless, helpless, helpless)
The chains are locked and tied across the door
Baby, sing with me somehow (helpless, helpless, helpless)

I didn’t really know what to do when I got home, so … I cleaned the mailbox. That’s the only thing I really remember from that day. But honestly, if I hadn’t taken pictures? I probably wouldn’t even remember that.

Blue, blue windows behind the stars
Yellow moon on the rise
Big birds flying across the sky
Throwing shadows on our eyes
Leave us

Helpless, helpless, helpless

Lyrics by Neil Young
Helpless