August 27, 2015
Two weeks ago tonight Marv and I sat on the couch together. We had gone to dinner
at The Pizza Factory earlier in the evening and taken Anna and a friend. Anna was so set on pasta but
uncharacteristically relented and let her dad get pizza: half pepperoni,
sausage and peppers for me and half Hawaiian (Marv’s favorite). Lane was working at Café Rio, so we were
waiting up for him, watching Jimmy Fallon
Live and winding down for the night. Sometime between 11:30 and midnight we heard a quiet
knock on our door. It was a young man
from our ward who had recently returned from his mission. He hadn’t heard from
his mother—a woman who was normally in bed by 8:30. She wasn’t home when he returned
to the house that night, and she wasn’t answering either of her phones. Her car was in the church parking lot, but
there was no sign of her or her whereabouts, leaving her son visibly worried and confused. As the Relief Society President of our ward,
she had met with Marv sometime between 7:00 and 8:00, so her son was simply trying
to retrace her steps which led him to the bishop’s house. We speculated about
where she might be and sent a few text messages in an effort to locate her or
her close friends. Marv was just getting up to put on his shoes so he could
help the young man in his search when the call came on Marv's phone. Apparently, the mother had gone with a
friend for a much-needed single mom reprieve (a.k.a. a Diet Coke run), and the car in the church
parking lot was not hers but one identical to it.
Eventually, mother and grown son were reunited in our front
yard, Lane came home from work, the kids went to bed, and the TV went off. While turning down our bed in preparation to say our nightly prayers together, I mentioned to Marv how tender I thought it was that our young
friend was so worried about his mom. I
even went so far as to say that he “...was just so sweet! I hope our boys would show
that much love and concern and take care of me like that if I were ever alone.”
Little did I know that the next 12 hours
would afford my boys the opportunity to become their mother’s watchmen--her
guardians, her tender caretakers--my rocks.
August 28, 2015
Two weeks ago today I woke my husband with a goodbye kiss. “Bye, baby.” It was only my second day back in the classroom,
but we fell back into our morning ritual with ease.
"Mmmm. Bye-bye,
cutie pie. Have a good day…"
"I will. Love you…"
Standing at the
threshold of our bedroom door, I waited for his muffled reply before leaving. “Love
you too.” They would be our last words to each other.
It was going to be a productive day. I got more done in the
first three hours than I had accomplished all summer. My website was updated, my room organized, my
English 8 disclosure revised and printed, the first day’s lesson was outlined,
and the posters needed for our day one activity were laminated. I had even taken time to visit with friends
and catch up on weddings, babies, missionaries and the like. Plus, I had two prep
days in the upcoming week to prepare for students. At one point, I remember looking around my classroom
thinking that my mother was there watching me, proud of my productivity and
happy to see me working hard.
Feeling on top of things, I created an email group for the
new student council members and began composing their first email of the year. That’s when the call came from my
mother-in-law. Eleven twenty-two to be
exact.
“Hello?”
“Where are you?”
“Just sitting in my classroom getting things…”
“Well, leave your classroom right now." Her uncharacteristic interruption garnered my full attention. "We have bad news for
you..." Filling in the pauses of her deliberate diction, I assumed she was calling about my 81-year-old father-in-law who had recently survived a post-operational bout of sepsis, but somehow, I knew that wasn't the case. "Marv was out at the barn by the four-wheelers…” At the sound of his name I
was on my feet, grabbing my purse and pressing the phone to my ear for details.
“…and looks like he fell 'cause he only got the machines half uncovered." Her voice, a mix of calculated calm and undeniable lament, made it obvious she was telling me only what she needed to. "We’d only been gone about an hour, so we’re
not sure how long he’d been there, but when Lolly got to him and ask him what
he could do for him, he just said, ‘Call an ambulance.’”
“Is the ambulance still there?!”
“No. The police came right away and started working on him…” Working on him? By then I was out of my room and running for the office. “…and since then, the ambulance
has been here and they’ve taken him,” she said.
“Oh, Ruth! But he was
conscious, right? You said he was talking…?”
“No. By the time I called 9-1-1 and got out there, he wasn’t.
But he did take two deep breaths before they put him in the ambulance. I saw
that much.”
“Mountainview, right?”
“What?”
“Mountainview Hospital…in Payson?!”
“Yes.”
“I’m on my way.” I hung up and immediately began my worried moan-cry.
I cut through the office but didn’t see anyone until I got
up front. “My-husband-is-in-the-hospital-and-I-don’t-know-why! I’m leaving.” Remembering that Kaye and I were going to
lunch in a few minutes, I ran to her room and repeated the same robotic
blurb. By then Susan had come out of the
office looking for me, and seeing the panic on my face, suggested that I let
someone drive me. She and Kaye both offered, and while Kaye went to grab her
keys, Susan consoled me.
“I can’t do this. I
can’t lose him,” I cried in her ear, not believing that I'd even considered this, let alone allowed its utterance.
Pulling away from me, she said, “It’s going to be okay. He’s
going to be alright.”
I nodded, gave her one last hug, asked her to say a prayer, and followed Kaye to her
car.
During the drive I called my kids. Their grandmother had
called the house looking for me, so they knew and were on their way. Lane and I
began talking over one another with the same panicked questions, but my “Where
are you?” trumped his.
“We are just passing your school,” he said.
“Good. You are right behind me. Drive carefully…And say a
prayer!”
“Mom, is Dad going to be okay?”
“I don’t know, honey, but I hope so. He’s probably having a
heart attack like Brother Muhlestein, so yes, he’s going to be fine. All we can do now is pray. You hear me? Pray!
And drive safe.”
“Okay, Mom. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
Somehow, while talking to my kids I convinced myself that
all would be well. He was going to be
okay. Even though I told Kaye I’d had a nightmare just nine days prior
that he’d died of a heart attack. Even though I had hurried home from my overnight
writing retreat because I had felt the time to show him how much I loved him
was urgent. Even though I recognized how unusual it was that we'd gone everywhere together the previous week—check-cashing,
lazer-bowling, bill-paying, drink-running, friend-seeing, star-gazing, grocery-getting, even shoe-shopping everywhere! Even
though I had felt my mother’s presence in my home all summer trying to tell me
something. Even though I felt Marv himself comforting me… In that moment, I
convinced myself that if I had enough faith, he would pull through. He would be okay.
After a slow, agonizing thirteen-minute drive, Kaye pulled in behind the empty ambulance, its doors still
flung wide. I got out of the car only to
find the sliding glass emergency doors to the hospital were locked and not
opening, so I ran (the wrong way) checking doors and yelling at nurses when I
finally made it inside. “Emergency Room! Where is it?” Kaye met me at the proper entrance after
parking the car and walked me in. Before
they could ask me anything, I barked at the people sitting behind the trauma
desk, leaving Kaye to run interference with my kids. “Marvin Thompson?”
“He’s in Trauma 1, right there” A nurse pointed straight ahead.
“Can I go in?”
I don’t know if she said yes, but I began running toward the closed curtain, fully
expecting to see my husband all prepped for surgery and teasing me that I wasn’t
getting rid of him yet—a joke I hated but one he insisted on repeating in
emergency situations. They would put in
a few stents, maybe do open-heart surgery, but he was going to be okay. Damn
it! He was going to be okay I repeatedly told myself.
Instead, I pulled back the curtain to the trauma room and
was met by a sight that will haunt me the rest of my life: my husband’s lifeless,
half-naked body experiencing the violence of CPR at the hands of a frantic team
of doctors and nurses. “Marv! Oh, Marv!”
I cried out, hoping he would attempt to answer me in spite of being intubated.
“Is this the wife?” a team member asked, and all I could think was the wife? Don't you mean, his wife?
At some point, my mother-in-law had joined me, and we were
ushered to a nearby room where a nurse calmly explained what they knew so far. They hadn’t had a heartbeat, but they were
going to keep trying.
I immediately fell to my knees, said a quick, sobbing prayer
then turned to the nurse and asked if I could be with him. “Of course,” she said. At that point my
mother-in-law stayed in the side room while Kaye tended to my children down the
hall.
Trying to be
rational and calm, I stepped behind the curtain again, watching in a daze as
the team switched positions every three minutes and took turns pushing into my
husband’s chest with no regard for his sore back or the broken ribs that had turned his chest to a mass of fleshy Jell-o. Looking up at the monitor, I allowed my hope to return as
I noticed activity bleeping on the vitals screen but soon realized that it was
only a result of the compressions. False hope.
I repeatedly
gave Marv our three I-Love-You squeezes to the hand and waited for the four-squeeze reply.
But it never came.
The nurse continued to explain the medical procedures to me
and asked questions about my family while she rubbed her open hand between my
shoulder blades in an attempt to calm me. Though soothing and somewhat distracting, it didn’t keep
me from noticing the doctor’s pained expressions when I told the nurse that I had
just lost my mother in March, that Marv wasn't only my husband but also my bishop (hoping he'd remember that bishops don't die), that we had three children: two in the
waiting room and one on a mission in Mexico. I also saw the doc wince when I begged Marv to come back to me
from beyond the veil if he was given a choice on the other side--a pleading prompted by the life-after-death-books we'd both read in conjunction with my mom's passing. As my worst fears slowly crept into my reality, I couldn't mistake the
look in Dr. Eggbert's eyes when I asked how long their team had "been at it," when they had last "shocked" him, and if they had seen any sign of a heartbeat as I pointed to the unhooked leads covering Marv's chest. With each negative, pursed-lip response I
knew that everything they were doing at that point was simply an effort placate
me—to show they had tried.
Glancing from me to the clock, the doctor finally spoke. “We need to talk,” he said, locking eyes with mine in a moment of unavoidable solemnity. I
followed his nod to the clock and was shocked to see that ten more minutes had lapsed. Time was standing still in my mind.
Reluctant and hollow, I let him lead me back to the side
room with Ruth, hoping I wouldn't be asked to make the decision I dreaded, but still praying he had better news than I expected.
Taking a deep breath, he began, “We are now getting to the
point where we are worried about brain function and the condition of other
organs. It has been almost an hour since
the call came in." Ruth and I both nodded dumbly as he continued. "Even if we were able to start his heart at this point, there
would be significant damage. We will give it a few more minutes but…”
“So… this is it?” I interrupted. This is all we get?
“I’m afraid so.” He put his hand on my shoulder, my knowing
glance making it obvious that I understood the words he had just said. I nodded again. Then
he turned and left the room--his only job now… to call the time of death--12:02.
In spite of my faith, Marv was gone and probably had been for awhile. Life
as we knew it was over.
Before I could accept what was happening, the nurse began explaining the process they were going through
behind the curtain. They would take the tube from his throat, clean up his
bloodied face, and cover him appropriately so my children and I could see him.
My children...
As difficult as the last few minutes had been,
I knew that the next few would be even harder.
I had to tell my kids. How could I tell my children? How could I watch them receive such a devastating blow?
Flanked by a nurse and my mother-in-law, we somehow managed
to navigate my empty legs down the curved hallway of the E.R. I still didn’t know how
I was going to tell them that Dad was gone. The word “died” was too harsh at that point,
but “passed away” felt like a lie--too delicate for what I had just witnessed.
The word choice battle in my head didn’t last long and was completely
unnecessary.
They didn’t need words.
My
haunted face and slight head shaking told them everything. When our eyes met, both Anna and Lane came
running toward me screaming. “No! No!
Nooooooooo!” I wanted to fall to the
floor in a huddled mass, but my kids held me upright as we sobbed and shook together.
We exchanged I love yous, Whys?, I’m so sorrys, and more Noooooos with our tears and were eventually led into what is
called the Quiet Room. "Quiet" being a
euphemism for “We’re sorry your life just fell apart, but please shut up and
don’t get too dramatic 'cause we have a hospital to run...”
The kids were met with hugs from their grandparents and Kaye
was the first to offer her sympathies to me. I was so grateful for her. She had been there
with my kids when I couldn’t, she had watched in agony as my body language told
my children they no longer had a dad, and now she was faced with the task of
driving back to the school to deliver the worst news of all: “He didn’t make
it.”
Before she could leave, however, my logistical need for propriety kicked in.
I knew Ruth and Lolly were making phone calls to Marv’s side of the family, and
I needed to do the same for mine. Someone offered
to get a hold of Kyle’s mission president, and I asked everyone else to stop calling
until I let my sister know. I didn’t
want anyone finding out about Marv on Facebook—especially my siblings who were
still grieving the loss of our mother.
Fortunately, Janice answered right away and she was able to understand
my sobb-laced explanation and accept my request to let our family know. I called Angela next and then I was done. With a wave of my hand, the
calling could commence.
And commence it
did. Within minutes, more close friends were coming to the Quiet Room to console us. By
that time, Marv’s body had been cleaned up and I was given the okay to see him
again. Anna refused, but Lane reluctantly agreed to walk with me.
All was calm when I was allowed back behind the curtain. The
team had dispersed, leaving only the doctor and two nurses. The nurse who had talked me through the ordeal
hugged me and told me she was so, so sorry. In return I thanked her and let her know that
I had nurses in my family and knew that these situations were hard on the staff
too. The doctor then expressed his
condolences and let me know that he knew Marv.
They had just golfed together weeks prior. Seeing this human side of the man who had
just called my husband’s time of death brought a small measure of comfort as I
realized they had done all they could do.
The rest was up to me.
It was time to face my new reality: I had been orphaned and
widowed in a matter of months.
Widow.
I hated the word already. It was only 12:20 and I hated the word already.
August 29, 20015
Two weeks ago today I wrote this.
August 15, 2015
I woke up
this morning without you—
A shell of
the woman I was just hours ago.
Your keys
and wallet on the table
Tell my
mind you are still here,
But my
heavy heart and hollow limbs
Say
otherwise.
I want to
call out to you with hope--
Hope you
will answer--
But I fear
the blaring silence and
Steady ticking
of the clock that
Replace your
anticipated reply.
And yet…
Somehow…
I feel your
tender touch when my
Hungry
arms reach for yours,
Craving
the comfort of a full embrace.
I woke up this
morning without you.
And though
I’m not ready,
I sense
your “This-is-The-Plan” whisper in my heart,
Bringing with
it an unwelcomed peace--
A peace
that’s forcing me to accept that
While my
first day without you
Was filled
with emptiness
And
fraught with tears,
It may not
compare to the pain that lies ahead.
So forgive
me in the upcoming days
When I
pretend you are still here
By opening
drawers, caressing pillows, or
Immersing
myself in your shirts
Still
hanging in the closet.
It will be
my way of reminding myself
That
though our dance was interrupted too soon,
The music
still plays;
Though you
have been called to watch from afar,
I have
been asked to dance alone.
August 30, 2015
Two weeks ago today my children and I went to church knowing
full well that is where Marv would want to be. The messages were tender and
dealt mostly with the family. Fathers were mentioned several times as were
references to fathers in scriptures. At
the close of the meeting, President Hiskey offered a heartfelt message about
our ward family’s loss. The love and
respect he has for Marv was evident, and it made my heart sing to hear him
refer to my husband as one of the greatest men who ever sat in the bishops’ chair.
I couldn’t have agreed more. My sister and niece sitting behind us were a representation of the support and rallying that had
begun just hours before.
At 2:00 we met with Matt, the best funeral director known to
man. In addition to showing concern for
me and my children, he didn’t bat an eye when I presented him with a stack of
100-plus photos to scan for the DVD presentation. But before that, he tenderly shared the death certificate information which included the
cause of Marv’s sudden death: a bilateral pulmonary embolism resulting from a DVT in his left leg. It wasn’t a heart
attack. There was nothing anyone could have done for him had they been standing
right there when it hit. Anna could
stop beating herself up for not going with her dad that day, and my in-laws
could stop lamenting the fact that they weren’t home when Marv pulled
into their drive and began hooking up the four-wheeler trailer only to
collapse, unseen by anyone. There was nothing
we could have done. At that point, I was
just grateful it didn’t strike while he was driving and that Anna wasn’t with him.
. . None of us even knew he had a clot, and looking back now seemed pointless. Besides, we had a funeral to plan.
Matt and I briefly reflected on the funerals Marv had
conducted this past year and made note of all the things I loved about the care
shown in each case. In total, Marv and I had been part of six funerals in the
months leading up to his passing, and this had allowed us the opportunity to
discuss the logistics of such an event—an event I never guessed I’d
be planning so soon. If I do say so
myself, I was probably the easiest client who ever walked through Matt’s door
(100-plus photos aside). In the hour we were there I had chosen a day and time
for the services, edited the obituary, outlined the program, presented all the
photos necessary, chosen a casket, picked floral arrangements, and asked
specific questions regarding the services themselves and the logistics behind
them—all with the help of my children, of course. In the midst of planning, I looked over at
Kyle who had returned from his mission the previous evening and asked, “Is that
the only suit you brought home?” Seeing
the concern in my eyes, Matt offered a discount at a local tailor and told Kyle
that if he went tomorrow first thing, they could have a new black suit funeral ready the
following day. All I needed to do was pick out a plot and pay for the opening
and closing of the gravesite the following morning. Boom. Funeral planned. Two texts, a few emails, a free suit
(compliments of Matt’s “discount”), and one follow up trip later, we were in
business.
We then went home where we were surrounded by family who had
converged from all over the country in a show of love and support.
September 2, 2015
Two weeks ago today, I buried my husband…
