We found out today that my husband has the flu.
No big deal except in the 30+ years we've been together he's never had more than a cold.
It started a couple of weeks ago with a cough. Then he lost his voice. Then his voice came back.
But the cough wanted to linger, especially first thing in the mornings.
It became one of those aggravating things.
Like, "COULD YOU PLEASE STOP COUGHING ALREADY?!!"
Never said out loud of course.
But definitely screamed inside my head.
Two days ago he started to get tired by midday.
I wondered how he could be tired at all since he had been sleeping an unusual 9-10 hours a night.
"He's probably tired from too much sleep," I thought and dismissed it just as quickly.
Yesterday he was in bed by 3pm.
We had a bunch of things we needed to do for our business but while he was waiting for me he decided to lie down. He never gets in bed in the middle of the day. That's when I knew he was sick.
I hoped the Elderberry syrup and tea with honey and lemon would help. It did a little. But he woke up this morning and soon felt dizzy and nauseous. I thought I would have to drag him kicking and screaming to the doctor's office. I was wrong. "Let's go," he said right away when I asked him.
He came home from the doctor and said he was going to sleep on the couch in the living room tonight. We joked about him staying away from us so he didn't get us sick too. And I was fine with that and started stripping our beds to disinfect our house.
And then he threw up.
And that was the game changer for me.
When I was 6 years old my mom got sick unexpectedly. We took her to the emergency room and they ran some tests and sent her home. My dad wanted her to get some rest so she slept in their room and the rest of us slept in the living room. My mom got up in the middle of the night to take some medicine. She went back to bed and threw up in her sleep. It went down the wrong pipe and she aspirated.
She died in that room all by herself.
Dramatic I know. To somehow be comparing the two. But the problem is when you suffer tragedy it becomes who you are. You try to walk away from it but no matter how far you go it's still there. Lurking. Hiding. Waiting for the right time to time to rear its ugly head. To remind you that it still remembers you.
To taunt you that it will not be forgotten.
And tonight was that night.
People say you get over death.
As if it's something that eventually goes away.
But it doesn't.
You don't get over death.
You never do.
You just get better at blocking out the pain.
And so I'll be sleeping in the living room tonight.
On a couch across from Chris.
It may seem crazy to some. To risk getting sick when it doesn't seem necessary.
On a couch across from Chris.
It may seem crazy to some. To risk getting sick when it doesn't seem necessary.
But my heart can't stop the 6-year-old who still lives inside of me from remembering and believing there's no other place I should be.
