Tag Archives: Illness

All Of Life’s Hues

Life is timing, I’d say.  Months ago, after Jody died, I decided to buy a ticket to see Celtic Woman on March 25, 2015.  Jody and I loved to watch their DVDs.  Some truly enchanting songs.

Nearly four weeks ago, I started coughing.  Bronchitis, the doctor said.  It subsided for awhile but came back with a vengeance maybe four days ago – deep coughs, lots of mucus, stuffed nose, and intermittent nausea.

So, what to do?  Well, go to the concert.  I sat down next to my unsuspecting neighbours and tried my darndest not to cough.  The first song (three sublime female voices and a brilliant violinist) wasn’t bad, but halfway through the second one I was rocked with eruptions.  Totally unfair to the audience members.  I told the woman to my left that I’d be leaving at the end of the song, and to be ready.  She was feeling for me.

I made my stumble along the row, apologizing mightily.  Then down the tunnel to the concourse, where I just about fell onto a bench.  Down went my head and up came the mucus.  Later, I wondered how my noises echoed in the empty space, empty except for several employees getting ready to serve drinks and snacks.  One woman brought me over a paper cup for water.  Thank you.  A supervisor said she’d search for an empty area in the arena where I could enjoy the show and not disturb other patrons.  Thank you.  A third woman suggested I stand beside her in the tunnel and catch a glimpse of things that way.  Thank you.

But I wasn’t ready for any of that.  My ample supply of Kleenexes was dwindling and the mucus wasn’t.  And I was dizzy.  Somewhere far, far away I could hear the sweet strains of “Danny Boy”, one of Jody’s and my favourites.  Beauty and spasms with their arms around each other.

Later, I felt strong enough to stand in the tunnel, leaning on the handrail.  Such a unique view of the music.  Then, from behind a blackout curtain, came the supervisor.  She had found a spot for me.  Up the escalator we went, and then past a balcony filled with folks enjoying their meals at tables.  Through a secret door, and then another secret door.  And there I was – in a private box, which normally would seat twenty, but tonight was dark.  Thank you again.

Coughing continued, but at least people were far away.  And down below me, I listened to the magic of melody and harmony: “Amazing Grace”, “Caledonia”, “You Raise Me Up” and “The Parting Glass”.  Jody and I held hands and sang along.  I cried when she raised me up.  She thanked me for bringing her.  “The pleasure was all mine, my dear.”

Just your basic date night.

Struggling

I bet it’s been five days since I’ve written a post, by far a record for me, unless I was away somewhere.  Illness is so humbling.  A few posts back, I was feeling poorly but I still wrote my daily thoughts.  Later, things changed.

I’ve had bronchitis for 13 days now, and the coughing has worn me out, plus my ribs have been getting awfully sore.  Whenever I ate, coughing would start.  And the worst has been the vague nausea I’ve felt after eating.  Didn’t even seem to matter what type of food.

Gosh, I don’t want to sink into “poor me”.  But it’s been quite the experience.  I’ve been worlds away from putting fingertips to keys.  So dull in the head.  Sometimes I’ve felt guilty for not writing, but I’ve usually been able to let that go.  Thank God.  I see my need for rest.

In the back of my agitated head has been the fear that this is not really bronchitis.  It’s lung cancer … exactly what took my lovely wife away from me.  Today, my doctor Julie had me get a chest X-ray, to rule out the really bad stuff.  If I don’t hear back from her by Tuesday, I’m fine.  And she thinks I’m fine.  I thought my meditation practice would prevent terror from seeping through, but good luck with that thought.  Fear has overwhelmed me at times over the past few days.

It’s so amazing not to be me, not to kibitz with folks I meet each day, not to move my body and sweat, not to love deeply.  Just blahness, fear and an overcoat of nausea.

I had bought a ticket for a concert that was held in London last night – a marvelous folk duo from Newfoundland called “The Fortunate Ones”.  Turns out that Catherine and Andrew were recently engaged.  They were so happy on stage.

I sat in the front row, trying not to cough.  A lot of little wheezes.  A couple of times, they asked the audience to sing along … and I couldn’t.  Again such a strangeness for me.  I love belting out the melodies, and sometimes the harmonies.  It’s okay, Bruce.  Your body doesn’t have it right now.

My aliveness returned in the moments when Catherine and Andrew sang to each other, and when each rocked forward towards the loved one, her caressing the accordion and him picking out the melody on his guitar.  It was like they were making love as they leaned in.  So beautiful to see.  And Catherine’s voice especially touched the heavens.

The coughing continued, and the nausea, but the world was a lighter place.  Thank you.

There.  I’ve actually written a post.  Hallelujah.  Hopefully, I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.

Sick

This was to be the evening when I told you about my acting possibilities down the road.  I had lots of say but I’m too weak.  I woke up this morning with a deep cough, wracking myself in a high-pitched squeal as I tried to get the mucus up.  Once, I was having trouble breathing.  I was scared.  In the summer of 2013, Jody had continual pneumonia symptoms.  It turned out that it wasn’t an infection.  It was cancer.

In Emergency today, the doctor told me I don’t have pneumonia … just bronchitis.  No sign of cancer.  Thank God.

Tonight it’s all about coughing spasms, chills and fever.  I feel like poop.  But I want to see if I can write anything of value.  It’s fine to say good stuff when I’m well.  This, right now, is the test.

How do I treat people when I’m suffering?  I got some clue about that today at the hospital.  The triage nurse asked me what colour the mucus was, after I had told him.  So let it go, Bruce.  Not important.  I answered him with no editorial comment.

After triage was the registration desk, and then finding a seat in the waiting room.  I had my mask on.  I chose to sit right next to a fellow, rather than two seats down.  Was that being irresponsible?  I don’t think so.  In life, I simply want to move towards people rather than away from them.  Could my presence right next door be a benefit to him?  I say yes.  In any event, my decision came from a good intention – to contribute rather than infect.

Earlier, in the triage seats,  I talked to a woman who had been admitted to the hospital for a few days and then was sent home.  Back again.  We had a good time.  Eventually I was sent to a smaller waiting room, hopefully to see a doctor soon.  And there was the same woman, with two empty seats to her right.  I saw her nudge her coat over, to allow me full space next to her.  Inexplicably to me, I sat down two seats away.  Immediately, I felt the contraction.  Distance is not what I’m up to in life, so I moved over beside her.  That felt good, and right, and what the planet needs.  We talked some more.  And I knew that I had already forgiven myself completely.

A half hour later, I was alone in that room, when a fellow ambled in.  I wanted to make contact, so I said:  “You just missed the hors d’oeuvres.  A woman came by a few minutes ago.”  He smiled.

A few minutes after that, two women dropped their paperwork at the window and took a seat.  “It seems that they’re serving us in alphabetical order.”  Two smiles.  Missions accomplished.

I’m happy, and sick.  Nothing special.  Just me.

 

 

 

Toronto – Part 3: Scarf and Applesauce

It’s so easy to be happy and openhearted when my body feels good.  In Toronto, my body mostly felt bad.

When I was a kid, mom and Aunt Norah wrote back and forth a lot.  I got to read Norah’s letters, which were usually full of reports about her various ailments.  I vowed that I would never turn into my aunt, that I would never let what’s wrong dominate my conversations.  But I feel the need to address the pain I felt last week, as a way to open to all of life.

I had already been cold for ten days or so, and Toronto’s deep freeze sent me over the edge.  I was terrified of being cold, colder, coldest.  “Will it hurt?  How long will it hurt?”  I don’t know what happened to the mountain man in me.  He was gone.  Instead, there was a guy who developed this dressing ritual every time a door was about to open onto the outside world.  The neck of my coat totally zipped up.  Toque pulled way down.  Scarf so tight around my nose and mouth that it brought up thoughts of asphyxiation.  Mitts struggling to fit way inside the sleeves of my jacket.  Neal waiting patiently.

Sometimes our forehead-burning street travels brought us to more subway time.  I loosened the scarf so it wrapped around my neck but the rest of the arrangements stayed put.  Mitts and toque fully engaged on the train.  As we jostled our way from station to station, all I could think of was diving under the covers of my hotel room bed.  No expansive mind.  No lovingkindness aimed at my fellow passengers (well, very little of that).  Just me, me, me.  How very unBuddhist of me.

And then there was my stomach.  For most of our trip, the nausea came and went and came again.  My diet was basic – microwavable rice, bananas, dry bagels, applesauce and herbal tea.  Neal had omelets and seafood fettuccini and beer.  I was drooping with a lack of calories and flavour.  Dizzy and roiling and flat.  Oh vacation, wherefore art thou?

At the Allan Gardens plant conservatory, I sat.  At the Royal Ontario Museum, I sat.  Neal boogied around, taking lots of cool photos.  I sat.  I tried to be present with what life was offering me, to see the pain as being no worse than pleasure.  But I couldn’t.  I rarely could talk to Jody.  I missed the beauty of the flowers, of the vendors offering their food at the St. Lawrence Market, even of the Buddhist statues at the museum.  I pretty much missed it all.  Sad some more.

On Sunday afternoon, we were leaving on the train for London.  My nausea had disappeared and the temperature had warmed to 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit).  How strange.

I wonder what life wants me to learn from all this.  Right now, I don’t know.  I’m open to an epiphany.  Come on down.

 

Toronto – Part 2: Fish Up and Fish Down

After depositing our belongings in the hotel room on Thursday, Neal and I braved the icy blasts and walked four blocks to Ripley’s Aquarium.  I was fully decked out in sweater, toque, parka and mitts, plus Jody’s white scarf wrapped tightly over my nose and mouth.  Oh my God!  I was just so cold.  My mind started heading to “I’m bad” but I nipped that in the bud.  Not bad, just sick.

Inside the building, I revelled for a minute in my senior reality.  I saved $10.00 off the adult price.  But the glee faded quickly when I saw the first tank just down the hall, populated with wild splotches of colour.  What came through was the warmth of peace.  I was somewhere special.

The upper tank was a tall cylinder full of large fish of every hue.  Actually, some seemed to have no hue, but all of the residents moved with such grace.  A lower and wider tank was teeming with small fishies, just as glorious as the big guys.

I just stared at all this flowing life.  Soon, I saw us human beings inside that aquarium too.  We’re so different from each other in how we colour our lives.  Some of us show the world a bigness of spirit, and some of us keep that part well hidden.  But we all can swim.

I didn’t know the names of any of these fish, although I could have studied the nearby signs.  I didn’t want to.  No labels please.  I just wanted to drink in the beauty.

Further down the hallway, I came upon a giant cylindrical tank that stretched way above my head.  It was crammed with silver fish, each about six inches long.  They were in a “school”, and seemed to hover in place … all these parallel lines of beings.  And again I saw us, this time how we are identical in our hearts, in wanting to be happy, in wanting to love and be loved.  I stared some more.

Many more tanks of fish beckoned me along the way.  A long pedestrian tunnel showed sting rays and sharks above, accompanied by far smaller swimmers.  The world was full of movement.  The curved glass distorted the size of the fish.  And soon it was my head that was swimming.  Dizzy.  Nauseous.  All I could do was sit down on a bench and wait for Neal’s return.  He came and went and came back again.  I sat and reeled.  I closed my eyes.  Families passed by in bubbles of excited chatter.  I faded.  My stomach rolled.  Both the happy variety of fish/human beings and their exquisite school of sameness were long gone.  I was sad.

I decided to follow the path of overhead fish to its end, and emerged to sit in front of a blessedly flat tank full of sting rays.  The huge ones rested on the sand floor, occasionally rousing themselves to float over the rock outcroppings.  The small ones pressed their bellies near the glass and climbed.  Although I was looking at their breathing apparatus, it sure looked like a lot of smiling faces to me.  And I had to smile back, despite the pain.  Messengers had come to tell me it would be all right.

And life is definitely fine, thank you.  I’ll just keep swimming through all the waters of the world.  Sights abound.

Illness and Light

Nausea has come and gone and come again for nearly a week now.  I thought it was food poisoning.  Finally, yesterday morning, I went to Emergency to figure things out.  (Turns out it was a bacterial infection.  I now have antibiotics.)

I waited in the triage chairs for my turn to be seen.  Those seats are right beside a sliding door that kept admitting the cold as people came and went.

No.

Overhead, a TV was blaring out a news channel, complete with on-the-spot reporting and brassy commercials.

No.

After I was registered, I sat back down in the waiting room at the far end, away from shivering and blare.  A couple sat down on triage chairs, her head slumping away from him, his hand on her shoulder.  He continued to comfort her as they waited to be seen.

Yes.

The vague nausea swept over me again.  Such a sense of not being present in my life’s moments.  Harder to reach Jody, to talk to her.  (“Bruce, I am here with you, even if it’s hard to sense me right now.  I’ll always be here with you.”)  But I can’t hear these words.  Jodiette, where are you?

No.

I wonder if I will get to the point in life where I’m totally accepting of what the world sends my way.  Where there’s no sharp demarcation between this being good and that being bad.  Maybe.  Maybe not.

Anyway, time to be ushered into the inner sanctum of Emergency.  I was in a long room which had been divided off into five curtained spaces.  I lay on my back, zipped up my parka and pulled on my mitts.  So cold.  And there I lay, comforted by the fact that I was no longer alone.  Someone would help me.

I heard voices from elsewhere in the room – doctors advising their patients, nurses coming and going, family members being with their loved ones.  I heard stories of not just nausea, but major vomiting.  And I felt small.  Here I was, not having vomited once in my week of discomfort, on the edge of feeling sorry for myself.  I decided to let the smallness go.  I deserved better.

And then I hear a woman tell her husband, “I left the meds list at home.  Stupid me!”  And I started crying.  Silently: “No!  You’re not stupid.  Please don’t say that.”  I was weeping for someone other than Jody.  And my wife was happy.  “You care so much, Bruce, about all these people.  I’m so glad you’re my husband.”

And now I’m crying for my darling wife Jodiette again.  “You are here, Jody.  I feel you.  Oh, my wife.  My darling wife.  We will be together in body again.”  “Yes, Bruce.  We will.  As for now and the rest of your life, I am with you always.  Every moment.  In sickness and in health.  In joy and in sorrow.  When you’re alone and when you’re surrounded by friends.  Always.”

I love you, Jodiette.

I love you, Bruce.

 

 

Woe

Just a few days ago, I threw an ice cream cone into the air.  And now I am overwhelmingly sad.  I ache for my Jodiette.

Last night, I watched a movie called “Unfinished Song”.  It’s the story of a vibrant woman named Marion who dies of cancer.  So close to home.  I saw her husband Arthur cradling her, bringing her food, caring deeply for his beloved … and it was Jody and me.

For supper, I ate some fetuccini alfredo that was past due, and nausea crept up on me.  As Arthur sang a song to his dear one near the end of the film, I cried and cried.  And felt like I was going to throw up.  Sorrow and nausea showered down upon me and I was deeply depressed.  Later, sleep wouldn’t come.  Thinking that I was going to vomit on the bed, I put my housecoat on, a coat and toque, and walked down the driveway.  I hoped that the cool air would lift the physical pain, and it did help a bit.  I was able to sleep some.

I had made arrangements to go for a walk with my neighbours Linda and Tony this morning.  I went over but they were busy preparing a holiday meal.  Time had dribbled away for them and now they were in deadline mode.  I talked, I cried, I ached.  No joy in Mudville.  And little ability to talk to Jody and to hear her love.  Such desolation.  Feeling so alone.

Tony and Linda didn’t know what to say and neither did I.  I wept for Jody.  I told them about Cuba.  We talked about going for a walk tonight after they return from their dinner.  I don’t want my grief and sickness to intrude upon their evening.  But I don’t want to be alone.  Oh, how I wish I could talk to Jody right now, but it’s so hard.  My stomach is overwhelming my soul.

These are the moments when I need to be kind to whomever comes my way.  It’s easy to be kind when the world is rolling along tickety boo.  But now?  How amazing it would be.  I need to reach out to my fellow man, no matter how I feel.  I need to do it now.

And so I write a few e-mails to friends.  They deserve my best.