I have never done anything like this before and to say that I was a wreck doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of my emotions. Every part of me inside was screaming. My skin was crawling as if I was covered in spiders and my mind was racing a thousand miles a minute. Panic was right there ready to set in if I would let it.
I would love to say that I am in control at all times, but that would be a flat out bold faced lie. And, at that point, I was not in control. NOT EVEN CLOSE. I had to keep reminding myself to breathe and focus on what is happening and how to make sense of it all. So much shit goes through your head in that moment that everything becomes a blur.
The entire day at work, I was a mess. I couldn’t do nothing. I couldn’t focus on anything I felt frozen. I was consumed with the anticipation of what was going to happen when Kerry’s Mom got to the house later that day. How would Kerry take this? Would he be silent? Would the bad Gemini come out and would there be a huge battle with lots of hate and anger. I had no freaking clue. I barely made it home 20 minutes before her Cadillac drove around the corner and my heart tried to climb out me like a man scaling a wall, through my throat.
Before Kerry’s Mom walked through our front door, I walked up to him. He had just sat down on the couch with a freshly poured Vodka Cranberry drink and I said, while choking so I could barely get the words out, “I told you I would call your Mom, and here is she is.” The look on his face was complete bewilderment. I don’t think he just comprehended what I said to him.
When they both sat side by side in the kitchen, he looked so frail. His Mom turned to him and asked” Do you know why we are here?” He said he had no clue. His voice sounded so weak. I hurt for him. There was no fight. No yelling. No arguing. She explained they were here to help me get him some help and that was it. He said OK. They turned to me and asked what I thought the next step was, like I had the itinerary all planned out. Again. NO CLUE. I was just trying to breathe and remain standing! But I at least said that I felt we needed to get him to the hospital and figure out why Kerry is so yellow.
With that said, coats were on and we were in the car. It all took less than 30 minutes. I sunk into the back seat of his Mom’s Cadillac while we headed to St. Marks ER.
We spent over three hours in the emergency room. We had numerous nurses and technicians come in and do all sorts of tests, and draw several vials of blood. HOLY SHIT so much blood. I kept thinking to my self, ” Leave a little for the patient Dude!” We had not seen a doctor yet so Kerry’s Mom got up and went to check on Dale who had been waiting patiently out in the waiting room.
I finally had a quiet minute alone with Kerry. I asked him, “Are you mad at me?” He nodded his head at me, but remained quiet. I figured this would be the case, but seeing his affirmation shook me. I was standing, but I wanted to slump to the floor, curl up, and cry. All I could do was just breathe. Shit – I was so lost and had no freaking idea what I was doing, or how we got to this point (ok I do, but SHIT! REALLY? SHIT!). I stared at him laying on the hospital bed looking so frail, small, sick and …. yellow as a damn banana peel. I kept telling myself, Breathe just breathe.
We waited there in the silence. The only sound was the slow beep of the monitors above Kerry’s head monitoring his heart beat and every so often sounding a noise reminding Kerry to breathe because his oxygen count was low. I would take a deep breath at the same time. I felt light headed with all of this.
How the hell had I missed this? Why did it take a text from a friend saying, “Quinn, Kerry is so yellow I almost cried.” to wake me up and take action? Had I really become that apathetic? YES FML YES I had. I knew Kerry had been drinking a lot more than he had in the past. (when I say a lot more, I mean nearly a 1/5 of vodka a day). I would usually get home from work around 5-5:30 and Kerry would already be curled up on the couch with blankets wrapped around him and his hat pulled low over his eyes. The house was dark because it was winter and already dark outside. He would pass out shortly after i walked through the door. So as not to disturb him, I would quietly go about my brief end of day business and then wind up on the couch next to him, while he slept, with a glass of wine in my hands.
I never saw him even though he was right next to me. He would wake up around 8 pm, pour himself a couple more drinks and pass out again or head to bed. This was our nightly routine for a very, very long time. There was never any talking. There was never any “Hey, how was your day?” type of discussions. Just drinking and solitude. And loving from my dogs.
Have you ever had that feeling of loneliness, even though you are right next to someone? BIG TIME.
So, there we sat in the ER waiting. Finally a doctor, whose name I cant even remember, walked in and started to talk to us. He explained to Kerry that he is a very sick man and that after reviewing tests, he may have cirrhosis of the liver. Wait what? What is that? What do you mean? What does that mean for Kerry? All of these questions start going through my head and I feebly started pelting the doctor with these half formed questions to try to make sense of what I heard.
However, the doctor didn’t want to say definitively what was happening until he was able to review all of the test results, including the MRI. But he did say they were admitting him. He needed help and fast. It was time for us to go while they got Kerry into his room and we made plans to see him tomorrow. Kerry’s Mom and Dale dropped me off at home, I walked in the door and collapsed before I could even finish greeting the dogs. HOLY SHIT! What did I just do?! I could barely breathe.
I had no idea what Cirrhosis of the liver was or what it meant for Kerry and his ability to get better. So while the dogs were out doing their morning business, I was ferociously trying to google everything I could find about this subject. It was not good. Every article I read seemed to get worse. They said things like “certain death, liver transplant, last stages, point of no return.” Shit like this kept coming up. I wanted to vomit. I wrote out a list of questions to discuss with the Kerry’s doctor when I get to the hospital that morning. I needed answers so I could get on top of this and figure out what were the next steps for Kerry. Look at me trying to be in control, HA! Not a chance in hell, but it was a nice try.
His doctor, Dr. Trobridge, was amazing and had the best bedside manner, but did NOT pull punches when he talked to Kerry about the serious nature of his situation. In truth, it was more serious than any of us thought. Kerry had been near death. Days away in fact. DEATH! By the grace of god, we were able to get him where he needed to be at the right time to save his life. But it was going to be a long road.
During his stay at St. Marks, I learned a lot about liver counts and bilirubin levels (the count that shows how Yellow you are). Kerry’s biliruben level was a 9.5 when he was admitted to the ER. It spiked as high as 19 (very bad, meaning his liver is not processing anything) and back down to a 9.2 when he was discharged. What is normal you ask? Normal is .5. We had a long way to go and because his liver was not processing anything, the fluids were getting pushed into his abdomen. This was serious and something we started watching.
Kerry was hooked up to everything imaginable. He had lost so much blood that they had to give him more, plus fluids, potassium. You name it, Kerry got it. They were throwing everything at him just to get him back on his feet. We were reminded by everyone that saw him just how sick he was and how close he came to another outcome. I just kept breathing. Little did I know that this was only the beginning of he physical recovery.
I was warned he would go through stages of withdrawal from alcohol. He may hallucinate. He may ramble and be incoherent. I was told to be patient and not panic, this was normal and would pass. OK! So I waited, and watched….and nothing. Nada, Zilch, Zero. We didn’t see any symptoms like this.
One day at a time is the mode I went into. I started breaking down each day by saying, “Today we are going to find out more about Kerry’s status.” Today we are going to deal with rehab (correct term is recovery now) and where to go or if he will go. THAT was the big question. Just do one day at a time and just keep breathing.
On the day we were to discuss recovery, he brought up intensive outpatient therapy. WTF? I hope I didn’t show it on my face, but as he was talking about it, internally I was saying. “OH, HELL NO!” I felt I knew what he needed better than he did or so I thought! LOL. That control thing coming out again, but I knew I had to let him make the decision or this was not going to work. The next day I went back and as luck would have it, he was reading brochures for in patient therapy. THANK GOD!
He chose one and called. I could breath easy again. A representative from the place actually showed up that same day and got the ball rolling with Kerry. I was super impressed and totally relieved. Kerry wanted to come home and rest for the weekend and be admitted the next Monday. This was not quite what I wanted because I was worried he would pick up a drink while home. But again, I was not in the driver’s seat. I would learn that this was a very valuable lesson over and over as time went on.
But for now, I just kept breathing and brought him home. He slept forever. The poor guy was so tired as you can imagine. You get no sleep in those hospitals because they are constantly coming in checking on you, taking blood, and looking at your vitals every few hours. So he slept a lot. And he needed it. He was going to need the rest because soon enough, his days were going to be very structured.
Monday! The big day! He was all packed and ready. We drove down to the place and walked in. We waited and soon enough, they came and got him. I got up to following thinking there was some sort of orientation we would go thorugh or transitional process, but NOPE. They guy stopped, turned, looked at me and told me I was free to go. Startled, with a stupid look on my face, I am sure was thinking,”Wait, What? This is It? No ceremony, torch passing, baton running? Just go?”
I stood there for a moment and watched Kerry go through the door. He turned and waved to me. I waved back, turned, and walked out the door. I slowly walked back to my car in the morning rain. As I walked, I breathed a sigh of relief and finally cried.