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Nancy's Notes

Mon, 11/23/2020 - 13:26
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Thanks Giving

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It’s Thanksgiving Day, and what a wonderful day it is! The kids are here, having driven in from Flint, Texas and Cheney. Grandkids are everywhere—playing the Wii, a granddaughter is playing the piano, the youngest grandson is acting crazy with Grandpa. The house started out perfectly clean, but right now it is a disaster—a crazy, wonderful, blessed disaster. The happy noise in the house is what I live for at this time inmy life! I had prepared a lot of the meal early, so today I can just relax, enjoy the family, set the table, and then sit down and enjoy a feast with our loved ones all around.

Sadly, the above paragraph couldn’t be further from the truth.

No one is here but Grandpa and me. Oh, and Charley, our four-legged family member. It is so sad, and I am sick and tired of it. I know you all are, too. We are all COVID-weary. We all want our lives back. But the really sad truth is, the way the virus is trending, conditions are expected to get worse before they get better.

On this Thanksgiving Day, hospitals everywhere are filled to overflowing. Families are being told that a loved one must be taken to a hospital in another state because there is no room for them to be treated close by. And no matter where a loved one may be hospitalized, you wouldn’t be able to sit with them anyway because family cannot be there. Some may be hospitalized only a few days, or several weeks and some much longer. Many have died alone, or attended only by nurses and other healthcare professionals who are exhausted and have accompanied far too many deaths.

And yet, almost daily on the news I hear stories about people who claim this illness is not real. Last week I saw an interview with a woman who had just been released from the hospital after 17 days of care. Her grandfather, father and mother have all died from the virus, and she admitted that several months ago she had been vocal about her belief that the virus was not real, that it’s no worse than the flu. But with tears streaming down her face, she said this is real, far too real. The tremendous heartache of having lost three of the most important people in her life and nearly dying herself was too much to bear.

My husband was very sick with the virus and was hospitalized in the COVID Unit at HaysMed for nine days. His first symptoms began with a high fever Thursday night, the 15th of October. At the time, we were three hours away from home, so we waited until morning and I drove home Friday, stopping in Plainville for hime to get a COVID test just to confirm what we already knew. By Sunday, the 18th, it was obvious he needed medical attention, and I took him to the ER at Rooks County Health Center. Having asthma was his “underlying condition” that may have caused the virus to escalate quickly. I was glad that I was able to stay with him in the exam room in the ER while some tests were done. It was then determined that he needed a critical level of care that could best be done at HaysMed, and an ambulance was called to transfer him. As I kissed him goodbye, the tears started rolling. But the dam burst as I left RCH, turning right turn to go home while watching the flashing lights of the ambulance heading south to HaysMed. That was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done, and of course, my mind went to the worst: what if I never see him again. The families of almost 250,000 people in the U.S. never got to see their loved one again. Ask any of those families if this thing is real.

Gratefully, a little over a month later, my husband is finally crawling out from the grasp of this thing. He is starting to do a few household tasks and doing some light maintenance for me at the housing authority. But he doesn’t stray too far away from the oxygen bottle, and certainly never leaves home without it.

So on this Thanksgiving Day 2020, there are millions of us who can sincerely give thanks for the gift of good health if we have not had the virus; there are millions of folks who have had symptoms—either light or severe—who are very grateful for returning to good health and resuming their lives; there are medical professionals close to home, and millions more all across America and around the world, who we are forever indebted to for their commitment to the Hippocratic Oath that frames their lives; there are millions of family members who give thanks for the gift and memory of a loved one no longer with them because of the virus; and there is a woman in Stockton, Kansas who is grateful beyond words for the blessing of being able to pick up her husband at HaysMed and head north, together, to bring him home.

Happy Thanks-Giving, Today and Every Day!