Friday, October 21, 2011

It is done.

The words echoed in my head as I stood beside my father's bed after his last breath. It was 3:46am, September 21, 2011. It was the end of a long struggle for my father and the turmoil he has lived with the past 5 months of this horrible affliction that finally overcame him. The last week was the most trying for him, and witnessing his journey out of this world and into the next has changed me forever.




There were many moments of time shared with just the two of us. Most of "our time" time was in the wee hours of the night as I took "night duty" with Dad and stayed with him at the hospital. I watched his labored breathing progress, his food intake lessen, his body weaken, he was shutting down. He would have such terrible, restless nights of uncomfortableness, confusion and frustration. Sometimes he would wake and look at me and say "Well Lydi, I didn't know you worked at the hospital!". I would just smile and ask what I could do for him.


The night they moved him to the 4th floor was the realization that he would be leaving us. With all of the confusion and miscommunication with many of the Med One doctors we had experienced, we were finally blessed with Dr. Patel. A young, energetic and forthright physician, and the only doctor who sat us down and told us he was dying. Had it not been for Dr. Patel, my father would not have been able to die the way he wished. At home with his family.



That night I sat by his bedside and watched the heart monitor screens outside the door for any changes in his activity. My eyes were drawn to a lovely artist's print of an angel on the wall in the nurses' station. A perfect print for the nurses of that department. Angels, every one of them. During the night my Dad awoke and was very upset that the lighting was too bright in the room. There was only one light on, which was indirect lighting on the wall behind the bed and could not be dimmed just a switch On or Off. Try as I might, I could not get the lighting to be dimmed. I turned all the lights off and turned the bathroom light on and cracked the door. Dimmer, but darker. Dad said it would not do. Back on with the indirect lights again. 5 minutes later.... the bulbs on the left side of the fixture flickered and burnt out. Poof. "Ahhhh. Much better..." my Dad says.




Yes, there are angels everywhere.


The next morning we made arrangements to get Dad home. The next 36 hours were a mixture of emotion. Laughter when he looked at my brother at the end of a serious family prayer he had just spoken and said "Nice hat", uncontrollable crying as I wondered how much more suffering he could take, heartache as he clutched my mother with all the strength he could muster and tell her he didn't want to leave her, love as I watched my wonderful nephew Zach play his ukulele for his grandad at his bedside, happiness at rememberances of times together, fear when he was shouting out in the night reliving his time in the war and demanding the dirt be dug in front of the tank he was driving and giving military commands, compassion as my mother and I took turns playing hymns on the piano and singing trying to comfort him, worry as his body went through the stages of preparing for death, so many ups and downs. I am thankful for the time that we had all together as a family to be with Dad right to the end. I am thankful I got to tell him how much he meant to me and how much I love him.


Throughout the last hours he kept seeing a door and asking for the door to be opened. We all were wondering... is this the door to heaven he is asking about? If it was, at 3:46am he stepped through that door to walk with the Lord and have all of the questions he spent his life learning and researching about.... answered.



"And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely"



I miss you Dad.