Jumpin' Jack Flash....Backs

I thought this time would be easier. That's what I get for thinking!

I accompanied my mother to her surgical appointment today. This appointment required us to go to the hospital where my husband & I spent a great deal of time over these last 6 years. This wasn't the first time, however, that I had returned to my husband's "2nd home" (as he used to call it in his more animated days). So, naturally, I ASS-U-MED it wouldn't be as difficult this time around. Perhaps it will never get easier for me to step through those doors.

I'll admit that the 1st trip back there was much longer in length therefore giving me plenty of time to remember. This time, I seemed to focus on his last stay there. I remembered the countless hours that I spent by his bedside. The overnight stays I pulled because I couldn't bear to think of him there alone on Thanksgiving, Christmas or New Years day morning. I wanted to be the first to wish him happiness on those days. I was.

The sights, sounds and people transported me back to those moments. Every tear that I cried because I knew his health was rapidly declining, every hand holding minute, every stroke of his brow and every word that I spoke swirled in my mind each minute that I was in that hospital today. A swell of emotion slammed into my brain and heart. A tug on the ol' heartstrings. A longing to have him back so that I could comfort him. Everyone else went about their business like nothing has ever happened to me and mine. They don't know the loss that I felt as I watched them making themselves busy with the business of taking care of people. How could they? Why should they? The gap between life and death grows wider as the days pass and time moves on. I feel further away from "us". A separation. I'm becoming "me" again. No longer "John's wife" or "John & I" or "me & John". No more of that kind of talk.

I miss him. John, the patient.