Catch up:
Sorry, but this is a long one: I really don't want to make this a five-part series, and I think wrapping it up exactly one month after Doug's death is perfect.
Putting it all together
I grew up a brainy, nerdy kid with a father who seemed to make it his life's work to convince his children that we were worthless and unlovable. And he was very, very good at it. As a result, I was a very unpopular child - desperate to be liked, but believing I wasn't likeable - an excellent target for bullies, which only added to my belief that I was worthless. Even as I got older and found things I was good at and people who liked me, there was always that nagging voice telling me that nobody really cared all that much.
When it came to dating, and then marriage, I subconsciously picked men who didn't really love me. They'd throw me enough scraps of affection to keep me coming back, but love? That wasn't in play. But, having no roadmap to follow, I was too foolish to realize that this wasn't love.
After two failed marriages, I decided I'd had enough, and I built a full and rich life on my own. I was content. I didn't feel as though I was missing anything, because I'd never had a true love affair.
And then I met Doug, and he changed everything. Our path to love was easy in that being together was easy. Our path to love was hard in that we both had a lot to overcome in order to believe in us: he had a pattern of choosing women who needed to be saved; I had a pattern of picking men who couldn't love me, and I had a pathological need to be independent. But we knew that we were breaking our unhealthy patterns, and we did the work - the labor of love - to make it happen so that we could flourish. And we did.
WE weren't perfect, but our love sure was. With the exception of my son (and that's a completely different kind of love), I've never loved anyone with the ferocity and certainty that I did Doug. It wasn't a choice, it wasn't chance (there was no "falling" in love); it just WAS. Our love was a certainty from the first few minutes we sat in that bar in Antioch, even if it did take us several months to realize it. It was immutable; it was unbreakable; it was everything beautiful wrapped up in the permanently-bonded hearts of two wounded people who made each other whole.
With Doug, I became more myself, and I became my best self. And I actually began to think that maybe I'd been wrong all these years: If DOUG loved me, then I must be lovable. If he loved me, then maybe I really am okay.
I felt as though my life - my time to live for myself and my own happiness - had finally begun. I was making good money, he was retired, we'd be able to travel and build our dream home and live out the autumn and winter of our lives together and blissful. For once, I wasn't worried about the future. I was finally happy in a way I didn't think I could ever be. For once, I knew - KNEW - that good times were ahead.
And then I watched him die.
Doug's surgery and death
Trigger warning: I'm going to get into details here, so if that's going to be too painful, you might want to skip it.
Monday, February 17 2020
I brought Doug his coffee in bed at 5:00 AM, and then he took a shower and we headed out. We held hands, tightly, the entire way to the hospital. We arrived right on time at 7:00, and he checked in. We were placed in a holding room where, he, Missy and I chatted once he got into his hospital gown and settled in. After a while, Missy left us so we could have a little time alone, and we had what would be our last private chat and several kisses. We managed one last kiss in the hall as they were taking him to surgery, and that was the last I saw him until 7:00-ish that evening.
The surgery, originally expected to take five hours, ended up taking seven. There was a lot of scar tissue from his previous surgery, and Dr. Kim felt it was important to deal with all that scar tissue (particularly, the adhesions on Doug's bowel) to assure that he wouldn't end up with an obstructed bowel down the line.
Once the surgeon met with us and we knew Doug was in recovery, I headed home to feed the cats, and then went back. While I was on the way, Doug's nurse called to ask for permission to put in a PICC line, because they were having a little trouble keeping his blood pressure up. When I arrived, Doug was still heavily sedated and not responding, which I expected. I stayed for about an hour, and then headed home, planning to be there early the next morning so I could see Dr. Kim when he came by.
Tuesday, February 18 2020
By the time I arrived at 6:30 that morning, Doug was on four different vasopressors, all of which were maxed out on dosage. Even so, his blood pressure was topped out at about 90/65. Every time one of the bags emptied, his blood pressure would drop in a matter of a few seconds, down to about 65/44.
Dr. Kim came and in and checked the pulse in Doug's feet via doppler, and all was good. He told me that the goal for the day was to get Doug off the ventilator.
Midmorning, the nephrologist stopped by, because Doug still wasn't producing urine. I wasn't terribly concerned at this point, because it's not uncommon for the kidneys to temporarily shut down after such a major surgery. Dr. Khan ordered a large dose of Lasix to try and get his kidneys to kick back into gear.
The Lasix didn't work.
Next, she ordered Interventional Radiology to put in a Central Line so that they could begin dialysis. That happened somewhere around 3:00 PM. About a half hour later, everything went to hell.
Suddenly, Doug's blood pressure spiked to over somewhere in the neighborhood of 230/197; a couple of seconds later, it dropped to 70/35 or so. His pulse started racing; he started developing PVCs. For the next three hours, we watched as this kept happening, over and over, while Doug's nurse pushed medication after medication just to keep him alive until they could get him on dialysis, which - for reasons I don't know - I really thought would fix everything that was going wrong. I was certain that he was going to die before the dialysis tech got there, but somehow, he managed to hang on.
When we left that evening, Doug was being dialyzed and was stable. I went home, crashed, and was back up again early Wednesday morning.
Wednesday, February 19 2020
Wednesday was a GREAT day. It was the last day I was happy. It was the last full day of Doug's life; it was also the last full day of mine.
When I arrived early that morning, his nurse already had him dialyzing, and spent the day working to get Doug off all the vasopressors. And he did just that. And I was able to talk to Doug, and hold his hand - and he held mine too. I was able to tell him that UT had beaten Vandy the night before, and that Jordan Bowden had come out of his slump and had a great game. I was able to tell him that I loved him. And even though he couldn't say it back, he squeezed my hand, so I knew. THIS is the time that haunts me: I SHOULD have asked the nurse to make room so that I could get into the bed with Doug and hold him: he was awake, and he knew I was there. His last conscious memory COULD have been of me lying next to him, holding him close. Instead, it was me blabbering about basketball. I should have done that. But I didn't. And I will never forgive myself for that.
I left that evening, feeling optimistic that we'd turned a corner, and that the next day we'd get him off the ventilator and start working on getting him onto a regular floor so he could finish recovering and come home. I went home, drank a beer, ate a slice of pizza, and crashed without setting the alarm, confident that he'd be fine overnight but knowing they'd call if anything happened.
When I arrived early that morning, his nurse already had him dialyzing, and spent the day working to get Doug off all the vasopressors. And he did just that. And I was able to talk to Doug, and hold his hand - and he held mine too. I was able to tell him that UT had beaten Vandy the night before, and that Jordan Bowden had come out of his slump and had a great game. I was able to tell him that I loved him. And even though he couldn't say it back, he squeezed my hand, so I knew. THIS is the time that haunts me: I SHOULD have asked the nurse to make room so that I could get into the bed with Doug and hold him: he was awake, and he knew I was there. His last conscious memory COULD have been of me lying next to him, holding him close. Instead, it was me blabbering about basketball. I should have done that. But I didn't. And I will never forgive myself for that.
I left that evening, feeling optimistic that we'd turned a corner, and that the next day we'd get him off the ventilator and start working on getting him onto a regular floor so he could finish recovering and come home. I went home, drank a beer, ate a slice of pizza, and crashed without setting the alarm, confident that he'd be fine overnight but knowing they'd call if anything happened.
Thursday, February 20 2020
I woke up at 8:00 - which tells you how tired I was, because I never sleep that late. The first thing I did was call the SICU to see how Doug was. That's when I learned that he'd coded at 5:30 that morning, and no one called me. To this day, I have yet to receive an explanation or apology for that.
When I got to the hospital and asked how he was, the answer was "not good." He was back on all vasopressors, and his blood pressure was still unstable, as was his pulse. He was being dialyzed again, but it didn't seem to be helping.
Throughout the morning, Missy and I were on the phone with anyone and everyone we could think of, trying to get Doug moved to Centennial, where we felt they were better equipped to take care of him. By 3:30 PM or so, Dr Smith (the ICU Intensivist) told me that they were not going to be able to stabilize Doug enough to move him. At that point, they'd already had to shock him to get his heart rate back down, and it was simply too risky. But they'd made arrangements to have someone there to dialyze Doug overnight. The unspoken addendum to that statement was "if he makes it that far."
I asked, point-blank, if we were just torturing Doug. I pointed out that Doug's Advance Care plan specifically said to take all measures unless he was terminal. Were we, I asked, at the point where he cannot recover and we're just torturing him? Because, if so, we needed to stop. Dr Smith said that we were not - yet - but we were getting close.
Given the circumstances, he told me that, in the event that Doug coded, they would go for five minutes. I agreed.
It's important to point out that, on Tuesday, when everything fell apart, so did I, whereas Missy was a pillar of strength (as was Doug's best friend, Mike, who was there every single day). By the time of my conversation with Dr Smith, a preternatural calm came over me. I was still crying - a lot - but I knew that I needed to dig deep so that I could deal with what I feared was coming.
Over the next two hours, Doug's pulse continued to venture into tachycardia and then bradycardia. As the afternoon turned to evening, he became increasingly tachy, and stayed that way.
At a few minutes before 5:30, I pulled up a chair next to his bed, and held Doug's left hand with one hand and stroked his arm with the other, and talked to him. I told him that I loved him. I told him that they were doing everything they could, but that he needed to meet them halfway. I told him that I needed him to fight this so he could come home to me. And his pulse - previously hovering at 135 bpm, dropped to 85. And stayed there for about ten minutes. I started to think that maybe there was hope that he could pull through.
And then it started dropping. Slowly. And I kept talking to him and stroking his arm. And it kept dropping. When it hit 49, the nurse tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Honey, I'm going to need you to step outside." So I did. And I knew what was coming
I texted Missy (she'd stepped outside) and Mike (he was in the waiting room) and told them to come back right away. When they did, I explained that, any minute, they were going to call a code, and that, when they did, they were going to go for only five minutes, and we needed to be prepared for that.
The three of us stayed there - Missy and I each in a chair, facing each other, and Mike standing between us, holding hands, and then time stopped: they called the code. Looking back at my phone log, I texted my sister to tell her he was coding at exactly 5:40.
The three of us held tightly to each other's hands, and I just kept saying, "please, please, please" over and over. And I watched the clock as the minutes went by. Three minutes. Then four. Then five. Then six. Then seven.
And they kept going.
At about the ten-minute mark, Dr Smith came out and told us that they'd been able to get a heartbeat, but hadn't been able to maintain a stable rhythm. He said they were going to go for another ten minutes, and said that we were welcome to go in to be with him if we wanted.
Missy and I immediately said we would. I went to the far side of the bed, and held Doug's right hand and stroked his right leg; she stood on the side closest to the door and held his left hand and stroked his left leg. The nurses were switching out doing compressions every few minutes, and... I don't know if you've ever seen someone get CPR in real life, but it is NOTHING like how it looks on film. It's brutal. It's devastating. I could hear his ribs cracking. Missy lasted about a minute or so and then had to step outside. I don't blame her; it was the worst thing I've ever seen.
But I couldn't leave.
Four months and three days earlier, I'd promised him forever. Doug's forever was ending, and I wasn't going to leave him to die in a room full of people he'd never even met - people who'd never seen that handsome smile or his twinkling eyes; people who'd never heard his beautiful voice; people who had no idea what a miracle of a human being he was. I HAD to stay. So I kept holding his hand, and stroking his leg, and telling him over and over again that I loved him, to please come back to me, that I needed him.
At 6:10, it was all over. They ran that code for a full 30 minutes, but it was useless. Doug was over. Our marriage was over. My life was over.
Everything I've lost
I lost my closest, truest friend. I lost my biggest cheerleader. I lost the person I loved most in the world; the person whose diapers I would've changed down the road if it came to that. I lost the person whom I'd promised - if he developed dementia as his mother did, and forgot who I was - I'd promised him that I would remind him of who I was every day. I lost the person I loved more than my own life. I lost the one person I could count on always to tell me the truth about myself, even if it wasn't a pleasant truth. I lost the person who made even the most boring days entertaining. I lost the companion I never thought I'd find. I lost my lover. I lost my hopes, my dreams, my plans, my entire future. I lost everything I'd become in the past four years. I lost everything worthwhile. EVERYTHING.
Does it make sense now?
Now that you've read the entire story of my life up to Doug, and my life with Doug, do you understand, at least a little, why I believe there's nothing here for me without him? I've tried to convey just how much Doug changed me, and the impact his life and death have had on me.
Doug gave me hope, and just when I finally believed in happiness, when I finally believed it was time for us to have all the happiness we'd searched for all our lives, it was ripped away from us. There's no hope without him. Everything I was before is gone now; nothing matters. I'm empty. I'm lonely - profoundly lonely, in a way that you cannot grasp unless you've lost your life's companion. It's an emptiness and loneliness that no amount of love from friends or family can fill.
My entire future is gone. My very identity is gone. And everyone keeps telling me to take it one day at a time, that I will find joy and meaning in life again. But they're wrong. Losing Doug meant losing hope in a happy future; any fleeting happiness I could find down the road will never truly be happy, because it will be always be surrounded and tarnished by the bitter knowledge that it won't last - that the universe, in its cruelty, will steal it away from me as surely as it stole Doug. What's the point of living when you can't ever be happy because you know your happiness is an illusion that will be destroyed the instant you start to believe in it?
Look, I've done everything I set out to do: I raised my son to adulthood, and he's fantastic. I've had a successful career - both the professional one and my theatrical "career." I had a blissfully happy (though far too short) marriage to the one GREAT love of my life. I've met all my goals. I'm satisfied with the life I've had, other than Doug leaving too soon. There's nothing else I need to do. I'm good.
Look, I've done everything I set out to do: I raised my son to adulthood, and he's fantastic. I've had a successful career - both the professional one and my theatrical "career." I had a blissfully happy (though far too short) marriage to the one GREAT love of my life. I've met all my goals. I'm satisfied with the life I've had, other than Doug leaving too soon. There's nothing else I need to do. I'm good.
In the month since Doug died, there hasn't been a single moment - not even a SECOND - when I've thought, "Ok, maybe I CAN do this. Maybe I CAN find a way to be happy without him." That's because it's not possible. I CAN'T be happy without him. I CAN'T do this. Without Doug, and without his gentle but fierce, unconditional, unwavering love, without his smile, without his voice, without his touch, and without hope, what's the point?
There isn't one.
I've promised you all that I won't kill myself, and I won't. But that's as good as it's going to get, and it's going to have to be enough for you. I still want to die. I WILL want to die every day until I do. The Kathleen you knew is as dead as Doug is, no matter how long her heart keeps beating. She's dead, and in her place is this hopeless, scared, lonely, bitter woman who simply doesn't want to be here.
It's the great irony of my life that I - who used to be terrified that I'd die at 58 like my mother - now live in terror that I'll live longer than that. Hell, I live in terror that I'll live longer than tonight. To paraphrase Eleanor from The Good Place: Doug left and I'm all alone here. I was alone my whole life, and I told myself I like it that way BUT I DON'T. I like being with Doug.
Maybe I'll be able to laugh sometimes, and maybe I'll be able to have an enjoyable day now and again at some point. But happiness and joy and hope? They're gone forever.
God willing, I'll be gone forever soon, too.
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