The Oppenheimer Report 8/19/13

What Dad Taylor Saw
 

We got a call Thursday morning that Dad Taylor would be transferred to the Veteran’s wing of Sunnybrook Hospital the next morning, and so the roller coaster continues. By hospital standards he has stabilized, and there was nothing more they could do for him in the stroke ward. We had applied to have him transferred to the Veteran’s wing as a long term care option, and he was accepted faster than we thought he would be. Now, we have no idea what to expect, because he still requires constant supervision and his care is complicated. Nevertheless, I am relieved to have him out of that crazy stroke ward, because that was an unsettling environment in which to heal. He is now in a large single room, which is infinitely quieter than the stoke ward double he lived in for the past six weeks, with a series of four or five progressively worse roommates. The last was an old Indian woman who spent most of every night moaning loudly and making some other very strange noises. A few days ago I found out from one of her daughters - without inquiring I might add - the probable reason for her discomfort. A chronic laxative abuser, the woman had not eliminated since she entered the hospital over a week before. I was afraid she was going to blow on my watch and I fully expected to walk in one day to find windows blown out and nurses in HAZMAT suits mopping up the aftermath of her eruption.

After six weeks of being in the stroke ward every day, it is strange not to be going back. Every day I saw many of the same people. I’d walk in and before I got to Syd’s room, I’d be greeted by at least five or ten people I came to know. Many of the nurses, family members, and patients on the floor became my friends over the month and a half I was there. There is an inmate bond that occurs when one is in the hospital for so long. Last week, Shauna introduced me to a guy named George who was a retired Toronto firefighter who had served for 35 years. George is a character. I became fond of him almost instantly, he knew everyone on the floor, and I could always get the lowdown from George on which patient or nurse had misbehaved in my absence. George was on the floor because he’d had a stroke, but he suffered from a lot of other ailments as well, many relating to injuries he sustained on the job. George just found out, among other things, that he has lung cancer, and is now waiting to see if it is operable. He has been a wake up call to me because he never complains and he has a great attitude. I know that any of you still reading this blog must be about ready to throw in the towel, so oppressive has been the subject matter. But this has been the most meaningful journey I have been on in a long, long time, and I have learned a great deal. No matter how much I blather on about becoming more thankful, there is nothing like an extended visit to the darker side of a hospital to really drive that feeling home. I am so much more aware of and interested in people’s back stories than I was before and it has made my life more meaningful. Indeed I have been jaded, but before I start humming Amazing Grace, rest assured I am still the cynical wretch I have always been … perhaps I am just a wee bit less myopic.

Now that Dad Taylor is in the Veteran’s wing, things are entirely different than they were in the hospital. He is in the section for the patients requiring the most care; nevertheless, they have had him up and in a wheelchair. Sunday we brought him, fully dressed, down through “Warriors Hall” and outside to the garden courtyard. I put his hat and a pair of sunglasses on him. We cruised through the flowers and the past a lovely rock pond with falling water. The sun was shining. Perhaps I was projecting, but I think he knew he was outside and in a beautiful setting. Birds were singing, pecking at the bread crumbs on the ground under the “Do Not Feed the Birds” sign, and for just a moment the family could imagine that we were heading out to a picnic.

The night Shauna and I learned that Dad had to go back into the hospital, July 6th, we were out on my boat for a sunset cruise. The lake was like glass and we drifted in the pink dusk light. Reading her book, wearing one of her colorful sundresses, Shauna was the picture of serenity. I took a picture on my cell phone and sent it to Syd and Ethel. Syd was able to see that moment, and three hours later everything went south for him. Last week, Shauna celebrated her 55th birthday, and as I always do, I wrote her a birthday letter. In it, I mentioned that July 6th, before the bad news came, was “a moment”. In the past 20 years we have shared many such moments, many snapshots of serenity. I know there will be many others, and I will store every one of them in the scrapbook of my mind.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED