Each night I lie on a mattress on the floor in my brother's room, listening to him breathe. Sleep has been elusive, I am afraid that I will not awaken if he needs my help, or begins to wander. Worse yet, I am afraid he will slip even farther from us as he sleeps.
This week has been a week of many firsts. I just finished changing my brother's insulin pump tubing, which I think requires much more experience than I have. What if I did something wrong, or screwed up his dosage? This experience came on the heels of an aggressive outburst. He doesn't know who I am so he is fearful and violent. Moments before we had been talking about the days he would go frogging in the backyard of our childhood home, chasing lightening bugs, and gutting trout. Twenty minutes later he is apologizing and crying saying he loves me.
Tomorrow his wife will be home. I will see a smile split his face, and the light of recognition torch his eyes. Tomrorrow night he will sleep beside her in their marriage bed of thirty years.
Monday he will be admitted to a longterm care facility.
I want to think about tomorrow instead.
About Me
- tomirose
- I'm a wife of a wonderful man, mom to three awesome children. I like to laugh, encourage, and I would love to write. I think community is a wonderful thing, and I'd like people to be less cynical about church, not THE church, but the institution that we call the church. I think soul patches, piercings and tattoos are kinda cool; attitudes are not. Sometimes I lie in bed and think about weird things.. like why I like the taste of bubblemint gum, but despise the taste of our youngest son's bubblemint flavored toothpaste, or if our older children have already met their future spouses, how amazing it is that I've been married to the same man for thirty-two years, and why dryer lint looks the way it does. I hate having cold feet, being too hot, and stubbing my pinkie toe. I like to read pretty much anything but angsty poetry, well no I lied..not about the angsty poetry, but I don't much like to read biographies either. Laundry is the bane of my existence, along with cleaning out the refrigerator, and just plain cleaning.
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