Post 12 - Bed 2

Photo by Oluwaseyi Johnson on Unsplash

A Toast To: All of whom we meet along the way.

Song Pairing: The Buggles - “Video Killed the Radio Star” (from the album, The Age of Plastic, 1979).

If someone asked “what’s your earliest childhood memory,” what would you say? Is it just me or do all people have a clear defining moment from their early childhood that they consider their very first memory? Why is it that moment? What about it makes the brain take a snapshot and permanently store it as the first amongst all other memories collected through life? I have alluded to my earliest memory in previous posts but skimmed over it. I mentioned I might come back to explore it one day. My earliest life memory happened when I was three years old. Was I three? I think so. This is the age my brain catalogued it. If it wasn’t three, wouldn’t my brain remember another age? Two, four? I’m sticking with three. Now, as with most memories, there are very vivid parts and parts that seem to have been completely erased. I may not have all the facts correct, but this is the best recollection I can do forty-seven years later.

It’s rush hour, my Mom is driving. We are on Highway 417. It’s warm, I think it’s summer, the sun is shining brightly and the windows are down. I don’t think my Dad is with us but my brother is there. I’m in the back seat of my family’s station wagon with a rectangular plastic basin on my lap. It’s the kind some people put in the sink at a cottage to wash dishes in, to preserve water, or when the plug for the sink doesn't work. I am retching continuously into it. Holding a big basin of my own vomit. It’s green, “bile” my Mom says, “it’s what your body puts out when you have nothing left in your stomach to puke.” I have been vomiting nonstop. Maybe hours, maybe days. I remember being really tired and my stomach being sore from all the heaving but my body just unable to stop with the upchucking. We lived in the West end of town and the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) was, well, in the East. At any other time of day this would have been maybe a half an hour drive but in rush hour when you feel like shit and are vomiting over and over again, it takes a while. I would replay this drive several years later when I broke my leg. Twice. A tale for another time.

Arriving, parking, triage, being admitted…no recollection. The vomiting continued, I do remember that.

There were a lot of needles, pokes, prodding, IVs, blood draws. So many that at one point the nurses had to find veins in my legs. This terrified me for some reason. I know now it was just really invasive for a three-year-old. I hurt everywhere, I was exhausted and just wanted to go home, but every time I tried to eat something it just came back up. I remember being hungry but also being so afraid to eat after a while. A day or two into my stay, my Dad came to me and said “I really need you to eat this.” I asked “what is it” to which he said “it’s like a milkshake.” Ice cream! I was all over that idea. Finally something yummy. Ice cream for dinner? Had I died and gone to heaven? One sip, and I looked at my Dad with absolute disgust and hatred. This was not a milkshake, this was liquid chalk masked with a wannabe “Creamsicle” flavouring hidden in a big white styrofoam cup. My poor Dad. What a job he had that night as a parent, getting angry at his kid as she refused to drink something he needed her to. I despised him. In the moment I don’t think he ever thought I would forgive him. 

The next day, the hospital food tray arrived, and again my parents hoped I would eat. Remember, I was three, and it was hospital food. I had also been puking for days. I tried, but the food was terrible, and the little I did eat made me gag. A doctor came in and asked me, “If you could have any food in the world, what would it be?” Basically, they just needed me to keep something down, so I think they would have brought in McDonald’s had I asked, but my favourite food at three years old was Brussels sprouts. Don’t ask me why. I honestly couldn’t say why. So I said to the doctor, “Brussels sprouts.” The Brussels sprouts came. Tiny green marbles of frostbitten yuk slathered in what was probably watered-down margarine. Cold. Mushy. Suffice it to say, the mission was not successful. My Dad was not happy at all with my performance. Not long after Brussels-gate, my Dad came into my hospital room with a little cup of Jell-O (a tiny hit of whipped cream on top). He either sat on my bed or I sat on his lap in a chair, but I remember the moment as an intimate one. He was calm, very quiet, and now I see him as being pretty defeated. He looked at me and said very softly, “I need you to eat something, Kerri. If you don’t eat something, they are going to have to put a feeding tube down your throat, and I really don’t want them to have to do that.” I wanted so much to make my Dad happy. I tried so hard, but the Jell-O tasted awful. Orange is not my go-to. The next day, a feeding tube was inserted up my nostril, maneuvered down my throat, into my esophagus until it reached my stomach, and it remained in me for eight days. 

Other kid patients came and went, in and out of my room, but no one stuck. I was alone a lot of the time. Then one day a boy was wheeled in, and we became roommates. He stayed the longest. I believe his name was Brian. I could be totally wrong, but for some reason, that name seems right. I was told Brian had a tumour in his stomach. He looked like he had swallowed a football. That’s the best I can describe it. One night while watching my personal beside tv attached to the heavy swinging metal arm that never swung, the channel knob fell off. This wasn’t the first time the knob had fallen off. However, this time when it happened, it felt like the world had ended. That particular night, my parents had gone home. I was stable but still milking my weakness and exhaustion pretty good. Having to get out of bed to get the knob felt like a huge feat, but I wanted to switch channels, so it had to be done. By the time I stopped huffing and puffing about having to do it, Brian was walking over to find it. I remember being so grateful he did this. I also felt a little bad because I was sure I was feeling much better than he was. I have never forgotten this small act of kindness; it meant so much to me. 

A day or two later, my very own paediatrician, Dr. James, who was a pretty big deal, came to the hospital. I loved Dr. James, fellow redhead, instant ally. He kept me as a patient until I was eighteen! When I went in to ask for birth control pills, he said, “I treat babies, not prevent them." He then quickly referred me to another doctor in the building. Our breakup was harsh. By this time, my feeding tube had been removed, and I was eating Brussels sprouts again. Dr. James asked me to stand up on my bed. I immediately did, and he immediately pulled me down and said, “I need you to stand up on the bed.” So I stood up and again, and once again, he pulled me down. I tilted my head and looked at him very confused with a bit of an evil eye. He said, “Kerri, if you can’t stand up on your own, I’m not going to be able to let you go home.” Ahhh, a game. I stood up again, this time him allowing it and then making some notes on his chart. 

The next morning, as I packed up my belongings that had accumulated over my three-week stay, Brian excitedly waited with his parents for the entourage of medical professionals to come in for him. He was getting surgery to have the football removed. He and I were very excited about this. I was really happy to be going home but also remember being pretty emotional because I was leaving Brian on such a big day for him. We had bonded as fast as two sick kids confined to a hospital room for days would. Brian was wheeled away, and our parents assured us we would reunite once everyone was home and back to a more normal routine.

Arriving home, I could barely contain my excitement to see Daisy. I missed her so much. I thought she would either be mad at me or have forgotten who I was, but of course, she didn’t. It was the happiest of homecomings. Years later, I was told I experienced an infection causing blood poisoning. Or maybe it was blood poisoning that caused an infection? Regardless, the vomiting was a reaction to my body being in full inflammatory mode. Because my body was using all its energy to fight the infection, my digestive tract just naturally shut off as a preventative measure. Apparently it was quite serious. My friend Brian did not get to go home. Sadly, he passed away either during his surgery or soon after due to complications. For a long time, my parents told me Brian was from out of town and there just wasn’t a good time for us all to meet up, but that he was doing well. It was only later that I found out the football was cancer and his odds were never good. After being told the harsh reality of Brian’s story, I felt even more guilty for being so lazy the night the tv knob fell off. I have thought about Brian getting out of his bed for me many times over the years, and what a truly selfless, kind act that was. I have always felt wholeheartedly that talking about people long after their death is how to truly honour them. Memories are how we can stay connected, and speaking (or writing) about the memories is how I communicate with those who meant something to me. Brian did a very small thing in his few years of life that I have carried with me for fifty. His life was not for nothing. He made a difference in mine, and I am so grateful to have met him.

RR

xo