DR’s father passed away yesterday at 7:32am. Da has left us.
We spent the entire night at his bedside while a respirator and way too many IV tubes kept him without pain as his tired body was shutting down, and I couldn’t help to be absolutely reminded of the same events 3 years ago when my own dad passed, sitting in a dark room, looking at a monitor flashing heart rate numbers, blood pressure rate numbers, trying to make sense of it, what could be considered good, what could be considered bad… I had my own dad in mind, and this was doubly painful as I’ve come to consider Da my second father. He was that loving.
Da and I shared a very sarcastic sense of humour and he often made me laugh. This is a recount of our very last conversation:
At 4:20, after having left my office after work, I had made plans to go see Da at the hospital. DR was working late and couldn’t come. Everything was good as we had seen him at 7am that morning and were very hopeful that he’d be going home that same day anyway. I walked into his room only to find an empty bed, newly changed and made. I took a look at the name board, his was gone. I thought to myself that it was a good thing, he had probably been released since he had been eating for 2 days and hadn’t had the need for an IV drip for the same amount of time. Usually he was in the hospital for 4 days when he had pancreatic episodes, this time was 9 days, so he was probably fine. I turned and walked to the nurse station to ask if Da had been released. She looked at her book and said he had been transferred to a room on the 9th floor, that I could go inquire there.
A bit surprised, I made my way to the 9th floor and remembered that the doctor who had been visiting him regularly had mention that he’d prefer seeing him on the 9th as it was where his office and other patients were… I felt a bit of a relief as I walked towards that nurse station, but still anxious. After a few minutes of listening to nurses chat about their lives, I finally cleared my throat and one of them begrudgingly asked if she could help. I told her who I was looking for and she gave me the info. I walked into the room and was shocked to find 3 doctors and 1 nurse fussing about Da on his bed… A heart monitor had been reconnected and it was beeping like crazy. One doctor said: “ok, the best thing for you to do right now is to just relax. You’re heart is going way too fast and we need to quiet it down a bit”. I turned to the nurse and asked if it was ok for him to read and she replied that she really only wanted him to clear his mind of everything and simply relax. I asked if I should leave and she said that I was welcomed to stay.
I looked at Da and he mouthed the word FUCK! with a face that said how annoyed and tired he was of this situation. We started chatting about what had happened and he explained that a technician had pressed on his chest during some test and he had had problems breathing since. We were interrupted several time during our talk by people fussing about, asking him about pain, discomfort, how he felt… Then one nurse came in and told him she was giving him nitro and would be spraying it under his tongue. After that was done, he looked at me and rolled his eyes in annoyance.
I wasn’t sure what to do, I didn’t know if I should call DR or stay to see what the Doctors had to say… That’s when Da turned to me and asked me to look inside his shoe to find his watch so I could put it on his wrist for him, explaining they had taken it off before the last test he had gone through earlier. I reached down for the shoe, found the watch as my eyes filled up with tears. I don’t know what came over me, I suck at these situations sometimes. With my vision blurred, I started fooling around with the watch band, trying to fasten it around his wrist. After I finished, I stepped back and leaned against the window sill as he took a look at his wrist to see the time. Approximately 10 seconds later, he looked at me and said: “When you have a chance, it’s no rush, can you put it on the right way so I can tell what time it is?”
I had no choice, I started to laugh as two tears rolled down my cheeks.
After that, the heart monitor wouldn’t stop beeping like a banshee and a second nitro dose was sprayed under his tongue. I asked one doctor if I should be leaving and he said that it would probably best as they were going to take him down for a scanner in a few seconds to make sure it wasn’t a blood clot near his lungs that was making all this happen. Da heard too. I looked at him, and for some reason unknown to me since I’ve never done that in my entire adult life, I smiled and blew him a kiss and waved goodbye. He nodded and I could see some fear in his eyes. I left the room and went straight for the elevator. I stopped midway, leaned against the wall and let it all out.
I’m glad I’ve had the chance to know him well and share a lot of our lives together in the last 8 years. I’m glad I had the chance to be by his side last night letting him know he was surrounded by people who really loved him.
This man will be missed so much, not only by his family but by an amazing amount of friends in this community. What a lovely legacy to leave behind.
Da and the DR’s Werewolf, last Halloween
