It's been a while since my last post; it's been a hellish few weeks. The last post I made my son was getting sick, and a few days after penning it, we went into the hospital for a week +. After we got out I spent some time trying to make up work for school, catching up with both my day and evening jobs.
Playing catch up is always fun when you're not prepared for it.
Then I lost internet access for a few weeks.. We're preparing to take him back to the hospital in the morning, which is a few hours away, but i'm not really ready to sleep. I got a post up on my other blog, and since I've been neglecting this one as well, I figured it was time for an update.
If anyone is curious, we found out that his condition was much worse than any of us had anticipated, and he has been preparing for a future surgery.
Now to the meat and potatoes.
Psychology is an art form. Hit or miss. Your either right or your wrong. There is no margin for error when your fucking with someone's mind. The consequences from a miscalculation could be devastating.
As has been obvious if you have been following along, there is a great deal of concern over the health of my youngest child. My wife, who suffers from bi-polar disorder (believe me when I say suffers), has not been dealing well with the situation; as to be expected. None of us have, but she has been taking it extremely hard.
The thing with bi-polar disorder if you are unfamiliar, is fluctuating emotions between different extremes in the spectrum. They are either extremely happy, or extremely sad, and it's hard for them to hit a middle ground. If you've ever met a genuine bi-polar person, you know what I mean. They're not psychotics screaming at bus stops and beating up old ladies as our cultural views and late night news would lead you to believe. They can be very manic and a mile a minute, or very sad and emotionally drained. My wife is of the type that spends most of their time depressed, or "hypo-manic."
How do you cope with the knowledge that there is a very good possibility that you will outlive your children? I honestly believe that it's harder knowing in advance. Why? Because you have hopes, fears, expectations, dreams, regrets and an entire plethora of other emotions to deal with while trying to maintain a facade that all is well while your insides are churning brimstone. You spend every waking moment going over in your mind what you can do to try and prevent something that may or may not even come to fruition.
Too much is on the line, including your sanity. Unfortunately, when a child is taken unexpectedly, that entire part of the process is removed from the equation. Your left dealing with the aftermath, there was nothing you could do to change the outcome. Not in every situation, I admit, but tearing yourself from the inside out before anything even happens is removed. Your left with keeping yourself together afterword, and dealing with the shock.
To help my wife deal with life in general, she seeks the services of a psychiatrist. This person helps her maintain her medication, which if you know anyone who actually lives with any type of clinical mental condition, it's quite a regimen. They also offer advice, help her to set goals, and try to help her maintain a stability.
If you know me, and if your reading this then I expect you at least know some of my views. You probably know that I struggle with religion, as does my wife. She is a lot more active than I am. She actually attends church, and is active within the community. Whereas I like to just dabble in the philosophical and theological aspects of the business.
Lately, my wife has been trying to deal with what I have dubbed the "what if" factor. What if he doesn't survive? What if he doesn't make it out alive? What if he doesn't get to experience love with another individual? What if he doesn't get to experience laughter only true friends can provide? What if he doesn't get to create a million summer time memories? What if he doesn't get to experience what life really has to offer? What if all of the sudden everything as we know it falls apart? What if we can't keep it together? What if?
It's quite a lot to take in. A conundrum you don't really want to spend time thinking about. But you cannot stop yourself, and you find that it's all you think about. The more you try to push it away, the more it creeps in when you least expect it.
She's been slipping back evermore into the recession known as depression. With her condition very bad things could happen. In an attempt to alleviate her distress, she has frequented her psychologist's office more often trying to seek salvation from her haunting distress.
In what I believe to be a very dangerous power move by her doctor in an attempt to help, they prayed together about my son and his well being. I don't mind that at all. Good for them. I find that most people find courage and inner peace after consulting with a higher being, and given support from others while doing so. I'm glad that the doctor had the conviction to do so and express this with my wife.
What I don't agree with is what he did next.
After they had said their prayer, he removed a cross on a string from his wallet and held it over a picture of my son. They watched transfixed as it floated delicately over the photo. They watched as it swayed to and fro, and spun in semi-circles above the photo. Appearing to move by it's on volition.
When the cross ceased to move further, and the spectacle finally ended, he had very exciting news for my wife. He confined to her that my child would live a long life, and that he would go on to father 2 children of his own; a boy and a girl. Needless to say, my wife left the office feeling very optimistic about life in general.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a complete pessimist, and I want to believe this just as much as she does, but I can't bring myself to. I have reality nagging on my neck. I want this to be the truth, I want to put all my chips in this basket, and ride my winnings all the way back home. But I can't. I am not ready to stop being afraid.
I cannot stop thinking about how I want this to not go south even more now than before, if that was even possible. I firmly believe that if something does happen to him, she will walk away from the one doctor she's ever trusted enough to take the advice from. She will be even more devastated because she has put all of her chips in that basket. She wanted to before, but someone finally gave her the validation that she so desperately needed before doing so. If this power move did not work, I fear she may never recover.
She believes so desperately that I have found myself trying to support her with this against my own judgement. I just hope more than anything that I can openly admit that I was wrong about something and mean it.
