How we roll...

I went to the hospital to see my mom today with my sisters, Dana and Chris. As we passed through the glass corridor to my mom’s building we saw a man fall to the sidewalk, having a seizure. People looked at him but kept walking and even the man he was talking to actually stepped away from him and acted as if he didn’t notice him. In those moments I became numbly aware of everything around me, the people starting to stop in the hall, the color of the man’s sneakers, and the blue scrubs of the HUP nurse who finally noticed the man and flagged down a passing ambulance for assistance. As the events unfolded Chris banged on the glass of the corridor and yelled “Isn’t somebody going to do something? What is wrong with people?” As they loaded the injured man onto a gurney Dana turned and said “Lucky for him it happened in front of the hospital.” This event made me realize how differently my sisters and I react in difficult moments.

Dana sees the positive in any situation. She hears what the doctors’ say about my mom’s illness and of the 50 horrible consequences she holds on to the one positive outcome and carries it with her always. Her hope and faith are unwavering and I truly envy her and need her with me.

Chris, on the other hand, lashes out and gets angry. She doesn’t really mean it but everyone knows how to express anger, it’s an easy emotion. Worry is something different altogether, there is no release for worry, it just stays with you and eats at you until you turn it to something else. I like Chris’s anger; it makes me think and keeps me from quitting.

My sister Kelly is always strong, quick and efficient; she gets things done and has no time for the grey area. Her emotions are quickly felt and filed away where they belong before she moves to the next problem at hand. I find her rather amazing in her abilities and am so relieved when I see her come through my mom’s hospital door.

I am the one who puts myself in an emotional shut down while things are happening. I process events and pull out the information I need to make decisions and then save the emotional impact for late at night when I lay in bed and torture myself with the images of the day. Each night before my brain collapses from the exhaustion I whisper into the darkness, “Please God, don’t take my mom.”