There and Back Again

We spent most of last week in Colorado. Here's a recap.

Ever since my brother fell down the stairs on May 30th, we'd had regular contact with my parents on his condition. We talked to them on Friday and Saturday, and each time things looked stable. We didn't talk to them on Sunday, but given that things had seemed to be moving in a positive direction, we didn't worry about it much.

On Monday morning (June 4th), I got a phone call from my Mom. She said that things had taken a turn for the worse with A (my brother's first initial, to protect privacy and all that). Still in the coma, he had become unresponsive, and an electroencephalogram (EEG) taken over the weekend showed practically no brain activity. To all appearances, the life support machines were all that was keeping him alive. "If you want to see him," she told me, "you'd better come now."

So Nancy and I made all the necessary arrangements with our respective employers—I was supposed to have started back with the market research company that afternoon as their new Quality Assurance manager—and left Salt Lake City at about 2:15. The drive across southern Wyoming was all I have come to expect it to be. Let me just borrow a bit from S. Morganstern and say that what with one thing and another, eight hours and 495 miles passed. We rolled into Mom and Dad's house around 10:30.

It was too late to see A that night, and to be honest, I just wasn't ready. So we went to the hospital with Mom & Dad the next morning. A's wife J was there and looked like she had been for a while. She's been really strong through all of this. I know it's hard for her, but she's handled it amazingly well. Anyway, that's when I finally got my first look at A. He didn't look good. Of course, all the tubes in his mouth and nose and all the wires attached to him didn't help, but I could hardly recognize him as my brother. His whole face was red and swollen, and his left eye was bruised shut. His face was still and expressionless. About the only thing I did recognize was that moustache he's had almost continuously since he was about 13. It wasn't easy to see him like that.

Fortunately, he was in one of the newest and best hospitals in the state of Colorado, the Medical Center of the Rockies. It's kind of ironic; a couple of years ago, he was working for the engineering company that was designing the hospital. I remember him showing me plans for the electrical systems and ductwork. Now he's staying there.

When we visited him again that afternoon, someone was already there preparing him for another EEG. We watched in a sort of morbid fascination as the lady attached dozens of wires all around his head, then in quiet curiosity as she administered the test. I'm no expert in electroencephalography, but he didn't seem to be very responsive to me. On several occasions, she took a few moments to type something into the computer after a round of stimuli were administered. I didn't see any of it, but Mom told me later that she saw her type in 'Optic nerve damage' at one point. Anyway, we left once the tests were concluded. A was scheduled to go into surgery later that afternoon for a tracheostomy and to get a feeding tube inserted.

He looked a lot more familiar On Wednesday when we went to see him. With the trachea tube and feeding tube in place, his face was clear of all obstructions. The swelling had gone down, too. And the news was encouraging as well; A was now breathing on his own. He was still receiving oxygen from his tube, but he was no longer being ventilated. It was the first good news we'd had in a couple of days. Mom and Dad were in Colorado Springs that day for Dad's aunt's funeral, so when Mom called to see of we'd made it to the hospital yet, I gave her the news. She was amazed, and a few minutes after hanging up with her, Dad called back just confirm what I'd told Mom.

We spent that afternoon with A's daughters (and my nieces) M and J. They were leaving with their mom and stepdad the following day for a weeks-long trip to see other relatives, so this was the only time we could really see them. We went to the Cozy Cow Dairy for ice cream and cheese curds, then took the girls to see Shrek the Third. We got back to my folks' house just after they did and had dinner with them, my brother S, his girlfriend K, his longtime friend and business partner AC, and AC's son T. We had dinner together, then the kids (including me) got out the Legos and built spaceships and other vehicles. Fun.

My uncle Cal and my aunt Liz came up to see us and A on Thursday. Uncle Cal is one of the few other members of the LDS Church on either side of my family; in fact, Cal was the one who baptized me when I joined the Church in 1982. I had talked to J the night before about giving A a priesthood blessing. I explained the process to her as best I could, and once she had been reassured that we wouldn't be giving him Last Rites, she said she wasn't opposed to it. So Cal anointed him and I sealed the anointing. It was an honor to stand there and exercise the Priesthood with him, knowing he was a large part of the reason I could do it at all. I've had the opportunity to give blessings to Granny and Mom in recent years, and it's always hard for me to do. I have to be very, very careful to listen for promptings from the Spirit and not just to say what I want to say. This was the hardest one I've ever had to do, I think. I never really remember what I've said once it's over, but Mom told me I'd blessed him with rest and patience. We stayed and talked for a while afterwards, and the Liz and Cal had to go on to other obligations. It was good to see them again, despite the situation. It was also nice for them to have a chance to meet Nancy. Nancy got to meet several new people this trip.

By the time we saw A on Friday, he was off all pain medication and was no longer being sedated. He was still not awake, but was showing increased signs of activity. J told us that Thursday evening when the nurse was giving him a sponge bath he opened both eyes. Then when he was being shaved, he opened one eye. When the neurologist tried to get him to open his eyes, he was unsuccessful. J told him, in so many words, "You're not a girl giving him a bath. Why would he open his eyes for you?" That sounds more like my brother. A also seemed to react to the shirt my Mom was wearing that day. Whether it was the stripes or the movement, or whether he just sensed that it was Mom, I don't know, but his movements seemed more pronounced and purposeful. We saw brother S and presumed future sister-in-law K again Friday night and introduced them to Ticket to Ride. Nancy won, and I finished second to last. People kept building where I needed to build, so I lost a lot of points for uncompleted routes.

By Saturday morning, A's condition had improved to the point that Nancy and I felt we could safely go back to Salt Lake City. So we made plans to return that afternoon so that we could have Sunday to recover before jumping back into the routine on Monday morning. Before that, however, Nancy had the chance to meet someone else new to her, my old friend Dilliwag. He and his family were making their annual visit from Iowa to Colorado, so we got to see them for a couple of hours. In addition to seeing D and his wife STK, we finally to meet TLO. Cute, cute kid! He slept through most of our visit together, which D tells me is not the usual case, but nonetheless, a cute kid.

Once D, STK, and TLO were on their way, we packed up our stuff and headed to the hospital for one more visit with A. He was much more responsive that day. We spent about half an hour with him, taking turns holding his hand and talking to him. He still wasn't speaking, but his eyes would follow our movements and he would look from one of us to the other. He would reach out to each of us and switch from one to the other every so often. He played with my watch and even walked his fingers up my arm once. He was much more like my brother than the broken, motionless stranger we'd seen just a few days before.

After a quick visit to Qdoba for lunch—the Colorado stores no longer carry the chicken mole burrito, to Nancy's great disappointment—we were on the road. We took Highway 287 from Fort Collins to Laramie, where we stopped to top off the gas. As I was filling the tank and washing the bugs off the windshield, I noticed what I thought was a bead of water that had run down the side of the left front tire. Closer inspection revealed a 6" gash in the sidewall of the tire. We were fortunate to spot it, because that tire would never have made it the remaining 400 miles to SLC, and a blowout at 75 miles per hour (~120 kph) would have been catastrophic. So we took about 45 minutes and changed the tire. Thank heaven Granny'd kept a full-sized spare in the trunk! A donut would have left us in a real lurch, as there's no way it would have taken us all the way to Utah. After that, the trip home was long but otherwise uneventful. We got home about 12:15 Sunday morning.

Since we arrived home, we've heard more updates on A. Mom told me that J gave him a kiss at the end of her visit a couple of days ago, and he kissed back. He's been even more responsive to Mom than last week. And on Wednesday, they moved A out of the ICU and down to Denver into a long-term rehab facility.

It's going to be a long road back for him. He landed on the left side of his head, and he hasn't had a lot of movement on the right side of his body. It's impossible, at this point, to predict how long rehab may take, or how much of his functionality he'll be able to recover. He may never—probably will never, if the doctors are to be believed—be 100% again. But at one point, the doctors didn't think he'd even make it this far. Long story short, we went to Colorado expecting to go to my brother's funeral and ended up not having to do so. Better yet, in the wake of all of this, our family is closer and more united than we've been in a long time. Miracles really do arise from tragedy.

Many of you have expressed hope and good wishes and prayers for my brother and my family over the past couple of weeks. Thank you, thank you, thank you all so much. I don't have the words to express how much that has meant to us all. We are blessed to have so many good people who love us. We couldn't have made it through all of this without you.