On March 3, 2010 my boys saw their father for the last time. I tried to prepare them but kids cannot grasp what it means to be intubated by handling the tubes prior to visiting. The boys just wanted to see their dad, to hug him, talk to him, to tell him to hurry up and come home. I'm not sure why I chose that night or why I even thought it would be a good idea because when the moment arrived I wanted to swoop them up and run. What had I done? Their last memory should not have been fear, tubes and machines. Poor Tommy, he was so excited. I can still see him bounding into the room, his happiness melting into horror as he stared at what used to be his indestructible father. He wanted so desperately to talk to him, to climb up into the hospital bed and "watch TV like I did the last time" but the lifeless body sustained by a breathing tube was too much for his young mind to process and he ran from the room crying "I'm afraid!, I'm afraid!" I had been numb for weeks but when I watched my little boy finally understand just how sick his father was something in me snapped. As I spiraled downward, our then 9 year old slowly approached the hospital bed with silent tears streaming down his face. Charlie leaned forward without hesitation, kissed his father on the forehead and said "good bye, dad. I love you". Darkness consumed me. I knew Chuck was crying inside that shell holding him hostage; cursing cancer and the pain it was causing his boys.
Charlie. How could someone so young be so astute? His courage that night continues to inspire me. When the routine of the MICU, the doctors, nurses, rounds, beeps, EKGs, EEGs, biopsies, PET scans, CAT scans, white counts or lack thereof become common place, you allow yourself to ignore the obvious. Observing Chuck thru Charlie's heartbroken eyes forced me to see what I refused to acknowledge since being told in November that the cancer had come back as a lymphatic tumor. Chuck was going to die. I knew well before it was ever discussed with his team of doctors that he was not going to make it but I tuned it out - refusing to see what was shown to me. My boys forced me back to reality. I remember thinking that night that I had ruined them, tainted their memory of Chuck and caused irreversible damage. But, as I sat head-in-hands with my back against the cold glass of the walkway windows connecting the MICU to the Children's hospital, I heard Tommy laughing. He was laughing. Forcing my head up, my vision clouded by tears laced with furry, I saw my little man's smiling face in mine asking if he could "sleep ova Gam's house" (those who know T know that "ova" is not a typo :). When I told him that he could, he hugged me said thank you and bounded away. Watching him was surreal; like a parallel universe. Tommy was wreaking havoc as always while Charlie was pensive and withdrawn, eyeing his brother with a new sense of responsibility. I know now that Charlie was born into this role and in that moment I screamed at a God I hardly knew. Why them? What did they do to deserve such pain and suffering? Why? Why? Why?!!!!! In time I would come to understand but right then I hated the God my husband embraced. What did his prayers get him? Nothing. The anger has diminished and is no longer directed at God but at what I view as a senseless loss. Faith eased my husbands fear and offered the unconditional love he had sorely lacked for most of his 34 years here on earth. For that I will be forever grateful.
Neither of my children have spoken of that night. Daily conversation and recollection has ensured their memories are centered on those moments they want to keep close, times shared that define their relationship with their father rather than those defined by TPLL. But still, they are so young, will memories dim; voices fade? This is Charlie’s greatest fear - that he will forget his dad.
These are the reasons why memories, good and bad, must be guarded from alteration. Our past is who we are, or were, depending on whether or not we chose to learn from it. Burying, revising, or omitting events that brought us to the place we now occupy does all involved an injustice. It is only by embracing who our loved ones were in life we are able to carry on their legacy with honesty, integrity and lots of laughter. My boys deserve nothing less.
