Someone’s very happy to go home
The final diagnosis was sepsis, but oddly this ended up being his shortest hospital stay yet. I’m relieved, not just because he’s home, but because the longer he’s in the hospital, the more opportunities there are for things to go sideways. Infections like COVID, more skin tears, more interventions that a fragile body simply doesn’t tolerate well. At one point, I stepped out of the ER for a moment to eat some chips, and when I came back he had a new, sizable skin tear because they were trying to draw labs. It’s no one’s fault, really…it’s just the reality of caring for an elderly body that bruises and breaks easily.
I want to mahalo everyone who reached out with love, concern, and quiet support. I started sharing pieces of this journey not because I need attention, but because caregiving is profoundly isolating. Having witnesses matters more than I ever expected it to. It reminds me that this isn’t something I’m carrying alone, even when it feels like it.
The first night in the ER was especially hard. I was waiting on a bench while they tried to get him settled enough for me to come back in, and at some point I just wept into my hoodie. The questions came fast and heavy: How am I going to do this again? I should have never gone back to work. I would have caught this sooner. Is this a sign that I shouldn’t have returned? If I leave now, at the beginning of the semester, maybe it wouldn’t be so disruptive… maybe they’d have time to find a replacement.
It was one of those moments where everything collapses inward, where fatigue and responsibility and fear all stack on top of each other. And then — quietly — it passed. Later that evening, the panic dissolved. Not because anything had been solved, but because the moment had moved through me.
I don’t know if that’s how pule works, or if someone’s love and light reached me in a very real way — a kind of unexpected Care Bear stare straight to the nervous system but I felt held. And sometimes, that’s enough to get through the next hour.
We’re home now. I’m tired, but grounded. Grateful for modern medicine, for moments of calm, and for the people who remind me that even in the most isolating seasons, I’m still seen.
