Willothewisp

Judith Brain Surgery

“And here I am falling,
Oh why am I falling.
Take me to where I belong.
I’m standing here falling,
Before you falling.
If it weren’t for your wings I’d be gone.”

From the moment Judith went into hospital Nicky (8) and Hilke (9) were constantly on at me not to let her have any surgery until they were there when she was woken up afterwards. I have to confess that perhaps I did not pay as much attention at first as I should, wrapped up as I was in my own worries about Judith, but the increasingly difficult behaviour of my kids eventually forced me to take notice. So while I set about trapping six of the neighbourhood cats they had set to roaming the house and cleaning the whipped cream off the kitchen floor, units, walls and ceiling I spoke with the kids while trying not to scream at them. Having spent the last eleven years living at close quarters with first one then two hearing impaired people I am a little surprised that it has given me both an insight and at the same time left me somewhat insensitive to them and their world, but sometimes the rush of life can blind any of us.

After Judith’s last experience of waking from surgery the children had later asked their mother what made it so horrid and frightening for her. They were confused as they had been told by all the adults around them that their mother would be fine, that she was in “good hands” and yet they had seen what they had seen and were therefore confused. Eventually they asked her and Judith had told them that she hated it so much because the first thing she felt as she started to wake was that she was falling, plunging down at great speed and without any control. This was not just a physical feeling, but she felt like she was falling in her heart as well. It is a legacy of the destruction wrought to her hearing and balance centres twelve years ago of course. When that hammer smashed into her skull it destroyed a great deal.

When we go through a change in the state of consciousness our sense of hearing is the last thing to go and the first thing to come back as we go and so it provides some sort of anchor to our senses but, just what do you experience when that sense is as well totally gone, and layered on top is compromised vision ?

The answer it appears is that you feel like you are falling, falling a very long way. I am rather ashamed that it took my children to highlight this and demand to be with their mother as she woke so that maybe they could in some metaphorical way catch her. I spoke with Nonke, the child psychologist of our little group and she thought that given Nicky’s extreme sensitivity to Judith’s problem following the encounter with the English tourist that it would be a good idea to do just as they were asking. So then we contacted the nurses and doctors looking after her and “wake-up day” was carefully planned for when the children could be there.

Thirty hours after the surgery she was unhooked from ICU and taken to the neurology ward where she was brought up from the induced coma with Hilke and Nicholas either side of her clinging onto a hand each. Movies and TV always get it so wrong in their portrayals of waking from a coma. The heroine, hair and make up all perfect, flutter their eyelids and gracefully wake up. It is all very clean, very lady like and utterly false. Back in the real world there were naso-gastric tubes, central-lines, breathing tubes, drains and pressure sensors springing from her partially shaved head like some StarTrek cyborg. Waking up can be anything but pretty and dignified as the person chokes, coughs or vomits, sometimes waking up only to go straight into shock. No it is definitely not as shown on TV.

We had prepared the kids carefully to focus just on their mother not on what else went on around them. Then the agent to reverse the effects of the muscle relaxants was injected into the central IV line. As she started to wake and fight the ET tube it was swiftly removed. Normally at this point the patient would be talked to, told where they are and what is happening and about to happen in order to reduce the waking distress, but of course when you are deaf you have to be left to wake into confusion, disorientation and panic. Nicky was signing onto the palm of her hand and it did appear to work to some degree. Hilke was caressing her face and neck in the same way we had caressed and tickled all our children to calm and reassure them all their lives, it made me smile inside to see it. Considering that on previous occasions I have seen Judith wake fighting and screaming and kick a doctor so hard he became a patient himself this was a peaceful waking by comparison.

Then she was there, Judith was back. She was groggy, sore and not firing on all cylinders but she was definitely back, the rest would come over the next few hours and days but I was happy and relieved that the big hurdle had been cleared.

Then it happened – my heart was pierced.

I watched as Nicky signed to his mother that he and Hilke had been there, to stop her “Falling”. I saw the look of recognition cross her drawn face as then in slow and painful movements Judith replied in sign;

“Don’t worry [precious ones]. You are MY wings, and when you have wings you cannot fall”.

My heart felt like it was bleeding as the message of this little exchange swept over me. From my eight year olds seeing what I had not, to the realisation that for all Judith’s apparent inner strength she was in fact so totally reliant on the infallible and imperfect people around her, to my total pride in the empathy shown by the children. This was the beauty of the small moment born of love that I had just witnessed. The rewards of parenting really do come from those unexpected small moments of revelation – and for me at that moment it was almost too much bear.

It was not until late that evening back at the house on the Singelgracht that I cried. I had been recounting the day’s events to Nonke, Tyjardia and my sister in law Carol when Tyjardia got up and dropped her iPod into the HiFi dock. As the music played I listened, LISTENED – a privilege that I still have. As I absorbed the words of the song I dissolved into tears as I remembered my day and seeing Judith’s wings in action, helping prevent her falling. I often try and imagine the fears that life would hold for me if I were deaf and my sight inefficient. I could manage a day, maybe two, but a week, a month, a year, ten years ? I believe I would be looking for my wings very quickly indeed as fears and terror slowly tried to squeeze the life out of my life. I could understand her fear of falling now and her words to the children.

So, my thanks to the wonderful English folk singer Kate Rusby for expressing what I am sure Judith would express if she were able to still enjoy music, as well as my thanks to my little bundles of character and contradiction commonly referred to as my children. Between you all you gave a perfect moment of happiness and pain, yin and yang.

Falling by Kate Rusby (1.9mb download)

You heard me shout hear me shout when no one’s about,
You find me where I can’t be seen.
I feel the air flowing for life’s in full swing,
So tell me why I cannot breathe.

And here I am falling,
Oh why am I falling.
Take me to where I belong.
I’m standing here falling,
Before you falling.
If it weren’t for your wings I’d be gone.

Time moves on and time won’t be long,
In time I will fear not the day.
I’m endlessly knowing that you’ll never know
What I might want you to say.

And here I am falling,
Oh why am I falling.
Take me to where I belong.
I’m standing here falling,
Before you falling.ings I’d be gone.

My back it aches, my body it breaks;
To grow my own wings I have tried.
And painless I came no aim must remain,
Alone and adrift on the tide

But here I’m still falling,
Oh why am I falling.
Take me to where I belong.
I’m standing here falling,
Before you falling.
If it weren’t for your wings I’d be gone.

And here I’m still falling,
Oh why am I falling.
Take me to where I belong.
I’m standing here falling,
Before you falling.
If it weren’t for your wings

I hope Mevrouw Rusby will excuse my providing this track (albeit in much reduced quality). I urge you my dear readers to visit her web site, purchase (as I have done) her albums and help in some small way to promote her lovely talent

Kate Rusby on Amazon:
Amazon.de
Amazon.co.uk

Author: Nina

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