36 hours

On my oh-so-exciting weekend off with my husband that I have been waiting for all week, I came down with food poisoning (we think), and I have been sleeping almost non-stop. This morning I woke up early, the house nice and dark and quiet, with Adrian still sleeping. I had the scariest dream. I still do not have dreams about my mom that are happy and peaceful. I'm still having dreams about her dying or knowing that she will die or where she is already dead, and they are so scary and so real to me.

I remember a couple months ago I had a recurring dream that was in the form of a game show where I had to save my mom's life. We would re-wind to Tuesday night when we found out she had the infection, and then they would "release" me into the hospital to try to save her knowing that she was going to die Thursday morning if I didn't. I never could, and time would run out. And she would die. I'm pretty sure I have written about this dream before.

Last night, my dream was more like the movie "Saw," where I was given weird clues and riddles about where my mom was and how to save her. My time started on Tuesday night, and if I didn't figure it out in time, she would die on Thursday morning. I was in a huge castle, but not like a medieval castle. It was very modern and dark, and I was cold. I was in a chamber of some kind that held tons of electronic control panels for what appeared to be the whole house, controls for lights, doors, that sort of thing. There was a video screen. A movie started, and it was of my mom, her and I together, her and her sisters together, shots of memories playing over and over. Then the screen went black, and then re-appeared as a live shot of my mom, sick like she was in the hospital the night we found out about her infection, laying in a bed, in a room with nothing in it. She was screaming my name like she did in the ICU. The video didn't tell me what I had to do, but I already knew. That is so weird how your brain just knows in dreams. This room was slowly filling with water, and I needed to save her before the water got too high. I had 36 hours-Tuesday night to Thursday morning.

So I started to run all over the castle, searching for a control to the water in the room. Long story short, I figured out a clue that led me to the controls, which were right in front of the room. I had a large glass vase to break it with, and I couldn't see inside the room at all to know if I was too late. I raised the vase above my head and smashed the controls over and over again until all the lights on the control went blank. Water began to spew out from under the door of the room, and I knew that I had done it. I had saved her.

But then I just stood there, hesitating to go in. Enough water came out of that room to flood the hallway in front of it. What if the water did get too high, and it looked as though I was successful because it all came out but really I wasn't? I didn't want to find out. I didn't want to walk into the room and see her dead, knowing that I hadn't in fact saved her at all. My heart couldn't stand the thought of that, and I stood in front of the door for a long time.

Then I woke up. I woke myself up, like how you do when you're having a scary dream and you can't take it anymore. I couldn't stand the thought of failing her and knowing that I couldn't save her in time. Somehow, I knew that she was already dead, laying in the room among all of the water. I already knew.

I am sure, like the other "game show" dreams, that this is supposed to tell me that no matter what, this is how it all had to end. Nothing could have changed the fact that the infection could not be stopped. The drugs weren't strong enough and her body couldn't help her fight. We all had to stand there and watch, not being able to do one thing about it.

I wasn't even allowed to be with her while she screamed for me in the ICU. She could see me through the glass and she wanted me around her, not the nine nurses and doctors trying to help her. I should have gone in and at least held her hand but all I could do was stand there and watch them hook her up to things. She wanted me, not them. I should have gone in. There are so many things that make me so sad about what happened, and it's not just that she lost her life after such a battle. The fact that our visits were limited when they knew she was dying and the rules couldn't even be bent for a family that was actively losing one of their own. The fact that there was nothing anyone could have done for her, or the fact that we had to make the decision to "pull the plug," as our society likes to call the choice to end your own mother's life.

In my mind, she was already dead. That wasn't her. And when they stopped the IV's keeping her heart pumping, it stopped immediately. She really was already dead.

It did not matter how fast I found the controls to that room and broke them. It did not matter if I would have stopped the rising water. She was already gone, and I knew that without even having to go into that room.

I know my brain is trying to help me cope with the fact that I was helpless in this situation and that is just how it had to be. No one, not the nurses, doctors, the amounts of prayers sent up, could have helped her. She was far beyond help, and there was nothing that could change that situation. I know my body is trying to help me move on, I'm sure it is as sick of dealing with this as I am and it's trying to speed up the process. Despite the fact that it makes all the sense in the world and that the "game show" and "Saw" concepts are just a metaphor for what was really happening, the truth is that I understand what my brain is trying to tell me but it doesn't help me feel any better.

Maybe I can't let this go because I felt like I should have been able to help and I couldn't?

At my job, and in my schooling, I am taught to exhaust all options to help someone and to keep them as comfortable as possible. Serious measures are only taken when the need is obvious. I wouldn't just order a hole to be put in someone's stomach unless the need is really there, right? But, I would still do it if it would help them from dying. In my mom's case, I couldn't do anything for her and had to take a back seat and just watch it all unfold.

I was completely helpless.

As I ran through the corridors of the castle to find what I needed to save her, I was crying and yelling, "I would do anything for her. I would do whatever it takes to save her. Please don't let her die. I'll do anything." I kept saying things like this over and over again, hoping it would change whoever's mind was controlling the room with the rising water. It didn't work. No matter what I said, no matter how fast I released all of that water, it would do no good.

36 hours can completely change your life. Tuesday night to Thursday morning. 36 hours is all it takes for your whole world to be turned upside down. It took 36 hours for her to move from the Bone Marrow Transplant center to the ICU, for the pneumonia to completely wipe out her right lung, leaving her left to work for its life, for the infection to invade all of her organs. It took 36 hours for her kidneys to fail, her liver to fail, her heart to fail, and her lungs to fail.

36 hours is all it takes to realize that in this world, in the big scheme of things, we are not in control. We are completely helpless and left to stand and watch, for a big hand to slap you in your face back to reality. Prayers. Medicine. Breathing machines. They are not in control. None of us are. We are all helpless.

When it is time, it's time. 36 hours is all it takes to realize this, no matter how many times you play it over and over.