The Real OG's

10 years after ‘The First One’. But Bigger.

It was Saturday, and I woke up late. Per usual, I heard D cough from the couch where he has slept for a year and a half now and that was my sign to take a deep breath. I worked in the yard for a bit, then applied for a couple of jobs, made a grocery list, and checked emails. By 2 pm, I still hadn’t seen him, and that was not normal. I went inside and silence; he was lying on the living room floor, so I took a deep breath and promised myself I wouldn’t yell. I made noise and he sat straight up. He had the same look on his face that we see every weekend: the bellyache face. Of course. Here we go.

“Please don’t put us through another weekend like this! Why can’t you just do what you say you’re gonna do?”

He promised me he would clean the trash area outside and help me with the “deck .” He’s so full of broken promises.

Usually, when he gets a bellyache, it’s because he ate too much sugar (he has diabetes and will not take his meds) and spends a good portion of the day smelling up the first-floor bathroom. This is our typical weekend vibe.

He promised he would be better; he would try. I yelled something like, “Stop acting like a teenager and get up!” He didn’t yell back, and he laid back down on the floor. Making a loud “grr” noise, I just wanted to cry, but nothing ever came out anymore. I wanted to scream at him, but there was really no point anymore. Why? It does no good.

He still didn’t yell back.
I kept moving around, cleaning, you know, a million things to do and no one else was moving.

I’m always busy. If it’s not in the office, it’s at home cleaning. I get so tired.

Trying to come up with new ways to get him off his ass was becoming a challenge. After changing the laundry and putting dishes away, I listened. Nothing. I peeked back in the living room, and he wasn’t getting off the floor.

He would move but then lie back down and close his eyes. Finally, I called Kee because I was about to freak out on him. For the tiniest millisecond, I thought about the what if, but no – I wasn’t going to panic no matter what my gut was feeling. I would just get confirmation from Kee that I was about to do the right thing. He’ll just look like a liar in front of the paramedics.

You see, Derek’s stubbornness is unprecedented. It has almost cost him his marriage and his family, and every time we have a “heart-to-heart” (now involving Kee as a mediator of sorts), he says we’re right; he needs to try harder and do better. And every weekend, we’re back to the same thing. This has been the trend for years now. Just last week, I was going through old planners and noticed how many times I had made a note that he “slept all day” or “did nothing all weekend.” This was another weekend of disappointment. But… usually, he has his phone’s TV on. It wasn’t on Saturday.

When I explained what was happening to Kee, almost immediately, he said,

“Mom, call 911.”

I was almost positive that D was doing this out of stubbornness but if that was the case then he’d sure look silly pretty soon. I was being a bitch; I had quietly cussed a few times before I quietly offered one more out,

“Derek, you literally have 10 seconds before I dial 911. I’m not playing.”

He didn’t object. So I called 911.

The operator asked me to have him show me his smile, which I knew to do because this wasn’t our first rodeo. I knew he was – for lack of a better word – faking. That’s when he started making noise like he was yelling but no words came out. And that’s when I got some eye contact. His eyes didn’t look…right. I couldn’t tell you specifically what I noticed, but that look sent panic to my core. No!

The sirens were loud, but everyone was super fast and before I knew it, they were telling me they would meet me at the hospital. I just stood there and couldn’t believe they were taking my faking husband to the ER. No objection from him, no “I’m fine, Jennifer!”

Kee didn’t get off when he was supposed to and instead issued an SOS. Sophie and Jackson left Jackson’s graduation party to come pick me up and get me to the hospital. I couldn’t drive. But SOS was serious shit. It meant, stop what you’re doing RIGHT NOW and help. NOW. When we got to the ER it didn’t take long for the “spiritual guide” to usher me back to Derek’s room. Reminders of 2015 clouded my memory and that panic kept me on high alert. At the same time, I am pissed off. Years. For YEARS the kids and I have told him,

“Take care of yourself. Take your meds. Don’t eat that! You can’t have that you have diabetes! Quit smoking so much.”

The list goes on, and years of non-compliance have led us to this point. Period. He knew it. We knew it.

And this is where we are.

I looked for his eyes in a room full of doctors and nurses – again. But his eyes wouldn’t open, and his whole right side tensed up so much I thought he was having a heart attack. Unlike in 2015 when he tried to talk to me but his jaw was locked, there were no attempts this time, no words. No eye contact.

The doctor told me to speak with the neurologist, who was positioned on a TV screen at the foot of D’s bed. I was supposed to explain to the TV what had happened, what meds he takes, what time I last saw him normal, and what residual effects were left over from his first stroke (the 2015 shocker when he was 34 years old).

Then they laid it on me:

Massive stroke.

Not only did we have another stroke, but it was also in the same part of the brain as before. This time, much larger. With “unusual swelling,” the doctors needed a consult, and we were losing precious time. The University of Iowa Hospital is the stroke expert, so that’s where they were taking him. I started to shake my head…

“Wait, what?”

Anger and fear hit me hard and fast. I looked at him, wanting to smack him, or something, maybe scream at him to wake up and stop faking…but I felt
sick, light-headed. My chest hurt, and not in a metaphorical way – I needed to keep my shit together and not break down. They sedated him to stop his seizures.

Not again. Please, God – not this family.

Then Mom was there telling me to breathe. Deep breath.

Between breaths, I told her what they had told me. Then things moved fast. They were going to life-flight my husband down because an ambulance speeding with lights and sirens wasn’t fast enough. The doctor grabbed my hand and assured me,

“They are equipped to perform emergency surgery right away if it will save his life.”

In the UIHC ER, Kee and I sat with my parents and we waited. And waited. Listening to my mother and father detail how Derek and I should and shouldn’t be living, I finally checked with the nurse for an update. Not even 2 minutes later, the resident doctor asked if he could speak with me – in the hall.

Fuck.

Derek had a massive stroke, and they were worried about what was left and quality of life. They needed to perform a craniotomy. That’s when they surgically remove a piece of bone called a bone flap from the skull. This allows the swelling of his brain to go up and out instead of swelling down and pushing into his lungs and airway, suffocating him. They needed to move now to save his life.

I am sure it was hard for Derek to survive that operation because I don’t know how Kee and I managed to make it through that horrid waiting game in the dark, family waiting room outside the SNICU.

Four hours later, the neurologist explained that surgery was a success, but that came with a dire warning. The area this stroke affected was 10 times larger than his first, and there was a significant amount of damage to his brain tissue.

This time, he may not ever be able to communicate with us again.

He may be paralyzed on his right side.

He may suffer from seizures for the rest of his life.

He could be a vegetable.

Pictures of his MRIs from the first one showed a black hole about the size of a golf ball on the left side of his brain. This stroke covered the entire left side.

If one more person told me how much larger this stroke was compared to his last….

His brain was also bleeding when they went in, which was new. Doctor prepared us for the absolute worst and reminded us about quality of life. They put him in a medically induced coma to stop the seizures. It was crucial to keep his blood pressure under control and prevent infection.

The timeframe to get him out of the woods was 3-5 days, when the swelling would peak and his life would no longer be in jeopardy.

So we waited.