Covid

To Quote Jim Croce

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“Guess that it was bound to happen… was just a matter of time.” However, unlike Jim, I am not referring to a broken relationship but to Covid-19. Both DrB and I tested positive today.

I had a long run of avoiding the C19, two and half years. I traveled during the peak infection periods to Texas many times as my mother’s health was failing. I flew to Texas in September of 2020, passengers were seated in every other seat, full masks for the five hour flight, no food and no Bloody Marys at 30,000 feet! The only alcohol was canned beer or canned wine and that only in first class. Talk about flying anxiety! I felt for those people who relied on that to calm their nerves. I went back in January 2021 when she was hospitalized again, I went on Mother’s Day and again a week later to say goodbye. All while infection rates were high but I remained healthy.

There has been so much controversy about this virus, its origins, the vaccines and the treatments. The firestorms surrounding these issues could leave one with their head spinning. What to believe, who to trust, what is the right decision? I struggle with all of these and more. I was apprehensive about getting the vaccine. I prayed about it. I had only ever gotten the flu shot once in my life and I got it in 2013 because I was caring for my ill and immune compromised son. However, I have never known someone who died from the flu; but sadly, I knew several that died from covid. For that reason, and because I would not want to pass the virus to my son, I opted to get the shot, (see my post “God’s Kiss,” March 2, 2021) and I got the second, and I got the first booster and I got the second booster.

Even though I did get the vaccine, I believed and still believe it is a personal choice. Unfortunately for some there was a price to pay. Deep down I feel natural immunity is superior, however to get to that point could be hazardous and with this virus it seems no one was assured of the outcome. Would it be a mild case or a harsh one? The vaccine, as well, had risks for some, would it be effective, would there be a bad reaction, could it cause deaths? So many unknowns.

Life is full of “unknowns” and the older I get the more apparent and real that fact becomes. I don’t know what the next minute, or hour or day will bring. The more I see in life the more I understand that so much, whether it be joy or sorrow is out of my control. I may control the little things but the state of the world, illness or good health, life and death, or the future — these things are not in my control (sorry to say but not in yours either). So live each day as it might be your last and look to the future as if you have years and years ahead of you. Come what may, life is a gift.

My future for the next five days is quarantined with DrB and as many know that is a challenge in itself and I should add, he told me there no need to discuss who brought this virus home, so I won’t. So far it is looking weak, just some congestion, cough and sore throat. I might just make it through with a mild case.

In the meantime remember, that person wearing a mask may be immune compromised or have a loved one that is, and the person without one feels confident and free. Those who chose the vaccine had good and valid reasons and those who did not have the same. They made their decisions based on their beliefs and both groups based their decisions on risks they are willing to take.

As always be kind to one another. Everybody is going through some silent trial and kindness can make a heavy trial considerably lighter.

The Travelin’ Man

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Those of you who know my husband will understand. He is a motivated, driven, hard working never going to stop kind of man. Some would say a workaholic but to him his work is his passion, it challenges him and it keeps him going and he loves what he does.

Below is a post from 2015 and it is even more relevant today.

Once again he is home safe. Chrissie has always traveled a lot, I teased once that I’ve lived in Seattle 30 years but he’s only been here 15! It became common for him to be gone often. However, it seems now that whenever he is away, I am more concerned that he is well and taking care of himself and I am more thankful when he makes it home safely.

So you get the picture, he travels a lot and he works a lot. His last trip overseas was February 2020, just at the beginning of the Covid pandemic. Five days before returning home he became sick with what he felt was food poisoning. By the morning of his trip home he was pretty well depleted of everything as you can imagine after three days of dysentery. It was a grueling trip back, and because the food poisoning caused his GI track to react in a fiercely negative fashion, he neither ate or drank during the trip. Well that was a recipe for disaster, I picked him up from the airport and took him to an urgent care facility, who then in turn sent him to the Emergency Room. It was food poisoning caused by E-coli and Campylobacter infections which caused him to become extremely dehydrated (along with the no fluids on the flight). All of this sent him into acute renal failure and he spent four days in the hospital.

So in 2020 I was very thankful he made it home, albeit in rough shape. Then Covid hit and all travel came to a grinding halt.

While he was home all this time, from February 2020 to November 2021, he did not lay idle. As I said, he likes to stay busy and if he has 15 minutes of free time he’ll find an hours worth of work to cram into it. He became interested in the local homeless shelter organization. He eventually accepted a position on their Board and worked to help them find solutions to expand their capacity during the covid pandemic.

Last week was his first overseas trip in 20 long months. Believe me, he had been trying to organize me too and I was actually looking forward to a little “down time.” Although the covid outbreak in Eastern Europe was high, Chris had been fully vaccinated and received his booster in September.

Off he went into the skies. Traveling again but armed with tools for sanitizing and many cautionary words of advise from his dear wife. He arrived safely on Sunday and then on Tuesday he became ill. Almost a repeat of 2020 – this time it went on for five days. On Thursday he went for his required covid test to reenter the US, it was NEGATIVE, so he was going to try and get home.

He made the first leg of his journey, a five hour flight to Amsterdam and when he got off the plane he was nearly too weak to walk. His traveling companion, who was headed to Detroit, helped him to the KLM Lounge. He tried eating and drinking but his heart was racing and he was short-of-breath. After a very worrisome phone call, I called the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol. I asked for the medical clinic and a very kind doctor answered in Dutch. I asked, “Do you speak English?”

“Yes of course” he replied. Of course he did, according to Language on the Move, 77% of people in the Netherlands are trilingual. In my panicked tone I explained the issue. He calmly told me to have someone from the KLM Lounge bring him over. The compassionate and concerned ladies at the KLM lounge took him in a wheelchair to the Medical Center – Schiphol. The medical staff there quickly assessed him and administered three bags of IV fluids. After four hours he was feeling a boost from that and was ready to go. The clinic wheeled him back to the KLM Lounge where they rebooked him on a flight home for the next day. They then took him to the hotel within the airport where he rested and spent the night.

The next morning, he woke up not feeling quite as well as he did after the IV fluids but because they had booked him on a direct flight to Seattle in First Class, he thought he could make the trip home. I was still very anxious about the whole situation but getting home was the thing that was driving him to press on. It was a long, long night. I kept tracking the flight and my heart skipped a beat when it no longer showed on the tracker, however it was due to the fact they were out of range over Greenland and Northern Canada. I tried texting him as some airlines offer free texting via iMessage but it was radio silence for ten agonizing hours.

When I arrived at the airport he showed up after only a few minutes due to the fact he cleared Customs with his Global Entry status. I have to say, he did not look as bad as I expected, although he was sweating profusely. We left the airport and went straight to the hospital skipping the urgent care step this time. After five hours we left the ER, we discovered he had similar issues as before but added inflammation and infection in his colon; again acute kidneys injury (although not as bad as 2020, I think due to the fluids he received at Schiphol) and again E coli plus giardia lamblia infections. The doctor said that because of his age they would ordinarily keep him to continue IV fluid so insure his kidneys recovered, but hospitals are not the safest places these days. We came home with two different antibiotics and stern instructions to return if he did not improve.

So there it is. Once again he made it home and although not completely safe, he had the prayers of friends I had called during my panic and guardians along the way to help him. Quite possibly guardian angels. He has plans to travel to Israel in three and half weeks. All I can do is pray he makes it home safely which is what I have done for the past thirty-nine years. I tried telling him that although he feels 35 his body is 70. He’s not buying it.

God’s Kiss

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This morning I received my first Covid19 vaccine. My appointment invitation came through my doctor’s office on January 19, and was scheduled at an affiliate hospital. Three days before my original appointment date, I received an e-mail to say they had cancelled my appointment to prioritize second doses. A second e-mail informed me the vaccination was rescheduled two weeks away and the location had been move to the Microsoft campus in Redmond. When it comes to change with things I am uncomfortable with in the first place, I do not react well. This was no exception.

Now generally, I am not a conspiracy-prone type of person. However, there is so much good/bad and true/false information out there, it leaves one struggling about what to believe or who to trust. First of all, I have several friends and acquaintances who for moral and/or religious reasons are adamantly opposed to the vaccine and they had been bombarding my mailbox with videos from every well meaning, self-proclaimed expert and God-fearing prophet in the ether. Secondly, I am 65 and I have only ever gotten one flu shot and that was only because I was caring for my son who was extremely ill and immune compromised. I am not an anti-vaxer; I am cautious about foreign substances in my body and even the “experts” have changed their stories. Finally, I do believe God sends us signs and messages and I have been praying for answers. When the original appointment was cancelled then moved further away to a campus that has thousands of people, I began to question whether or not I should go. Maybe it is a sign I should not, and I have had the past two weeks to fret over the issue.

Awake at 4 AM, I go downstairs to search out some final truth about this vaccine. I send a Whats-app message to a friend in Israel who has received the vaccine in hopes of gleaning some knowledge from her. She messaged back that the congregation there is online streaming a worship service. I tune in and was encouraged by the message and song. Then I searched for a God-lead perspective and I find an organization that I trust. This organization had a podcast that discussed the vaccine, the origins of the cell-lines used to test it and the moral ethical issues surrounding the use. The video that followed that one was from ZDoggMD, a doctor I have listened to in the past who has a podcast where he openly and honestly gives easy to understand explanations on medical issues. I listen to his podcast and his experience with the vaccine and why many, as he himself did, have a stronger reaction to the second dose.

By this time I have decided to go to the appointment at Microsoft and take everything one step at a time.

As you can imagine, the vaccination center there was very, very organized. People greeted me warmly at the door as I walk into a sectioned off area with attendants in plexiglass booths. They ask to see the QR Code that was sent, took my temperature and gave me a sticker to wear that says, “I’ve been screened.” (Later when it in a mirror notice it is upside down…I was in a a daze and my glasses weren’t on). I was sent down a long roped off hallway to the next check-point where they again ask to see the QR Code on my phone. Another person greeted me and took me into a room with ten plexiglass booths, where I was asked to verify my name and address, show my ID and the QR code again. When I finished I was directed to the entrance of large room with about thirty vaccination stations; there I was escorted to one of the stations, each manned with a nurse and a tech (also encased in plexiglass). The tech verified my QR Code again and the nurse greeted me and asked my name.

Now this is were things get interesting. I smile and although we all have masks on, I can see she smiles back. I tell her that I am very apprehensive about getting this vaccination. This nurse, Kim, is so kind and understanding; she tells me not to worry that I have an old nurse that she has retired from Swedish Hospital (we discover later she is really not that old… just a few months younger than me.) I tell her my son is in Swedish Hospital right now with a bowel blockage. She says she had a blockage and a resection once and that she knows all the GI’s down there.

As she starts to name names, I ask, “Do you know Dr Menon?”

She replies, “Oh my gosh he is the sweetest man.” (I agree, in many of my stories from 2013, I talk about what a guardian angel he was when my son was so very ill.)

She tells me she was in charge of the ER in the hospital where Dr. Menon did his residency and she says half jokingly that she trained him. We go on to have this semi-Love-Fest conversation about Dr Menon. I get her name and tell her I will let him know that I saw her.

The final step in this journey is waiting in a large conference room for the prescribed 15 minutes to pass to insure there is no adverse reaction to the vaccine. Ten numbered rows, ten chairs each spaced six feet apart. By time I reach my chair I am elated. All my anxiety and angst have flown away. Was this a coincidence? Or was it confirmation that even in the littlest things in life, God knows our hearts and cares for us? He, in the most amazing way, set up the plan to put my mind at ease and comfort me.

I was going to title this “God’s Care and Love – Part II” but when I got back to the office I messaged my friend in Israel to tell her the story. She replied, “Wonderful story! God kissed you today!”

Yes, yes He did.

Life and Loss

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Life is trying these days. So much adjusting. Adjusting to a virus that has us second guessing each move. A virus that takes its greatest toll on the elderly — in loss of life and in loss of emotional support.

As I have written before my mother is in a nursing home facility in Texas. A facility that’s 2000 miles from me. I was visiting once every couple of months but once this virus hit I have been unable to visit. The facility was locked down on March 12.

Since that time I noticed a decline in my mother’s health, her mental health and physical. Every phone call she ask when I’m coming to see her. Every phone call I tell her no one can visit because of the virus. Every phone call I tell her the virus is everywhere.

She began asking about different family members and saying she was worried about them. She would say things like, “I wonder if they’re dead. Are they dead?”

One person she asked about often was her cousin Gladys, they were as close as sisters. A few months ago I was talking to my mother on an early Sunday morning and she asked those questions about Gladys.

Gladys lives in North Carolina. Only six months younger than my mother she has no dementia and lives a full life. So that morning I called Gladys then called my mom back and set up a three-way call. They talked for 45 minutes laughed and giggled just like schoolgirls. It was so sweet and Gladys was so patient with my mother as she repeated the same questions over again. The questions were mostly about the present because the past my mother remembered fully.

Sadly yesterday, I learned that Gladys had passed away, a casualty of the COVID-19 virus. Such a great loss to her family. She full of energy, so loving and giving to all around her. I loved to hear her speak, her southern accent so much like my grandmother’s in the way she called me darling drawn out into a melodic – “Daah-lynn’.”

Now I am faced with a choice as to whether I should tell my mother. One side of me leans toward not telling her. Her mental decline has been so noticeably great since this lock down. The other side of me faces the same old question can I/should I lie when she ask about her?

After am e-mail exchange with the social worker, Christy, (she is an angel on earth) I decide I will not tell her. Christy tells me my mother has days when she will have a moment of clarity and remember the loss of her step-son earlier this year. She mourns all over again and it takes days for her to recover. Just deflect the question or tell her Gladys is fine. I have decided on the latter.

After all, Gladys is fine, she is more than fine. She is in the Heavenly realms with her maker and the lover of her soul. They will meet again one day.

Unclear Vision

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2020 Vision
A perfect sight they say
But this year
That is 2020
Didn’t turn out that way.

Winter’s end turned to spring
And started with great hope,
Sadly spiraled downward,
When people started buying
All the TP and soap.

The virus that at first
We were told was not a worry,
Soon showed it had a deadly side.
The future became uncertain
More crazed, weird and blurry.

The message came,
Fifteen days to slow the curve.
With lockdown it was slowed
But days grew into months
Which cause many to unnerve.

Keeping a six foot distance
Our faces fully masked,
Lest we make a human touch.
Following all the protocols
Doing what was asked.

One tragedy upon another
A murder lit a fuse
Protests turned to violence
Lawlessness arose
The situation to abuse

Phases of reopening
Now we’re into summer
This has become a waiting game
And this year of 2020
Is thus far a real bummer.

2020 Vision
Is always better in hindsight.
Knowing what we know today,
We wonder
If all choices were exactly right.

Hopefully by year’s end
We’ll see the past more clearly
With empathy and wisdom
Not taking for granted
All the freedoms we hold dearly.

Trish © 8/4/20

 

The Last Time

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I wish I could remember
The last time I touched or saw you,
As I departed was it with a joke and smile,
Or were you sad or blue?

I wish I could remember
What the words were we said,
And as we said our goodbyes
If any tears were shed.

I wish I had only known
That touch would be our last,
And that we’d be kept apart
By a quarantine that came along so fast.

I’m certain that we always
Left with an embrace and a kiss,
But little did we know
About the time we’d miss.

I wish I had only known
That visit would be the last
And with this awful illness
You’d be gone so fast.

I wish I could remember
If I held you extra tight
Or if you stood to watch
As I disappeared from sight.

I wish I could remember
That day so long ago
A day that was like any other
Except for what we didn’t know.

I wish I could remember
As it held our last earthly embrace
But we’ll embrace again
When we see the Father’s face.

Trish ©️

America’s Brotherhood

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Today is day number 183 of the year with 183 days left; half way through this year 2020. I want to believe that everyday for the rest of the year will not be tragedy among tragedy but I do not have any real hope we will make it through the coming weekend without the world falling into an abyss.

It is as if we are in an altered universe. For the past few years there has been a pot of continuously simmering hot water. With Covid19, the noodles (us) were thrown in the pot and now the foam is bubbling over the top. The noodles in the pot are done but the heat will not turn down until we break apart.

Independence Day weekend is upon us, I will be praying for the first responders more fervently than ever as I fear many people will use the holiday to create further mayhem and destruction.

We are standing on the dividing line. It’s time for the rest of us to stop being noodles, remove the pot from the fire before it is too late, stand up and show our brotherhood and outshine the hate.

“ America, America God shed his grace on thee;
And crown thy good with brotherhood,
From sea to shining sea”

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