Sweetheart,
This is not going to be an easy week. Ten weeks today and it still sometimes feels so unreal, like a very bad dream. I was up until midnight last night and I suddenly realized, my God, ten weeks ago at this hour, you were alive. We?d just gone up to the bedroom and you were going to try to sleep. Ten weeks ago, and I should have realized when you woke in the middle of the night that we should go to the doctor. I know what you?ve communicated to me, but still I am plagued with ?what ifs?. If we?d saved you that night, would it just be prolonging the inevitable or would it have given you the time you needed to lose more weight and become healthier?
I?ve become friends with another online widow whose husband died suddenly of cardiomyopathy. He lived with it for four years, compared with the almost 14 you lived with yours. Rich, I sometimes wonder about what the doctor told us at Johns Hopkins in 1988 or 1989. You were doing so much better after that exam and the doctor said to us both, if you?d just lose fifty pounds you?d live to your seventies. What happened?
What if you had lost all the weight you needed to lose? Would that doctor have been right or would you still have died when you did? Were you depressed or unhappy with me and the kids, and that?s why instead of losing weight you kept gaining more? I wish I could understand. I don?t know if it would help me to understand?did you feel that I was rejecting you? Well, at the end you were trying so hard and you did lose the forty pounds. I guess it just wasn?t in time. My heart is so full of sadness. I miss you so much, my darling. I wish that I could hold you again, caress your face, rub your belly, and scratch your goatee just once more.
Last night Mrs. Landlord called to remind us about the painters and I was too mad to talk to her. Heidi took the message. I sent them a rent check paying in full and a letter that expressed how I felt. Mr. Landlord said that if there was anything they could do to help me?hah! I wrote that it would have been helpful if he?d taken care of the plumbing problem when I called, rather than put the burden on me and imply that it was the ?rough? kids or my ?big? husband. It would have been more helpful if he, once I called with the news that it was not negligence, had immediately reimbursed me. But noooooo, I have to get a lawyer to write a letter for me. I resent it and I?m angry.
Roseanne says it would be better to stay where we are; so does Steve and most all of my friends. They are right. I shouldn?t just react because the Devil I know is better than the Devil I don?t know. As far as I?m concerned, the ball is in the court. They can tell me that they won?t rent to me again. I really don?t give a damn?and I?m not giving up Amber. If that?s why I have to move, so be it.
So baby doll, I?m just going to try and relax and go with the flow and see what happens next. There was a big article in Newsday today, all about how Long Island has become the most expensive place to live. A nuclear family of four needs a post-tax combined income of $52,000 to make it here. Ha ha. A single mother with three kids needs $48,000 to make it here. I guess we?ll just have to see, eh?
The weather has been pleasant here today but I think it?s going to start getting hot again. We have a weekend birthday celebration planned in honor of you. I hope you like balloons.
I remember there was a really nasty heat wave when Billy was born. The other thing I just remembered is that you won the baby pool. My due date was supposed to be May 1 although I sort of insisted that I knew when I conceived and I was guessing May 11 or 12. You guessed Mother?s Day, May 10th. I remember being horrified. I didn?t want to be having a baby on Mother?s Day, I protested. Well, my water broke May 9th and Billy was born after 4 in the morning on Mother?s Day. My gift?our gift. The best Mother?s Day gift ever. I had a rose with every meal. It was so cool!
You spent almost every waking minute with me at the hospital. I didn?t think you were getting enough rest but was grateful for your presence. We were just so fascinated with Billy. He was born with a cone shaped head because his skull had to fit the narrow birth canal. He was tiny, red, and not very pretty but he was ours. I spent 2 or 3 days in the hospital?I don?t remember which?and I remember that Billy became crankier each day. I didn?t know what I was doing wrong or how to soothe him. Nurses came in to give us advice about what to do with a cranky baby, how to breastfeed and so on. I never quite got the knack of it. I?m so big chested you?d think it would have been easy but it was awkward and uncomfortable. Still, I tried.
The weekend Billy came home from the hospital, you got sick. I remember being upset because not only did I not have help for Billy but you were also feeling so bad you needed to be cared for. I look back at that now and wonder if that was the beginning of it all. When you got better, you?d sit up with Billy who would be wide awake from 2 in the morning until about 6 and sleep like he was in a coma the rest of the day. I remember you used to pick Billy up and sort of sail him around overhead playing with him but also trying to wake him. You and Billy watched the Iran-Contra hearings together in the wee hours of the morning so that I could sleep. And you did not get enough sleep yourself.
We had this group of pediatricians taking care of Billy. Eventually we ended up calling the Dr. Moe, Dr. Larry & Dr. Curley after the Three Stooges. Billy wasn?t gaining a lot of weight and he was spitting up an awful lot. Then I noticed an ammonia smell in his diaper. We took him to that practice and they discovered that he had a fever. He had to be admitted to Holy Cross Hospital. What a horrible experience it was! In Baltimore, a couple?s baby had just been stolen from the Johns Hopkins Hospital and I was wild with fear that it would happen to us.
The doctors had to do a spinal test on Billy to see if he had meningitis. They took him to another room but we could hear him screaming and we held on to each other and cried. It was horrible. They put Billy on IV antibiotics and he looked so helpless in the bed. I refused to leave him. I wouldn?t leave the room even to get a meal and so the nurse ordered meals brought to me because I was nursing Billy. She was very sweet and tried to encourage me to take a break and walk around but I wouldn?t. I was too afraid.
One night there was a fire alarm. You?d just arrived but went to the car to get something when the alarms went off and the police and fire department arrived. The nurse told me all the doors were locked and that people were being stopped in the lobby and not allowed back up. I knew you?I knew you?d be frantic and that you?d try to make your way upstairs somehow. About a half hour later, you came in the door! You managed to get around the guard and sneaked up a back staircase to get back to us. I was so relieved to see you, but at the same time I became even more convinced that it wouldn?t be safe to leave Billy alone in the room.
Billy and I spent a week in the hospital. After we were discharged, the Head Idiot doctor of that practice managed to terrify us with gloom and doom predictions of dire infections, kidney transplants?I was so scared I shut down producing milk and we put Billy on a formula.
We found another pediatrician to go to. I?ll never forget her. She was so gentle and such a quiet, caring pediatrician. She explained things clearly to us?that Billy had a narrowed ureter but it wasn?t anything to be alarmed about. She prescribed a prophylactic antibiotic for Billy to take for one year and then he could be tested again to see if his ureter opened up. If not we would have to consider surgery then. What a relief to the two of us!
We made arrangements to have Billy christened at the First Presbyterian Church. It was an okay, modern looking church. We didn?t stay there very long?just long enough to get Billy baptized. Your father and Alberta came down, and my parents came. My parents really embarrassed me. After the church service they high-tailed it back to our apartment so they could break into the beer. :P
Except for that cold you had that just wouldn?t go away, we had a pretty nice summer after that.