Born in September 16, 1921, but not exactly. We celebrated Grandma’s birthday on this day, but in reality a busy harvesting season had kept her Dad (Great Grandpa) registering in August. My Grandma (Vera Bonderoff) is on the right, my great aunt Hazel is in the middle, and my great uncle John is on the left. Happy Birthday, you’ve been gone many years but I think about you every single day. ❤️
My beloved rescue bunny Skye has been unwell for three excruciating days. As is often the case with “exotic” animals, her diagnosis was never 100% definitive, but in all likelihood she had a gastrointestinal obstruction as well as a possible ankylosing spondylitis flare. She was accepting treats from Grandma at 5:30 am; when I came to her at 7:45 am her disposition had changed 180 degrees. First panic that seizes any floof parent is when snacks are refused. My stomach always tightens instantly and red alert bells scream in my ears. Outside life ceases to have meaning and heavy surveillance begins to watch every tiny flinch, every shift, every behaviour pattern that could offer a clue. I have a deep connection with this girl and we’ve been through many challenges together. I instantly could tell she was in pain in the midsection.
Rabbits don’t shout out their pain or complain about it; they just go (imperceptivly) quieter, settle in, and try to tough it out. Dad was much the same way in the spring. Similar to many of my experiences with Skye’s medical challenges, I never knew how much discomfort he truly was in before receiving treatment. In both cases, of course, to a finely tuned observer, there were many signs.
Onward to watching the clock; waiting for office hours and opening. Known (clinic/own physician) is always preferable to unknown emergency; Dad too. At the last pet emergency they wouldn’t look in Skye’s ears for a potential dizziness episode. I called her office early before opening on a whim – and someone answered! If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. I always ask. Ask in a thousand different ways if you have to.
I made my heartfelt two minute plea to the gatekeepers (reception/techs) to the medical professionals. I knew Skye needed help immediately, but they live in a world of facts, outputs, measurables. I tearfully shared her status and told her I was at her mercy, then breathlessly waited for the response. A cancellation, can you be here in six? We were there in five.
In Dad’s case, though, many more steps. It is much more difficult to get critical care for a human. Clinic visits and tests and desperate trip to emergency and triage failures and another trip to emergency and endless wait times and incorrect triaging yet again and three days in purgatory in emergency hell on earth until going nuclear and involving patient advocacy. The health system is deeply flawed. If I had the strength I would go nuclear on public health care in this province. But a friend reminded me of the price, echoing my own hesitation. I do not have the strength to relive that trauma; to be trapped in those moments and the horrors we witnessed and experienced. How many more like us suffer in silence because speaking up is too high a price to pay?
…
Rabbits are an enigma. Vets try to read the subtle signs they give off but they don’t give much information up. Of course their heart rate is fast, they’re terrified to be in the office. Adrenaline can mask pain response. Blood work and diagnostics are cost prohibitive. We were at least blessed to not have to factor in those agonizing cost decisions for treatments for Dad, he stayed three weeks in ICU, likely over $3500 a day for our health system.
For Skye it was examination and then we went into probabilities, likelihoods, dipping into intuition, and costs. As I was signing the consent form for sedation for xray and filling out the form as to whether to rescuscitate I suddenly found myself back in the patient ICU waiting room, doctor sitting with us all round, talking the Night Before. Horrible times, awful decisions. Oh, how my heart bleeds for everyone who goes through those discussions.
Admission. Progress or lack thereof. The doctor consults and next steps. The celebrations over tiny steps forward and despair over steps back. Medications and more medications. In Skye’s case, she was discharged. They stabilized; now the ball is in my court to keep her alive. When family is threatened the wagons circle and I would go to, and have gone to, hell for those I love. The worst part in cardiac ICU is that families only have the margins to work within. The rest is out of control, left to professionals. But damn, did we ever blow to hell those margins trying to move heaven and earth and get Dad through.
In contrast, the margins are much larger with Skye. Skye’s very existence is now back in my hands, there is no IV providing nutrition. As she recovers and the clouds from sedation and illness and pain begin to try to clear, I perform literal life support. Critical care, a mix of essential nutrients, is added to water and syringed lovingly every three hours, until she can eat on her own. For a rabbit even six hours of not eating can spell death; their systems are so fine – almost like a fine sports car engine – that any disruptions bring the whole system to its knees.
There continue to be too many similarities in illness, bringing a torrent of flashbacks. Living on the tiny highs and despairing over the lows. The fog of illness minimizing/prohibiting interaction with the world around and hallucinations. Subtle signs consciousness remains. So many medications, full syringes, empty syringes. So much clinical science, so little natural world. That feeling that there is nothing left to give and collapse is imminent, and yet days later, somehow, continuing round the clock care. Skye is, like Dad was, an absolute fearless warrior in the face of illness. And so I shall relentlessly continue to try to do everything I can in the damn margins unless that final definitive answer comes back no.
Above, my heart- Skye
Passed by a lifeless squirrel on the road right near Mom and Dad’s a short time ago. My throat caught and tightened. A few minutes later, putting out feed, Dad’s little friend did not come. I didn’t think there was anything left to hurt but my heart hurts. The magpies were already taking care of things as I drove off.
Rest in peace dear heart, you were another connection to Dad. I know he would whisper to you and we both loved you. (Pic from last time we met)
Keychain I’d gifted Dad a few years back below; he loved it. They’re my keys now.
This is a hard post.
As my brother Scott alluded to in his Eulogy at Dad’s Celebration of Life, Post-It Notes were an endearing part of home life and how Dad kept track of the myriad thoughts within his brilliant ten-steps-ahead-of-everyone-else’s mind. He let no fleeting thought go to waste, they were pure potential energy. In fact, he wrote about this himself in one blog post: https://tothineownselfbetrue.ca/2019/07/07/staying-organized-post-it-notes/. It is very painful for me to share that even in the hospital he used them, to track medicine, lists of concerns for doctors, and unfortunately his symptoms and suffering.
The morning of his quintuple bypass and heart valve surgery, Mom and I met him early in the morning to wait for the surgery pick up. We tried to keep spirits light. I remember telling him how he was in the best care possible. How great it will be to have the surgery behind us all and be on the other side. I told him on a scale of concern, and this coming from worst case scenario Heather, I was not worried. We were all laser focused on optimism and the future. spoke about looking forward to finally making it past the rubicon and onto a journey to healing.
At one point that morning Dad picked up a yellow post-it note from the hospital bed table and pressed it into mine. I glanced at it, and put it in my pocket. We passed the nervous time away with further light talk and my brother Scott joining us brought additional joy and added hopefulness to the morning. The core four – the “fab four” of our family would face this together and make it through, leaning on our collective strength and love.
It was days later I found the note in a pocket. Days after unsuccessful attempts to stop sedation, come off the ventilator and into full consciousness. The note is below (I apologize, in this picture it is stained with my tears):
“If you can stay warm, you shall not perish from the cold”.
Reading it a first time, it seems deceptively simple. But my Dad was a man of great depth. I knew it meant so much more.
In the days that followed I would stay with him during the most impossibly hellish, darkest, coldest nights in ICU. I have never witnessed such levels of suffering. I filled the space with warmth and light and hope and love and beautiful music as best I could. I read messages of love from my friends around the world wishing him well and spoke for hours until hoarse about current events, family loves, passions, and plans and hopes for the future.
As the lights would dim and evening turned to night in ICU, a bone-chilling cold would descend, the likes of which I’d never felt before. One night a respiratory therapist working in the shadows saw me shivering and brought me a warmed blanket. An angel of mercy amongst many cold, (understandably) hardened and (some) fundamentally defective night staff. She whispered apologetically “nobody here knows why it gets so cold at night, not even the staff” and disappeared back into the darkness. I later spotted staff in coat and scarf in the hallway.
During that time in cardiac ICU and in the time following July 29, pain and loss and grief has brought winter to my heart and spirit. I’ve lost my connection to my own life source and spark within, in turn that connection to the life breath and energy of the universe.
I continue to struggle with the mysteries of Dad’s last note. I know that within this note is the road map for survival but there is a puzzle wrapped inside. How do I stay warm and keep from perishing from the cold in a world without him in it…
I must write soon about how much Dad loved coming over for “deck time” and enjoying Italian coffee outside on the weekends.
This picture from last year exemplifies how he was all in his glory during those visits, taking in the sun, the sounds of the birds on the lake, the garden and flower abundance all around. My resplendent Dad.
It’s a perfect crisp, sunny morning today, and we drink from the same mugs, but his space sits empty and a tissue box replaces a coffee carafe. I am exhausted from round the clock feedings for my beloved bunny, keeping her alive with sheer will and love. The garden in the yard below is unharvested and neglected. He would still be in wonder, though. I planted so much just to delight him and bring a smile. My hyperactive senses desperately reach out for his presence. I long for his voice and our laughter and deep talks. Where are you, Dad? Are you here?
An impossibly tough day. GI obstruction for our little one, hopefully headed off by early intervention. While waiting to pick her up when hopefully discharged, we visited Dad at the cemetery. A cold wind blew through the trees. We added a few flowers, the sunflower in honour of the ones the squirrel and birds planted at home – the ones we told him about in the hospital but he never got to see.
The city plaque will take months to come; I added a small one with a feather etched on the side. Anyone who read my post about portents will understand why.
We glimpsed a squirrel preparing for fall nearby. Our beloved squirrel whisperer would nod and smile in approval.
Dad is beside my beloved Grandma and Grandpa Reade by a lovely tree.
The cold wind continues to blow. I think of the Wind and the Willows story that you read to me, Dad. One of many beloved times we spent together sharing books. I am afraid of fall, but perhaps shouldn’t fear so much – I am in winter already. I will share the last writing you gave to me on the eve of your surgery next post.*
Deck time hit suddenly; it will be the post after Deck Time. ❤️
Woke up to my therapy bunny, one of two that are the only source of glimmers of joy for me these days, deeply unwell this morning. I have been thinking each time facing a hurdle this year I just need to make it through..
The problem is now, there is nothing left of me. I have no resilience left, no strength, no money, nothing. I’m not even clinging to a fragment of the raft’s wood at this point. The relentless series of misfortune has taken everything. I thought that perhaps when Dad passed there would be an easing, the final cataclysmic act… I was wrong and there seems to be no mercy.
(John Martin, The Deluge, 1834)
All this time
The river flowed
Endlessly like a silent tear
– Sting, Soul Cages
In previous posts I have alluded to the Shakespearean-like way in which my father left his corporeal form. The natural world surrounding our family was upended for months beforehand, in true “fair is foul, foul is fair” Macbeth fashion- it was as if the earth itself was shuddering in preparation for his imminent departure. I dedicated one bird-focused post to portents of death (https://idwellinpossibility.ca/?s=portents) leading up to July 29. The scope of this disuption was not limited to the avian kingdom, however; there was so much more. There was a steady drumbeat of ill fortune – relentless layer upon layer of terrible events.
The thread of undoing began in September 2023 and continued throughout the spring and into the events of the hospital. Misfortune struck first in September, when the basement had a severe sewage backup. Hopeful for a simple clog and repair that a plumber could fix, an emergency call a $20,000+ uninsured sewer line sag with hydrovac excavation services.
We were yet another victim of Alberta’s leniency toward home builders who rush in to build homes and rush out, changing their numbered company every year to avoid accountability for shoddy work. I wept for our plum tree beloved by many bird families, our hydrangea, the other perrenials I’d transplanted from my late grandma’s garden. Utter destruction. (A subsequent camera inspection at the end of the massive work revealed another sag and a fractured water pipe at the entrance of the house, but out of funds, we choose to sit on those time bombs for now). From that point on, it was a steady drip, ooze, flow of water (or lack thereof) into the first half of 2024.
The outside tap ceased to work and I lugged water from inside to water front flowers.
The hot water tank failed and needed replacing.
The drain pipe from the air conditioner to basement began dripping.
The shower upstairs ceased to have warm water, leading to over four months of shivering showers.
The kitchen tap began to malfunction and drip.
The toilet apparatus upstairs broke and ceased to work.
The upstairs washroom tap only would run cold water.
The sump pump failed. At the same time the drains filled with leaves from neighbours’ trees and began flooding over.
The replacement sump pump failed to work, needing a service call.
The water sensor refused to work, had several service calls, and remains glitchy.
Even our outdoor hose suddenly and inexplicably blew out.
There was too much water. I was awash in constant uncertainty, crisis, draining. By June I was trying to simply get through the next hurdle, the next task, with weaker spirit, and fewer funds. The ten months brutally wore me out (the animal illness post is also still to come…). And finally, when I was at my absolute weakest, my most exhausted state, crawling on the shores trying to gasp for breath, the worst imaginable crisis I could ever imagine rose up, and in three weeks swept away everything I knew and loved. Absolute, cataclysmic destruction. And now, infinite tears, and infinite sorrow.
***
A couple of weeks following July 29, I found a mouse suspended in water – drowned – in a pail behind me on the deck where I sat grievng (inexplicably, after a summer with little rain and baking heat). I scream-cried and convulsed. I am that drowned mouse.
Fall is settling in with cool temperatures, a mournful wind through the leaves, grey skies, and scattered showers. There is much tumult in the air, along with haunting past memories, sorrow and painful feelings of loss incoming today from all sides of my life.
These verses from the song Why Should I Cry for You from Sting’s Soul Cages album, have haunted my heart since July 29, 2024, when my life shattered forever. Today is the day to post them.
Dark angels follow me
Over a godless sea
Mountains of endless falling,
For all my days remaining,
What would be true?
Sometimes I see your face,
The stars seem to lose their place
Why must I think of you?
Why must I?
Why should I?
Why should I cry for you?
Why would you want me to?
And what would it mean to say,
That, ‘I loved you in my fashion’?
Source photo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_Grief
Dad’s notes from his original post regarding Sting lyrics (I chose the same verses he did) (https://tothineownselfbetrue.ca/2021/01/11/a-forgotten-sting-gem/):
(excerpt from an old favorite I used to sing, from “Why Should I Cry for You?”, one of Sting’s best songs, from 1991’s The Soul Cages album)
To my knowledge, this is the only picture of my great grandmother (Dad’s grandma), Lucy (nee Settee), who was born in 1906 (along with my young grandpa). In Dad’s early years, he and his parents lived in his grandmother Lucy’s house off Portage Avenue in St. James. Lucy owned a café, or as he called it, a greasy spoon, at the corner. Dad would often describe her as his “wild grandmother”. One summer while Dad was at the beach he returned home to find Lucy had been careless and lost his beloved dog Scamp, his boyhood companion. It was a loss he never recovered from. Lucy later surprised him with a CCM 3-speed bike from Eaton’s as a birthday present before he began grade 5, liberating him from his mother’s one-speed “wonky pink bike”, perhaps an attempt at redemption.
