Though it is finally spring and the weather makes everything all nice again, this particular time of year is also one of reflection and sadness for my family. You see, six years ago tomorrow, my dad, George Myers, passed away. It's hard to believe it's been that log, but not a day goes by that I, and everyone else in my family, don't miss him.
Since I missed his birthday last month, April 2nd (I left for Europe that day...of course with thoughts of him in my head!), and I don't want to go the whole season without remembering and honoring him in some way. So I'm posting a piece I wrote for Yahoo Voices on the day that he died, May 6th, 2009. Read on...
I woke up this
morning, as I do many mornings, with a song in my head. Only the tune that landed in my head today
was related to what was going to happen in just a little while. The song, “Papa Was a Rolling Stone”, by the
Temptations opens with the lines I’m still hearing now as I write this:
It was the third of
September.
The day I’ll always
remember,
Cause that was the day
my daddy died.
Today George Myers, my
father, passed on, and I awoke this morning knowing that it was going to
happen. We’d been dreading it for four
days now, knowing that any hope of survival was near zero percent. From the moment he was taken into the
hospital, we were told that he had gone far too long without oxygen and that
his brain was no longer functioning. As
the hours and days passed, we knew this was the one time he wasn’t going to
beat it.
We’d decided late last
night to remove the support machines keeping his body alive, but we had to put
it off for today because one of us was unable to be on hand. It was an unpleasant situation, to say the
least. We all wanted to get past this
anguish. And having to wait until
morning, waking up with the knowledge that your dad was going to die, is just
too odious a circumstance to be in.
Twenty eight years
ago, my dad was diagnosed with Diabetes.
At first, none of us had been too familiar with the disease, but what we
did know it was controllable one if you followed the guidelines associated with
the having the condition. In the
beginning, dad was great about it. He
quit smoking. He stopped drinking. Changing his dietary habits, though, proved
too difficult for him and this allowed this debilitating sickness to attack his
body slowly and steadily for so long.
Early on, dad’s
kidneys began to malfunction and he was sent to undergo dialysis treatments
three times a week. He was placed on a
list for a kidney transplant. I hadn’t
known what dialysis was at first, and I don’t wish to speak of it here, but I
know from dad’s experiences that it is not pleasant.
As is common with
diabetics, one problem invariably leads to other problems. To make things easier for his dialysis
treatments, his doctor placed a plastic shunt in his arm. I recall almost immediately there were infections,
blockages, and other problems associated with the multiple shunts that were
eventually placed within his arms. These
problems foreshadowed the more serious and painful things to come. I can’t possibly recall the numerous problems
dad’s experienced over the years, but here are some I remember:
- - While
working in a local supermarket, a 2 liter bottle of soda fell off a shelf and
landed on dad’s big toe. An infection
began to materialize. That was in May. By August, the infection had gotten so bad;
he had to be hospitalized for over six weeks.
It was the first time we thought we were going to lose him, but he
persevered and eventually pulled through.
- - A little
over ten years ago, dad got a call that a person with a donor kidney had passed
and he needed to get to the hospital ASAP.
In what turned out to be his happiest hospital stay, dad’s surgery was
successful and he got to spend Christmas with the greatest gift he’s ever received. Dialysis was now a thing of the past.
- -About two
years ago, dad began to have trouble hearing in his right ear. It was soon discovered that he had a massive,
benign tumor growing on his cerebrum. With
his state of health, surgical treatment was not an option, so he underwent 39
radiation treatments. Soon after the
treatments had finished, his hearing improved once again, but his new kidney
had begun to fail. In what turned out to
be the beginning of his end, dialysis treatments once again became a necessity.
- -A more
recent infection on his foot hadn’t been responding to treatments. Intravenous antibiotics were no help as
circulation problems were preventing the medicines from reaching the infected
site. A surgical bypass on his leg was
ordered by his vascular doctor. During
pre-surgical testing, though, a blockage was found in his heart and a resulting
angioplasty put off the vascular bypass.
The cardiac procedure was successful, and he was released from the
hospital with the infected ulcer still oozing and painful on his foot.
- -Two weeks
ago, and six weeks after the angioplasty, dad was brought back in to the
hospital for the original vascular bypass to help fight the infection, which
had gotten so bad that he had developed tendinitis in his Achilles tendon which
prevented him from walking anymore. He
had had to give up his job and his car, which crushed him. This surgery was successful, and the
infection had begun to heal.
These episodes
represent only a fraction of the seemingly countless health-related issues dad
has had to contend with. Late night
phone calls became all too familiar.
Every time there was a new emergency, the situation led from a dire to
insignificant, a false alarm. Dad took
each case in stride, with rarely an utterance of complaint, even through two
toe amputations (Though he always hated the needles!). We became too used to these episodes, expecting
the same result each time. We’d lulled
ourselves into a belief that dad was a fighter who’d always bounce back and be
around for years to come. But it wasn’t
meant to be this time.
The day after dad came
out of the hospital, he experienced this episode which ultimately led us to
today. Now I've skipped ahead a bit from
the first part of this story, but this part of dad’s story is more pertinent to
the freedom from suffering he earned today.
Having been faced with the decision we all made, we knew we had no
choice. Dad deserved no more pain.
In the end, he passed
peacefully with his wife, his six children and other significant people in his
life all around him. The room was filled
with anguish, devotion, love and a sense of collective relief as George finally
let go of all that pain.
So long dad! I love you!
It was the sixth of
May…
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