We've been on what I thought was the verge of death several times.
The last time I left Kath alone at home for a morning to fulfil a work obligation in town (2004), I brought home a takeaway lunch. Although she had made the decision not to go with me, looking back on it I think she had been stressing while I was out.
We went into the sunshine in my bedroom and sat together on the bed to eat. Funnily enough, it was something we had never done before, but it was fortuitous because as we chatted and ate, Kath's speech suddenly slurred and faded and she lost consciousness, falling back on the bed. I suppose she had a mini-stroke. As I bent over her, shaking her shoulder gently, talking and calling to her, she sicked up the food she'd eaten.
Luckily, I had put a towel on her knee before we started, and I was able to clean up and talk her back to consciousness. I thank the presence of mind of the 111 operator who took the reins, gave me good advice, and called the ambulance for me while I called the hospital.
Actually, the whole incident had its humorous moments, too. On the way out, the ambulance got its back wheels stuck in our bog and we ended up with the fire engine trying in vain to get up the drive (after wet weather) and the police ORV coming to the rescue with its bull-bars and winch. My mom had to be offloaded from the ambulance while they got it back on the road - lucky she was pretty much recovered by then but I can still see her sitting there on the stretcher under the trees.
The second time she woke up very early one morning and announced she was dying. She was shaking and behaving really wierd. For over an hour I knelt by her bed and got her through that. Finally she dropped off to sleep and I crawled back into bed, troubled and exhausted. When she awoke later, though, she was more like her usual self.
I felt the loneliest I have ever felt on a couple of other nights when I went to bed thinking she would not be alive in the morning. Looking at her general alertness, that stage may yet be far down the track. Then again, I may wake up one morning and find it has arrived.
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