Confession

[Ice Fire]

This will be a wall of text I need to get out.  So be warned if you're not in for a long read.

This isn't the first time I've told this story, but will be I think the first time I've told it to anyone who can offer more than a generic nod and apology.  Me and my partner were together for 9 years.  I am the proverbial loner and back sheep.  He was what I had and not really anyone else in my life, and we were as attached as any two people could be.

It started back in later November.  He came down with the stomach flu.  Worst I'd seen since we met, and he was always the better of us at overcoming illness.  Other times he got it it didn't hold him down much.  This was the first time since we met it made him throw up.  I cared for him, brought him the strongest OTC meds I could, vapor rub, anything he wanted.  After almost a week he got over it.  Then a couple days later the fever came back, he felt run down and was coughing a lot.  I had heard pneumonia can sometimes follow the flu, so I looked up the symptoms, and they all matched.  I brought him to the ER that night, but the hospital found nothing on an xray.  Gave him some generic antibiotics anyway.  He took them, started getting better.  Last few made him throw up, A LOT.  Doctor told him to stop taking them.  I was so worried.  But he stayed mostly better, with a mild residual cough I'd read and been told was common.

Halfway through december I found out he had a bad boil on his side.  He said he'd had them before and knew how to care for and keep an eye on it.  It was bigger, self drained and looked almost like a hole in his side.  It was deep, but he insisted healing.  A couple weeks later he sprained his knee, was told to stay off it for at least a week.  He was sensitive, cold and in pain a lot.  I tried to help as best I could.  I was working extra to cover him being out of work, and also trying to help him feel better.  I was getting run down, out of energy, out of focus.  Then the cough started getting worse.

I told him I was starting to get truly terrified that something was really wrong, that he wasn't getting better and I was going to loose him.  He kept reassuring me, just bad timing on everything.  The air in our home was just dirty, he breathed better outside.  I kept pushing, he kept pushing back and reassuring.  "I'm not dying!  Stop thinking that, I'll be ok and make a recovery.  I'm not going anywhere, I promise."

The cough got worse, and worse, and the constant gagging from phlegm and fluid was making him almost throw up.  The night of Jan 4th I came home to find him shivering.  He was wearing a hoodie, under a blanket, and had the heat turned up to almost 80.  I panicked, but again he insisted he was just cold from the cold pack on his knee.  I didn't buy it but he wouldn't give.  Halfway through the night he woke up, said he couldn't sleep.  Told me to go back to bed.  I woke up around 10 to find him feeling worse, and getting worse almost by the minute.  Shivering, not thinking well, sweating, couldn't get up.  Some of you may already know what this was...I didn't...not until later...

I told him he was going to the ER, that the pneumonia must have come back.  I told him I don't know if there was something else, that I didn't know how much the ER would for him, but we had to try.  He said he wanted coffee to wake up to drive.  I told him no coffee.  I told him if he has energy to get to the coffee pot then drive to the hospital.  If he couldn't then we call an ambulance.  You see I....I thought it was just the pneumonia had come back.  And we both thought his issue moving was because of his knee.  But I had to go to work, my boss was on me.  I was so tired and no thinking right I didn't fight my job and just go with him.  I thought it would be so simple.  Have the ambulance take him while I went to work because his knee held him back.  Go to the ER, get some antibiotics for the pneumonia, and get better.  Right..?  Everything would be ok...

WRONG.  I could not POSSIBLY have been more wrong.

He text me at the hospital after he got there after a while.  He said when the ambulance got there "my stats was in the 60s, and they got them up".  I blew up his phone with messages asking what that meant.  He was very slow to answer for the next couple hours.  I took an extended lunch break and he would just say that "it was a lot of info" and "they are just doing everything they have...just get here plz".  He said it was nothing bad.

It was the worst possible case scenario.  The ER physician explained to me.  He had full blown pneumonia all the way up both lungs.  He had ARDS which is a somewhat rare complication which makes your lungs stiff, filled with fluid and is extremely hard to get oxygen into.  They had him on 100% oxygen.  He was also in septic shock when they found him.  His blood pressure had fallen, along with his oxygen.  That's what the stats in the 60s meant.  60% oxygen.  He was on the verge of passing out and dying on our couch.  If I had given him coffee he would have died with the cup in his hands and I almost DID!

We were told they were going to bring him to the ICU, and induce a coma.  They said he was using too much energy to breath on his own and they wanted him to rest on a ventilator while his lungs and body healed.  They told me privately he could easily be that way for weeks.  They gave me barely two minutes to see him.  I held his hand and tried not to cry, but didn't manage.  He just looked at me, trying to give me a reassuring look.  I had so many things I wanted to say, to ask, to apologize for, to promise.  I wanted to say everything...but I froze and said nothing.

He was stable for 10 days at around 85-90% oxygen in his blood, but still being given 100%.  Then it dipped down into the 60s.  This "hospital" had no ICU doctor except on call overnight.  The nurse called him, and (unknown to me at the time) feared a ruptured and collapsed lung.  He ordered the sort of emergency procedures that were called for and told them not to wait for him.  The nurses failed to follow through.  I watched his blood pressure fall to under 40/20.  I watched his oyxgen fall to under 40%.  I watched him start to turn pale.  The doctor showed up 15 minutes later and began the procedure the nurses were supposed to...but...it waited too long.  We were sent to the waiting room while the doctor tried to save him....and only a few minutes later that's when it happened...

A code blue call out of the PA system for his room.  I hear it all day, every day, like a banshee tearing into my mind.

I spent 10 minutes trying to wake myself up from the nightmare, because it HAD to be a nightmare.  He was too strong, too stubborn, and good at fixing everything.  It COULDN'T be real.  The staff tried to get me to sit down, they were worried about me passing out.  I ignored them like they weren't there.  It was a bad dream and they weren't real and didn't matter. 

Half an hour later after listening to the doctor drone on about everything that happened, and screaming at him for having given up too early, I saw what was left of my partner.  He wasn't breathing, his heart wasn't beating.  He was bloated, his skin was purple and felt...wrong...and he had fluids coming out of his nose and mouth.  The room was cold.  The air felt of death, emptiness.  I screamed, I cried, I begged.  Nothing...just...nothing....he was...DEAD.  He was gone.  I don't understand why he isn't here anymore...why I don't just come home one day and find him playing a game on the couch.  Why I can't talk to him anymore.

He is gone because the hospital failed him.  He is gone because *I* failed him.  And every day, often more than once I go through all of this.  Again and again, tearing into myself DISGUSTED with how badly I treated him and let him down.  I hate myself now.

I really, truly HATE myself.

 

[Michelene]

15 hours ago, Ice Fire said:

He is gone because the hospital failed him.  He is gone because *I* failed him.  And every day, often more than once I go through all of this.  Again and again, tearing into myself DISGUSTED with how badly I treated him and let him down.  I hate myself now.

I really, truly HATE myself.

Ice Fire:

Sorry, i posted something last night, tried to add something this morning and it got deleted. I feel this exactly, carrying the self-hate. the blame. Remember that hindsight is biased, and you are judging your actions then by what you know now. I say to you what people have told me. However, I, too, feel ashamed. the shame of failing my husband, both when he had his heart attack because I was out of town, and ten days later went he went into sudden cardiac death and the CPR I administered was useless. I feel as if I am marked, or should be marked; I feel like people say--there she goes, what a thoughtless, careless wife. 

I am angry too, at the medical profession starting way back. And at the hospital. A doctor actually made fun of me because I was writing down what he was saying about the care my husband needed. I didn't say anything directly then because I didn't want to agitate my husband. 

I read a post about a woman who felt ashamed by her husband's death--I thought, yes, that too. Not just guilt, not just regret, but SHAME. I am ashamed that when it mattered most I failed him. So I understand how you feel on that. My counselor said it is a way of controlling things, thinking I can order things, and pride, how people think of me, how I think of myself, what my definition of a partner is. My point is, yeah, so what? I am still ashamed. I thought I was a good wife. But when it mattered most I failed. I am not a good wife. My counselor said it is easier to go to extremes like this, because it avoids actual grieving. Maybe so. 

I read articles like this:

https://whatsyourgrief.com/known-understanding-hindsight-bias-grief/

trying to find a way to make the sick pain stop, but now I just hope for forgiveness from my husband somehow. So I tell you, it was not you, and in the same breath I tell you, I understand. I understand what it is like to have a horror of yourself. 

I just wanted you to understand you are not alone in this. 

[KayC]

@Ice Fire  I am truly truly so sorry.  It sounds similar to my experience with my husband's heart attack.  The haunting memories...that day that forever sticks out in your mind, every detail indelibly etched in your brain.  I know there's nothing anyone can say or do, but still, I can't help but want to try.  You are NOT responsible for his death!!!  If anyone is, it is the nurses that did not do what they were supposed to do.  My own sister gets Pneumonia easily and is on oxygen, and they've been telling us for a month that she's dying, they gave her less than 24 hours to live twice, they put her on hospice, they won't admit her to the hospital anymore (she was in there in November and again in December).  Yet I wasn't told about ARDS, and I even worked for a doctor years back!  You can't be expected to know all these things!  We do not have medical training, that's why we rely on the medical system, and yet in his case, they failed him.  I'm very sorry for all you are going through.  I do hope you're getting counseling to help you through it.

[KavitaHubby]

@IceFire Sorry to see you in this club. I agree with KayC that whatever we say will not change your mind but we will try as much as we can. Trust me it is not your fault we are not medical people and even if we were sometimes you cannot think straight when it comes to your own loved ones. All of us here have gone thru this phase of guilt and at the end agreed that it was not our fault. So please don't think like that. Take one day or an hour at a time. Drink lots of water. Eat as much as you can. Take Care

Hugs

Manoj

[floyd11554]

@Ice Fire I understand the second guessing and the what ifs you must be feeling.  I am going through the same thing wondering if I had just got my girlfriend to the hospital at all then maybe she would still be here.  I had no idea she was that sick at home while I was at work.  The one thing I do tell myself is that everyone is responsible for themselves as well and as KavitaHubby said we are not doctors and we sometimes don't realize how severe something may be cause our whole lives we have gotten over sickness or other health issues without a beat and we assume that the next one will be like all the rest.  Don't beat yourself up,  it sounds like you did plenty to care for him on a daily basis.  The hospital on the other hand, that is a different story and if the nurses failed to act promptly and it had anything to do with it than a malpractice suit may be in order.  Hang in there,  we are all here and in this grief together.  

[KayC]

17 hours ago, KavitaHubby said:

Trust me it is not your fault we are not medical people and even if we were sometimes you cannot think straight when it comes to your own loved ones.

Good point!  I used to work for a medical clinic, and that's why doctors don't usually do surgery on their own family. 

13 hours ago, floyd11554 said:

I understand the second guessing and the what ifs you must be feeling.  I am going through the same thing wondering if I had just got my girlfriend to the hospital at all then maybe she would still be here.

The what ifs are part of our grief...it's a way of trying to come up with a different possible outcome because this one is just so hard!  But the truth is we do the best we can with the knowledge we are giving at the time, and you have to understand that the way things unravel it's what we saw at the moment, we didn't get the benefit of the whole picture at the time.  We have to be kind to ourselves, forgiving, understanding, we're going through a lot of trauma and frankly, none of us deserved this.

[LoveGoli]

On 3/5/2018 at 11:16 AM, Ice Fire said:

This will be a wall of text I need to get out.  So be warned if you're not in for a long read.

This isn't the first time I've told this story, but will be I think the first time I've told it to anyone who can offer more than a generic nod and apology.  Me and my partner were together for 9 years.  I am the proverbial loner and back sheep.  He was what I had and not really anyone else in my life, and we were as attached as any two people could be.

It started back in later November.  He came down with the stomach flu.  Worst I'd seen since we met, and he was always the better of us at overcoming illness.  Other times he got it it didn't hold him down much.  This was the first time since we met it made him throw up.  I cared for him, brought him the strongest OTC meds I could, vapor rub, anything he wanted.  After almost a week he got over it.  Then a couple days later the fever came back, he felt run down and was coughing a lot.  I had heard pneumonia can sometimes follow the flu, so I looked up the symptoms, and they all matched.  I brought him to the ER that night, but the hospital found nothing on an xray.  Gave him some generic antibiotics anyway.  He took them, started getting better.  Last few made him throw up, A LOT.  Doctor told him to stop taking them.  I was so worried.  But he stayed mostly better, with a mild residual cough I'd read and been told was common.

Halfway through december I found out he had a bad boil on his side.  He said he'd had them before and knew how to care for and keep an eye on it.  It was bigger, self drained and looked almost like a hole in his side.  It was deep, but he insisted healing.  A couple weeks later he sprained his knee, was told to stay off it for at least a week.  He was sensitive, cold and in pain a lot.  I tried to help as best I could.  I was working extra to cover him being out of work, and also trying to help him feel better.  I was getting run down, out of energy, out of focus.  Then the cough started getting worse.

I told him I was starting to get truly terrified that something was really wrong, that he wasn't getting better and I was going to loose him.  He kept reassuring me, just bad timing on everything.  The air in our home was just dirty, he breathed better outside.  I kept pushing, he kept pushing back and reassuring.  "I'm not dying!  Stop thinking that, I'll be ok and make a recovery.  I'm not going anywhere, I promise."

The cough got worse, and worse, and the constant gagging from phlegm and fluid was making him almost throw up.  The night of Jan 4th I came home to find him shivering.  He was wearing a hoodie, under a blanket, and had the heat turned up to almost 80.  I panicked, but again he insisted he was just cold from the cold pack on his knee.  I didn't buy it but he wouldn't give.  Halfway through the night he woke up, said he couldn't sleep.  Told me to go back to bed.  I woke up around 10 to find him feeling worse, and getting worse almost by the minute.  Shivering, not thinking well, sweating, couldn't get up.  Some of you may already know what this was...I didn't...not until later...

I told him he was going to the ER, that the pneumonia must have come back.  I told him I don't know if there was something else, that I didn't know how much the ER would for him, but we had to try.  He said he wanted coffee to wake up to drive.  I told him no coffee.  I told him if he has energy to get to the coffee pot then drive to the hospital.  If he couldn't then we call an ambulance.  You see I....I thought it was just the pneumonia had come back.  And we both thought his issue moving was because of his knee.  But I had to go to work, my boss was on me.  I was so tired and no thinking right I didn't fight my job and just go with him.  I thought it would be so simple.  Have the ambulance take him while I went to work because his knee held him back.  Go to the ER, get some antibiotics for the pneumonia, and get better.  Right..?  Everything would be ok...

WRONG.  I could not POSSIBLY have been more wrong.

He text me at the hospital after he got there after a while.  He said when the ambulance got there "my stats was in the 60s, and they got them up".  I blew up his phone with messages asking what that meant.  He was very slow to answer for the next couple hours.  I took an extended lunch break and he would just say that "it was a lot of info" and "they are just doing everything they have...just get here plz".  He said it was nothing bad.

It was the worst possible case scenario.  The ER physician explained to me.  He had full blown pneumonia all the way up both lungs.  He had ARDS which is a somewhat rare complication which makes your lungs stiff, filled with fluid and is extremely hard to get oxygen into.  They had him on 100% oxygen.  He was also in septic shock when they found him.  His blood pressure had fallen, along with his oxygen.  That's what the stats in the 60s meant.  60% oxygen.  He was on the verge of passing out and dying on our couch.  If I had given him coffee he would have died with the cup in his hands and I almost DID!

We were told they were going to bring him to the ICU, and induce a coma.  They said he was using too much energy to breath on his own and they wanted him to rest on a ventilator while his lungs and body healed.  They told me privately he could easily be that way for weeks.  They gave me barely two minutes to see him.  I held his hand and tried not to cry, but didn't manage.  He just looked at me, trying to give me a reassuring look.  I had so many things I wanted to say, to ask, to apologize for, to promise.  I wanted to say everything...but I froze and said nothing.

He was stable for 10 days at around 85-90% oxygen in his blood, but still being given 100%.  Then it dipped down into the 60s.  This "hospital" had no ICU doctor except on call overnight.  The nurse called him, and (unknown to me at the time) feared a ruptured and collapsed lung.  He ordered the sort of emergency procedures that were called for and told them not to wait for him.  The nurses failed to follow through.  I watched his blood pressure fall to under 40/20.  I watched his oyxgen fall to under 40%.  I watched him start to turn pale.  The doctor showed up 15 minutes later and began the procedure the nurses were supposed to...but...it waited too long.  We were sent to the waiting room while the doctor tried to save him....and only a few minutes later that's when it happened...

A code blue call out of the PA system for his room.  I hear it all day, every day, like a banshee tearing into my mind.

I spent 10 minutes trying to wake myself up from the nightmare, because it HAD to be a nightmare.  He was too strong, too stubborn, and good at fixing everything.  It COULDN'T be real.  The staff tried to get me to sit down, they were worried about me passing out.  I ignored them like they weren't there.  It was a bad dream and they weren't real and didn't matter. 

Half an hour later after listening to the doctor drone on about everything that happened, and screaming at him for having given up too early, I saw what was left of my partner.  He wasn't breathing, his heart wasn't beating.  He was bloated, his skin was purple and felt...wrong...and he had fluids coming out of his nose and mouth.  The room was cold.  The air felt of death, emptiness.  I screamed, I cried, I begged.  Nothing...just...nothing....he was...DEAD.  He was gone.  I don't understand why he isn't here anymore...why I don't just come home one day and find him playing a game on the couch.  Why I can't talk to him anymore.

He is gone because the hospital failed him.  He is gone because *I* failed him.  And every day, often more than once I go through all of this.  Again and again, tearing into myself DISGUSTED with how badly I treated him and let him down.  I hate myself now.

I really, truly HATE myself.

 

It took me two days to reply on this thread bcs recalling those last days still so hard for me. I can totally understand what you are feeling right now, all symptoms you mentioned here I saw them in my Goli and like you said I didn't have any idea what was happening to him. When we were going to hospital he was so sweaty, shivering and I thought bcs of fever he is having all these things never thought it could be septic shock, never heard this term before but now if I heard any death bcs of sepsis it makes me so sad and helpless for those people.

You said you were in office that day but I was with him in his last three days still couldn't save him, he was in such pain and I thought its bloody chicken pox and he will be fine in two three days but after three days my world ended, I saw him dying in front of me and didn't think what's happening inside his body just thought he will be fine after 2-3 days , I wish we went to doctor rather than waiting at home and I will never forgive myself for that ever.

[KayC]

On 3/7/2018 at 8:06 AM, LoveGoli said:

I wish we went to doctor rather than waiting at home and I will never forgive myself for that ever.

I hope instead of saying "I will never forgive myself" you can change that to "I don't see how I can forgive myself" because this was not your fault and it will be important for you to forgive yourself at some point down the road.  And I also hope you don't try to maneuver your way through this by yourself, but continue with the help of a professional grief counselor.  This is too much for any of us to handle on our own.

[Sunflower2]

I understand and I've experienced a similar situation.  I'm still working on those regrets and anger!   I'm angry that I didn't listen to my gut.  It was a routine prostate surgery but everything seemed to go so wrong.  According to the doctor Wayne had no indicators that he would have a heart attack. once home Wayne insisted he was fine.  He even walked across the street and to see the neighbor (doctor) who reassured Wayne that everything was fine. Wayne trusted this doctor who was just a neighbor and I trusted Wayne.  I'm told in time this regret will lighten.  For now it is overwhelming. We are feel what you are experiencing.  Be kind to yourself.  We all did the best we could.

[KavitaHubby]

I was on my way to doctor to get her procedure done (where the medical injury happened) and something strike my mind that I have some very important task to finish at work and may be I should call and reschedule. I looked at her and she was in pain and I told my mind work can be done later as we were suppose to be at doctor for like 15 min. Later after she left us I was telling the same incident to my daughter and said what a mistake from me not to reschedule and she said Dad if you reschedule and it happened then you would blame yourself why did I reschedule. So I came to conclusion that it was suppose to happen whatever we do doesn't matter. Please speak to yourself I am not Guilty I am not guilty  or I forgive myself few times a day and it will help.

Let's all try to find peace.

 

[June]

This made me relive all the days and  the code blue on the 2nd of 12 days in the hospital.  I took my love to the ER - knew he was dehydrated and probably low potassium and maybe aspiration pneumonia again.  He had been fighting Parkinson's for 12 years or more.   When they admitted him it was like all the times before - or at least we thought.

He went into respiratory arrest the next day and was saved only because his doctor had already been called by the nurse because she didn't like the way he was breathing.  The doctor walked in the door at the very moment he just stopped breathing.  I had no idea anything was wrong.  The doctor started CPR and brought him back.   While he was in the ICU on a ventilator I had to make a decision about DNR.  I didn't have a copy of his living will with me but knew what he had signed.  It did not make the decision any easier.  

He stabilized for a few days and seemed to be on the mend but got worse again.  Doctor told me there was little chance of bringing him back to where he was before.  He thought he would die that night.  So I held his hand and sat with him day and night for 6 more days before the end.

Every day I wonder if I made the wrong decision.  Maybe I should have told them to do anything and everything to keep him alive.  But just alive was not what he would have wanted.  He had had to make the decision to remove support from our best friend 20+ years ago and he said then he never wanted to be in that condition.  
Yes, I feel guilty.  Every day. 

 

[KayC]

17 hours ago, KavitaHubby said:

So I came to conclusion that it was suppose to happen whatever we do doesn't matter. Please speak to yourself I am not Guilty I am not guilty  or I forgive myself few times a day and it will help.

What we tell ourselves does matter.  They brought that up on the Dr Phil show too (epi #2968 with Demi Lovato) how we need to redo the tapes in our head.

[KavitaHubby]

4 hours ago, KayC said:

What we tell ourselves does matter.  They brought that up on the Dr Phil show too (epi #2968 with Demi Lovato) how we need to redo the tapes in our head.

I attended few classes of sahaj yoga which is about meditation and this is something i learned there

[KayC]

Oh yes!  I haven't tried yoga, but meditation and Restoration classes.

[KavitaHubby]

meditation does help so please do if possible...

[Azipod]

On 3/4/2018 at 9:46 PM, Ice Fire said:

He is gone because the hospital failed him.  He is gone because *I* failed him.  And every day, often more than once I go through all of this.  Again and again, tearing into myself DISGUSTED with how badly I treated him and let him down.  I hate myself now.

I really, truly HATE myself.

It's very normal to have some level of survivors guilt when we lose our partners.  I know it's not easy, but try to focus on the intentions and just the information you had at that time.  We can only make decisions based on what we know.  And sometimes, what we know is very little.  We can't fault ourselves for not doing something different.  If we could read the future and we knew the best course of action in any given moment, then perhaps life would be too easy?    Even then, if you had done something else that day, we don't really know the outcome and whether things would be OK.    I know it's difficult to accept but you did what you did based on love.  We don't operate on the premise that everytime there is a difficulty, we call the doctor and go to the ER.