Gone Breathless

It's a Saturday morning, and I had such an uncomfortable sleep. Still, sleep is sleep. It can help a bit to gain strength while in the hospital to watch over our father. There's a complication on his kidney after the surgery. Dialysis is needed to be done but since he lost a lot of blood during the surgery, his blood pressure level needs to go up first.

We had our breakfast in the hospital cafeteria. To be honest, the food doesn't tastes good, and expensive. When families of patients are already struggling yet the costs in the hospital is too high. They should just let them bring in their own pillows and blankets. Renting the hospital blanket and pillow will only add up to the bills, and it's not even cheap.

My aunt and her sister came to visit. I really appreciated them traveling 4 or even 5 hours just to visit at the hospital. They stayed there until late afternoon. It's such a comfort to have them there. They don't even want to go home but there's no place for them to sleep in the hospital. My father remained asleep the entire day, and finally, the dialysis was started as my father's blood pressure started to stabilize. At that time, we don't know what to expect. Will he able to survive or not, we're there as long as he's still breathing.

There are so many negative thoughts in my head that my resentment grew remembering what a relative said that my father is just pretending he's not okay. Thoughts such as "are they happy now?" has been in my head but just proving their ignorance.

Evening came, and my father is still sleeping. I went inside the ICU, and stayed there for several minutes. No chairs available, all we do is just stand up there. Seeing my father with tube in his mouth, dialysis machine installed on him, along with other equipments, I cried. He left home still walking, and in less than a week, he's battling for his life.

I went outside the room crying and let my eyes dry from tears. There are visitors around but I'm unable to accommodate them. My brothers are there so I let them do. One of them is even my friend. I just couldn't do anything. I even need comfort. I am tired crying, and all I want to do is sleep. There's an available small bed in the hallway which I occupied. My brother went inside the ICU and my father is awake. He can't talk because of the respiratory tube. But he told my brother he wants to go home. My brother just told him we'll go home the next day.

I slept around 8pm. I need to regain some energy. It was quite a long sleep, and never mind there are many people in the hallway. My sleep was undistracted. I was awakened around 3am. I peeked into the ICU, and I saw my younger brother. I told him to sleep, and take the turn to watch our father.

I've been standing for more than an hour because no chair is provided. Around 5am, my father was washed up. I don't know how to clean up a patient but I feel bad how the nurses just do what they do. It's as if less caution was done towards the patient. Minutes after they bathed my father, I know something strange is happening.

The resident doctor and the nurses approached him, and started to do CPR. The vital signs are not good. I am just in a shock. No reactions, just standing there waiting to see improvement. It's already an hour but it's as if the time is moving so fast. Then I had a gut feeling he's not okay. He is dying. I began to cry. I went outside the ICU. I woke my brother's up. The CPR was started around 5pm. I went outside the ICU at 6:30am.

My brothers went to the ICU. I can't get in anymore. I just cried out there almost consumed an entire tissue toll to wipe my tears and nose. Almost 7am, my father was declared dead. He's gone breathless.

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