The week before

my mom had the seizure that sent her to the ER, a dying raccoon crawled into my parent's backyard. My dad, who has done this sort of thing before, intended to go out with a shovel and bury it near the brush as soon as it died. But it didn't die. They watched it cautiously from the family room window or the porch as it crawled a few steps, then collapsed, panting.

The vultures knew the raccoon was dying. They perched on the roof, waiting more or less patiently, from Sunday through Monday and Tuesday.

On Sunday, my mom who had been feeling terrible for weeks, stayed home from church (which she never misses). On Monday, she called in sick to her first grade teaching job. Tuesday, too. She didn't feel like eating. Her insides hurt. She'd lost close to 20 pounds in under two months. She slept, fitfully, most of the day--my mother who eschewed naps as a waste of time and a detriment to healthy night time slumber. Her visit to her primary care physician had resulted in blood tests for stomach ulcers and a scheduled colonoscopy. She was getting worse, but there was nothing we could do. She was scared of some internal cancer, but she didn't say so at the time. We couldn't convince her to call her doctor back or see a specialist (for what, we didn't know).

So my dad went to work and my mom stayed at home, watched over by vultures, in the company of a dying raccoon. Wednesday, Thursday . . . the raccoon finally died.

On Friday my brother came by to see our mom (he officially still lived there, although he was more often at his girlfriend's house), talked with her, and then left her napping to get himself some lunch. When he returned, she had fallen half off the bed. She was staring at him but didn't seem to see him. He called 911 and then called me.

After arranging childcare (I don't remember now what I did with the kids, then 10 months and 3 1/2 years old--I don't think I waited until my husband got home), I met them at the hospital. My mom had bitten her tongue during the seizure, so she couldn't talk well, but she was back to normal cognitive functioning. The ER nurse told us she was in kidney failure which explained her symptoms. Without functioning kidneys, toxins built up in her system like she was being poisoned from inside.

This was 15 months ago, March of 2007. The next few months were tricky, between hemodialysis, which takes 4 hours at a time, 3 days a week, and various pharmaceutical complications (one drug allergy made her break out in a horrible rash). She wasn't allowed to drive for six months following her seizure. It was scary and I had a lot of selfish feelings, like What am I going to do for a babysitter? My dad had a hard time, saying that my mom was always the strong one (true).

My mom now does peritoneal dialysis at home, every day. She returned to work in the fall and taught this whole year with only occasional medical issues. She is awaiting a donor kidney, but is doing well for now.

Maybe this is a strange way to start a blog which isn't going to be about my mom, but I've been thinking about writing this down since it happened. Maybe the next post will be lighter.