Day 4 - I do....

The Matron at the hospital last night did say that almost without exception in the recovery process from strokes, and other debilitating illness too, there will be good days and bad days. Well, today has been both, because I have had a roller coaster of a day.

When the post arrived this morning there was a letter from our solicitor. Now for some time we have been trying to arrange our marriage, and the only thing this year that stopped us was that cleo's divorce took forever to resolve. Mine had taken three years, and we were waiting for hers from january, and our original plan was to get married on cleo's birthday in June this year. That had to be shelved because her divorce had not been finalised, and then our next date was in january, which was the aniversary of us living together. This too seemed to have been jinxed as until today still nothing from the solicitor.

The letter I got read as follows:

"I enclose your original decree absolute dated 2nd November... you are now divorced"

My heart soared because that was it, nothing now stood in our way. Now we had a real goal, get cleo out of the hospital and I could finally marry my soulmate.

Oh Shit.....

Buoyed up with the solicitor's letter I arrived at the hospital a few minutes before visiting began, and when i looked at cleo, lying there, eyes closed I knew something was wrong. I walked to the side of the bed, and leaned over her, kissing her awake, she mumbled something unintelligible, and I panicked. She sounded far worse than yesterday and looked awful. I only got one word from her: "Disaster.." My mind raced.

Numbed by the fact that she looked so ill, compared to yesterday, I asked her what was wrong. I have to say that at this point I was afraid she had suffered a second stroke. She could hardly speak at all, what words she was saying were impossible to understand, and she was lying flat on her back, not propped on the bed as before.

I walked to the nurse's station where one of the doctors was sitting, and asked what was the matter. They explained that they had tried to sit her in a chair, and she had undergone some sort of fainting episode, as well as a drop in blood pressure. To be safe they had decided to lay her flat but they also felt pretty sure that she had not suffered another stroke.

I have to say at this moment I was not convinced, and I saw my cleos vital spark, that light in her eyes which had been evident even last night, which is what makes cleo the incredible person she is, ebbing away. I was scared now, and at the same time afraid to show it for her sake.

i took her hand, and spoke quietly, up very close, telling her how much I loved her, and that I had the divorce papers through, and there was now nothing to stop us marrying. "Now you have a real goal" I said "the moment you're out of here I am marrying you". Her eyes lit up again, with that love and devotion which makes me in awe of her. I do not understand how someone can feel that for me, I am just me; some 49 year old overweight bloke with old fashioned and often outdated ideals, and a total bear-with-a-sore-head attitude in the morning!

"So, theres no escape now" I said, "you have to practice saying those two words: I do"

She did "I do...I do...I do..." I kissed her again.

Over the next hour she slowly told me how scared she was; the fainting fit had given her a really bad headache and she was very aware that when she had the stroke on monday she had a sharp pain over her eye. She was stressed because she was thinking this was another one on the way.
That made the headache worse and so on, self perpetuating.

I held her hand and listened to her almost unintelligible words but just being there together seemed to calm her down a little. She drifted in and out of sleep. Each time she woke up, i said "What do you have to say?" "I do, I do, I do" she said, with a little smile.

Finally I had to leave to collect the girls and while I was happier now than an hour or so ago, I have to admit when I got home I cried, huge floods of tears, because there seemed to have been a massive backward step and that wasn't how it was supposed to be.

I was crestfallen.

Tell the kids

When the girls got home from school I was so afraid for them that I told them, through my own tears, how their mum had been that afternoon, and they needed to be prepared to see her not like she was the night before. These girls are truly amazing; they heard what I said, and understood, and took it in their stride, which in itself is of course down to cleo who had made them what they are.

We ate pizza and headed to the hospital.

Walking down the corridor to the ward i reminded them again that their mum might not seem as good as yesterday......they nodded.

We walked in, and cleo was sitting up, as she saw the kids her eyes lit up, and a wave of massive relief flooded over me. She was back, like yesterday. I could have cried tears of joy there and then, but managed not to. I didn't want to start everyone else off.

I kissed cleo and asked her what she had to say "I do, I do, I do" came the reply. The headache was gone and she felt ok.

The relief was incredible.

Visiting was good, i fed cleo mashed banana, and some yoghurt, which she enjoyed, and finally at the end of visiting it seemed we had set a ritual last night. The girls wanted to let me go first and say their goodnights after I had gone: who am I to argue with three women?

Home finally with great relief, and i honestly hope i dont have too many days like that. What i will remember is cleo, with that little twinkle in her eye saying over and over again : "I do, I do, I do"