Helpless and Waiting

"I just can't help thinking...what if she never walks again? She loves to dance. What if she can't ever dance again?" Maggie teared up. My hollow reassurances tinned against her fears. I simply can't imagine and absolutely will not believe that Aunt Patti won't pull through this with all limbs in working order. She's a tough lady. One fall won't keep her down. But, I admit, it's tough to maintain that position when standing by her bedside. Her head is framed by the brace screwed into her skull. She claims it's very comfortable. She laughs that she sure did do a number on herself this time. She praises the notion of drinking water from a sponge fed to her by any available hand. She only asks that someone scratch her nose from time to time.

Maggie says that sometimes she's overwhelmed by the situation, that she can feel herself near to fainting and that it's all she can do to climb back to the surface of her brain without falling. I nearly fainted myself. The claustrophobia of the inability to move rips at my nerves, and standing by the bedside, I could feel myself curling up inside. sweating. needing to sit down. But, visiting time was over so I could escape to the fresh air of the free.

Times like these beg me to pray and to believe in those prayers. And if I could, my prayer would be this: with each passing day may Aunt Patti regain more of the movement that we all take so for granted, and may she feel the peace of patience in the process.