2000
| November 10, 2000 On Friday at the RT conference in Houston I was busy promoting. I was distracted. I wasn't doing the conference sessions. I am usually very good about going to the sessions. Paid for them after all. Troy put on a cute performance for one group - I took photos. 10 things a hero would never say. "Gee honey, you're brother looks hot!" Things like that. He's even coached the other contestants. Why he was Mr. Popularity in Toronto. When the reader's Hospitality suite cover model parade went by, I held up the extreme Troy calendar and the book. One of the models had a color photo up - No! No! No! Oh no you don't! I had a calendar and book up for a drawing at 3pm. Troy would drop by. I had a poster in the hall and more bookmarks on Promo Lane. I posed for photos and signed books and bookmarks. I kept a calendar near Troy. I am a mother hen. Marilyn Campbell came and suddenly dragged me out of the room. She had to tell me. I had to sit down. I needed not to drink and I needed to keep the walls up. He would be alright. My son. My younger son. Who has headaches and slight disorientation. I went back into the Reader's Room and 15 minutes later they came and got me. My son was ill and was going to ICU. They got me to a phone. Call the doctor. I called. My son is unconscious and headed for a second CT scan. He has menengitis. The test was positive. They did not tell me he was on a ventilator and could not breahte on his own. Good thing they didn;t. I might not have made it. I need to get there. The doctor was hesitant to give me a 50-50 survival chance. The doctor did not have anything positive to say. I needed to get there. Now. She sounded scared. I could hear it. The ladies around me went into action. I went to pieces. I cannot face life without him. Especially if I lose him before I get there. I was hysterical. They changed my flight. It is one at 5:30. It is 11 mow. They went for Troy. They went to find Pepper. They got me to my room. They packed. They took me to the banquet early and ordered food. I was told to eat. Kathryn and Skip both got me wine. I had one. I had by now put the walls up - firmly in place. There was confusion. Troy put the suitcases in the car and brought the car up - good thing because he had parked it and I did not know where it was. He carries luggage well. I remember from last year. I will get home. He thought we were leaving. We sent Skip to find him. He came in. We sent someone to find Skip. Musical people. We got sorted out. Food arrived - slow service. I ate. Something with stove-top stuffing in it. Something like pasta I called and left a message that I would be coming home and what flight. They had already paged my older child. He had gone home thinking it was a drug reaction. He had gotten up with an emergency page. He had to be going nuts. Mytruck is at the airport - right outside Continental. The doctor had thought I should take a cab. Could I make it driving? Hell yes! My baby son, my heart and soul needs me. My other son is holding the fort alone. He is just as precious. He needs me too. I will drive (I did). I will get there (I did). Kathryn and the others worked to keep me distracted. I gave Skip instructions about the bookfair (they sold over 100 calendars and more books than other authors did). I gave Pepper instructions about supporting Troy (He won Mr. Romance 2000 and Reader's Choice and I did not get to see it). Kathryn Falk had me get up in front of the entire convention and introduce the novel Jettison, how it happened, and the Extreme Troy calendar. I don't have any idea what I said. I made people laugh. I was on auto pilot. I couldn't find the car rental papers. (They came home with me.) I had to give written permission for Troy to use my credit card to get out of the hotel. I saw my bill - $295 for phone calls - not that many! And not that long! Outrageous! However, I was not dealing with them for now. Later. (I have filed a complaint.) Troy will return the rental car. In the meantime, Skip and Pepper drove me to the airport and got me to the gate and waited with me and fed me coke. Diet coke, that is, while waiting. The plane was boarded on time - and then we sat for 45 minutes while the paper work from maintenance caught up with us. The pilot flew - a few shortcuts, a little speed, through turbolence - like a bat out of hell. He made up the time only to have Oakland air slow him down because there was too much traffic in the area. We got down and I went for my bags. And waited and waited. Someone had helped me lift my bag into the overhead. Someone else had lifted it down. Must be the makeup. I am wearing my badge. I am dressed in velvet. My new Susan Gravor reptile tank top and matching big shirt and velvet pants. I hasve gained weight since they changed my Thyroid 6 weeks ago (I will strangle the doctor) so I like elastic. I have on black nylons and black low slipons - Easy Spirit. I look very classy. I am made up. I am also wearing diamonds (real ones). So I get help. Interesting. In spite of the shaved eyebrows. I shaved them for the costume contest I will not attend. The baggage is very slow to arrive. Someone helped me drag the bags off the belt. I got to my car and someone came over and lifted my bags into the truck for me. I did 70-85 on the 101 north and was being passed. I did 35-45 through Palo Alto and I tore into the parking structure about 9PM California time. All the way from the hotel I had talked to my son. "Hold on, Mommy's coming". I had a very clear image of him in my mind's eye. He had seemed to be far away at first - but then he was closer and that was OK. I greeted my older son on a dead run and he wanted to prepare me for the tubes. No. I want to see him now. The tubes I had already seen. I knew about them without being told. He looked exactally as he had in the image on the plane. We had raced into the PICU - pediatric ICU. He is at the back. I needed my hand on him. I stroked his leg. I rubbed his chest. I spoke to him. His heart rate dropped. We think he can hear. The doctor drove back in. Other doctors came in. They are treating for meningitis and testing for it (they are suspicious at this point but no positive culture yet). The doctor who had called me said she was not as scared now. My older son said he had tried to call me to tell me to stay. Not with my baby unconscious. He is being kept unconscious under heavy sedation because the swelling in the spine and head can be painful and because they don't want him to yank on the tube down his throat. He had trouble breathing. He thought it was April and was talking to a towel. He had lost words. He was using wrong ones. He conversed with people that were not there. I stayed. My older son went home. We will work 12 hour shifts. We have a sleeping chair. I stayed awake most of the night - napped in the parent room for 2 hours - I stayed nearby except when they had to change him (diapers and a condom cath) and then they changed him to an air therapy bed. It moves him around and avoids bed sores. I talk to him, rub him, wherever there are no needles. The needles are about everywhere. Both hands. One foot. Dual port. Two poles, Multiple consoles. Multiple bags. Esophageal airway. Nose tube (drain the stomach). Triple pumps. Monitors. Machine breathing. They paralyze him to prevent him over-breathing the machine. They monitor the pain meds so he stays sedated and won't wake up. Not yet. The ammonia level was 300 and by Sunday it had dropped to 44 - near normal. No reason why it jumped. It's a second problem. We wait. We are probably the only family that reads the machine displays and graphs and get it. We can read them as well as the doctors within a day or two. We are, after all, engineers. Me son does programming. I taught him. My students design the chips that go in this equipment. It all works together. Now we wait. |
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