Three weeks later, my world tilts sideways.
It happens on a Tuesday morning, the kind that’s supposed to be boring. Coffee half-finished and a full day of tasks ahead of me. Grandpa sitting up in his bed, having just finished breakfast. He didn’t eat much compared to usual.
He coughs.
At first, I don’t panic. He coughs a lot sometimes it’s to help him spit up mucus or saliva. Other times, it’s from swallowing wrong, forgetting to chew, getting impatient with food the way he gets impatient with everything now. I move automatically, hand on his back, murmuring his name. Normal, casual reassurance that he is not alone and to get up whatever is choking him up. Then he coughs again.
Wet this time not in the usual way. Deep. Wrong.
His face goes pale, then gray, and something cold and sharp cuts straight through my chest.
“Grandpa,” I say, louder now. “Hey. Look at me.”
He tries. He really does. But his breathing turns ragged, eyes glassy with fear he doesn’t have words for anymore.
I call 911 with shaking hands as I continue to provide care, focusing on his airway.
The ambulance ride is a blur of sirens and clipped voices and oxygen masks. I hold his hand the entire time, pressing my thumb into the thin skin of his knuckles like I can anchor him to me through sheer will.
At the hospital, they move fast. X-rays. Bloodwork. Doctors speaking in calm, measured tones that don’t fool me for a second.
Aspiration pneumonia.
I hear the words like they’re being spoken underwater. This shouldn’t rattle me. It’s not uncommon for someone with Parkinson’s, but alarming for me because he isn’t a patient, he’s my Papa. As hard as it is to watch the once strong, fearless man slowly lose functions and eventually his ability to even walk or feed himself, I can’t imagine a day without him.
Every day we wake up is another day closer to death. I’ve always lived by that motto since I encounter losses regularly at work. Dying is unavoidable. We all face it. Logically, I know his time is coming, he’s ninety for goodness sake. It doesn’t make it any easier that this may very well be the time he can’t beat back the pneumonia.
Even though we have gone through this very diagnosis more than once, it never seems to ease up the anxiety and fears that live inside me at the thought of losing him.
He is quickly admitted. IV antibiotics. Monitoring. Possible complications.
I nod. I answer questions. I sign forms. And then, when they finally leave me alone in the room with him, I sit down hard in the chair and fold forward, my forehead resting against the edge of the bed needing to be close to him. “I’m here,” I whisper, because it’s the only thing I know how to say.
He doesn’t reply. The silence, while expected, still hits me hard.
He’s asleep, sedated enough to let his body rest. The machines hum softly around us, steady and relentless. My phone buzzes in my pocket.
Miles.
Normally, I would have text him or talked to him by now. Everything happens so fast, though, I didn’t think to reach out. I stare at the screen for a long moment before answering.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call or text. He’s in the hospital,” I ramble the second I hear his voice greet me. I don’t bother trying to keep it together. “My grandpa. Pneumonia.”
“I’m coming,” he states immediately.
“No,” I respond, panic flaring. “You can’t just?—”
“I’m coming,” he repeats, firmer. “You’re not doing this alone.”
I don’t argue again. I don’t have the strength. But we aren’t a we, are we? How can he drop everything and rush here to sit with me and a man he barely knows?
By the time visiting hours end that night, Josie has already called twice, her voice tight with worry. By morning, she tells me they’re loading up the kids and driving.
All of them.
I cry in the hospital bathroom when I hear that—not the quiet tears I’m used to shedding, but the ugly, shoulder-shaking kind that leave me dizzy. I didn’t realize how badly I needed support until it was already on the way. Sometimes it’s hard to admit going it alone is a struggle. And these people who care about me, didn’t make me have to ask, they jumped in feet first to come support me. It means more than I can put into words. Knowing Josie is coming I find a renewed energy to get through this.
The next few days blur together. Grandpa’s condition is serious but stable. The doctors are cautiously optimistic, which I cling to like a life raft. I sleep in the chair beside his bed, waking at every beep and shift of his breathing.
