“Be her husband, not her doctor – remember?” the deputy reminded me, consistent in her demand. Once again, she said it matter-of-factly, without compassion.
I felt like she had both slapped me and told me to disappear, to stop asking questions, to stop being present. I hated her request, but I felt she left me no choice.
“She’s not very nice!” I said to Lily when I returned to her bedside.
I wanted to tell the deputy that Lily was not just a set of lab values, but a living person, the most precious one to me – that more than anything, I wanted her healthy – and I also wanted to ask how she couldn’t understand that.
As I paced the room, the deputy came in again. I thought she had come to apologize but instead, she ignored her earlier harshness and told us that according to theNew England Journal of Medicine,there was a new drug for her illness, but she would need to sign an informed consent form to participate in a trial.
“If you sign, she can get it,” she concluded.
I didn’t understand why she hadn’t told me that in the firstplace. Why knock down and then lift up? Still, this was the hope I had been waiting for – something to hold on to. Lily agreed immediately. She didn’t even ask questions. She signed the form. We both ignored the list of side effects the deputy began to enumerate. That evening, Lily received the drug intravenously.
“It burns terribly,” Lily told the nurse administering it.
“This is the first time I’m giving the drug like this,” the nurse replied. “Usually, it’s diluted in an infusion.”
“I’m willing to bear the pain, if it will improve my condition,” Lily murmured.
I stroked her hair. I loved to play with her soft curls. Suddenly she lifted her free hand, grabbed mine, and began to groan. The pain in her arm was unbearable.
“Next time we’ll dilute it, I’ll tell the doctor…” said the nurse, seeing her suffering.
“If this is the only way to treat me, I’ll endure it. I have to be healthy – for you!” she said to me.
“You know this will pass. Look, the bag is nearly empty,” I tried to distract her while caressing her free hand, hoping it would help.
“It’s all right. I’ll manage,” she said.
We couldn’t hide our tears.
When the bag was empty, the nurse connected her to a saline infusion. Lily thanked her and smiled, “What a difference.”
“The urea dropped!” the deputy announced triumphantly the next morning, smiling from ear to ear.
“To how much?” Lily asked. I didn’t dare.
“To near normal – and even lower.”
It sounded too good to be true. Especially since Lily felt no change.
“So the drug is working!” the deputy added proudly, as if the invention were hers.
“Maybe it’s a mistake. Maybe repeat the test. Lily feels no improvement,” I said outside the room.
“You’re being her doctor again!” she scolded me.
I swallowed hard and went back to Lily. Nothing had changed. She still looked pale, on the verge of gray. I didn’t believe the results.
“The deputy is calling for you,” a nurse told me in the evening.
“She probably wants to scold me again,” I said to Lily nervously.
“Go, go – she’s fine with me,” Lily reassured me.
I walked slowly to the doctors’ room, not knowing what to expect. To my surprise, the deputy received me hesitantly.
“I’m sorry. They switched the test tubes,” she admitted. “Her condition has actually worsened.”
