Determination and Stubborness

I spent this past weekend with my whole immediate family - including my parents. I was reminded that this may be the last time I get to see them ever - especially my Mother. That's a really hard pill for me to swallow.

Last year my english professor asked us to write about A Significant Moment in Family History. This is what I wrote:

What keeps a family alive?  What is that one thing you need to make sure every person survives?  My mother has always been ill and when I was twelve she came home pale, weak and unable to breath.  This was common but as we went through the all too familiar motions of machines and medicines my mother grabbed me in a vice grip.  She yelled "get your Father now!" Not the "go ahead and call 911 and tell your Father" that I normally hear. She was determined not to die without saying goodbye to anyone she could. Once we were assembled she stubbornly tried to keep us there and we stubbornly ran around calling 911, hailing the ambulance outside pulling out the
big tanks.  It began a night of fighting, and revealed something inherent in all the members of my family.  In order to keep each other together and alive we will dig our heels in and fight every obstacle with blind stubbornness and a healthy disregard for reason.  This may be strength, but I think this is love - through fire.

When I left my mother and father to flag down the ambulance he was attempting to inject her with an epi-pen.  It's a small hypodermic needle that only dispenses a safe dose.  In theory you should be able to stick it quick, push the button and everything is well.  When I came back escorting the paramedics my father had my unconscious mother turned upside down with legs draped over his lap, pen stuck and using his fist as a hammer to push the small little black button.  He was pounding and screaming like he was about to go into a battle for the freedom of Scotland and the needle was his only sword.  I heard the paramedics whisper "I think she's dead."  This only made my father re-jab the needle over and over in an effort to get the pen to work.  This was it, if only we could give her some ephedrine she would be fine, she'd wake up.  I knew my Father believed it.  He really did put all his hope into a three inch hypodermic needle.

We all look for things to hold onto in crisis, ideas, memories, keepsakes.  Something to give us comfort.  We may hold onto a locket of a loved one, but deep down we know that the locket will not bring that loved one back, it will help us but not them.  My Father though refused to give into that idea of comfort.  He refuse to believe that there was nothing he could do for his wife.  He continued to jab and push that button even after the paramedics began their own work.  He was stubbornly clinging to the fact that he could save her.  Of course he could, he was her husband, she was his wife, they were supposed to be together for eternity.  Normal logic would point out that this wasn't always the case, but because this was his family - normal logic didn't count.

My mother was showing off her own stubbornness as well.  By all accounts this woman was dead.  Her heart had stopped, she wasn't breathing, no amount of screaming was helping to wake her up.  But that didn't stop her.  The paramedics injected and shocked her and finally attempted to put a tube down her throat.  We've all seen this on t.v.  The patient lies there unconscious while the doctor guides a green tube gently down using a metal guide and they connect a little bag to force air into the lungs.  That is if the patient is willing to stay unconscious.  My mother was not.  Not only did she not want to stay still and pliant, she did not want that tube down her throat!  Later my mother told me she was afraid that they would take away her voice and she needed it to say goodbye to us.  My mother said "I was so angry at you all."  She didn't need to tell us.  My mother, the kind, gentle woman who never raised her voice used soft touches and refused to step on insects started to thrash like a banshee.  She clocked one paramedic so well he ended up with two black eyes.  We all tackled her as the paramedics attempted to put the tube in again.  My mother kicked me so hard I split my lip.  A shoe went flying off her foot, all the way across the large room and hit the window.  It's still cracked.  My father was pummeled and the second paramedic was shoved against the wall by a flailing hand.  Dead people don't act like this.  Hadn't someone informed my mother that people who are not breathing do not engage in boxing?  Did she know that her job was to be
peaceful while the paramedics brought her back to us?

We kept telling her "let them help you."  She would have none of this.  People talk of seeing white lights and either running towards them or away from them.  My mother saw red - red lights, red anger.  Her determination to stay with her family and talk with them, tell them exactly what she needed to say, made her fight harder than she had ever fought in her life.  Her body, acting subconsciously, acted out her will. She was not dead and she would not die without doing what she thought was most important.  Her vigor flies in the face of all science.  There are stories of mothers who lift cars to save their children.  Women will brave wars and bullets to keep their families together.  My mother used the same strength and love that all mothers use to fight her way back to life.  No scientific realities could have convinced her that she was not supposed to come back.  And her stubbornness insisted she do it her way.

I find the fact that my mother did all that while she was unconscious and unaware of her real surroundings the most telling aspect.  A person can consciously choose to not accept a situation.  My father could have made the decision to abandon hope and not fight as hard as he did that night.  I could have made the choice to stay with my mother till the last minute rather than running away for help.  But my mother didn't make a choice. It was instinct that made her fight, it was a part of her that's deeper than thought.  Her fighting was an impulse that I don't believe could be denied.  It's this impulse that keeps families together.  There are so many obstacles that fly in the face of family love, adultery, death, even simple disagreements can break bonds.  But the strength of love for one another is so much stronger than all of those elements.  It doesn't allow a family to quit even when the individuals want too.  It's what keeps families of any shape together, it's what keeps them alive.