by Judy Baer
The baby, as if it had read my mind, thrust some little appendage into my side with such force that it took my breath away.
The hospital looks entirely different when your husband is a patient, rather than an attending physician. The halls are longer, the lights are brighter and the antiseptic smell is more pungent. An E.R. isn’t a high-tech wonder, it’s a chamber of horrors, filled with equipment Dr. Frankenstein would have given his—or somebody’s—eyeteeth to own.
The on-call physician was Martin Steele, a doctor Chase says is “one of the best in the business.”
He took one look at me hovering by Chase and frowned. “Do you need a wheelchair, Whitney?”
Hysterical laughter bubbled through my lips. “Of course not! I’m fine. This baby isn’t due for six weeks yet. It’s Chase I’m worried—Oh!” Whitney or Chase Junior has the kick of an ornery mule on a bad day in the pasture. I imagined permanent footprints marking the inside of my womb.
“Sit down, Whitney. I’ll take a look at Chase and call for someone in obstetrics to check you out.”
“This baby is not being born today,” I said, teeth gritted. “I want to know what’s wrong with my husband.”
“Whit?” Chase’s voice was soft, but I heard him immediately.
I moved to put my ear closer to his mouth.
“Don’t make me worry anymore than I already am. Sit down and behave yourself. Dr. Steele will take care of me. You need to tend to our baby.” Then he grimaced, and a shudder spread thorough him. “Please.”
“I will, honey, I will….” I promised, begging him with every fiber of my being to be okay.
And then the gurney began to move and he was spirited away into the bowels of the hospital without me.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Kim and Kurt arrived just after midnight. My parents offered to sit in the car with the sleeping Wesley while they came inside.
Tears flowed silently down my cheeks when I saw Kim come around the corner to find me.
“What’s happening?”
“Oh, Kim, he’s in so much pain…. They’re running tests right now. They won’t let me stay with him because my blood pressure spikes when I am. Dr. Steele told me he’d talk to me as soon as he knew something, but he’s never come back.” I clutched at her hand. “What if Chase dies?”
“Surely it isn’t that serious, Whitney.” But a flicker of fear crossed her features. “Is it?”
Kim reached for my hands as I wrung them over the plumpest part of my belly. “Your parents said that Chase was fine, and then all of a sudden he was in the other room, writhing on the bed. Has he complained about not feeling well?”
“Nothing I can think of…” Then my mind began to replay all the recent times when Chase had slept too long or refused to eat.
“He’s been so attentive to me, and I’ve been so wrapped up in this pregnancy, that I didn’t take notice.” I told Kim about the times I’d found him on the couch warm and feverish. “But he always said he was fine…”
“So this isn’t the first time he’s been ill?”
Tears welled in my eyes. “If I’d been a decent wife, I would have paid more attention—”
“Stop that.” Kim splashed figurative cold water on my distraught emotions. “You’re pregnant, growing an entirely new person in there.” She pointed to my rotund middle. “And your husband is a doctor. If anyone should have noticed he was sick, it was Chase.”
Physician, heal yourself. That advice hadn’t worked in this case.
Kurt came in to say that Wesley and my father were sawing logs in the car and my mother had taken them home to put them to bed. I nodded dumbly, already having convinced myself that I would spend the rest of my life sitting in a miserable plastic chair with arms so snug that they held my belly in place like a bad girdle.
Then Dr. Steele strode through a pair of double doors and headed for me.
“Whitney, we’re taking Chase into surgery. His appendix has burst.”
“Appendicitis?” I echoed stupidly. “But he’s never said anything…”
“From the examination and what he’s told me, I think he’s been suffering from chronic appendicitis.”
“‘Chronic?’ You mean he’s had it a long time?”
“Some patients have an atypical clinical course of recurrent inflammation in the appendix, something you may have heard referred to as a ‘grumbling appendix.’ The symptoms vary from patient to patient. It flares and settles down again, so there aren’t specific clinical characteristics that might aid in a diagnosis. I understand why Chase didn’t realize what it was. His episodes resolved spontaneously in a day or two.
“We don’t see chronic appendicitis often. As far as I can tell, he’s been diagnosing himself with indigestion or possible gallstones. Since it was chronic, it actually could have been either.”
“Or Couvades syndrome?” Kim murmured.
Dr. Steele looked at my stomach and smiled faintly. “I suppose that’s a possibility, too. Doctors are sometimes the worst patients. They pay more attention to their patients than they do to themselves.”
He should have told me!
If I weren’t so frightened, I’d be furious with him for not telling me he’d felt ill. Now, I thought illogically, I’ll have to wait until he gets well to be angry with him.
If he gets well.
“Could he have done something sooner?”
Dr. Steele’s eyes darkened. “It would have been better if treatment hadn’t been delayed.” He looked at me with compassion that made me want to cry. “I’m sorry I don’t have better news for you.” He glanced at the clock. “I’d better go.”
He looked me in the eye. “I need to be straight with you, Whitney, he’s a very sick man. I don’t know how long surgery will last, and you are in no condition to sit in a hospital waiting room all night. The nurse I sent out to take your blood pressure says your ankles are swelling.”
I looked down at my feet in surprise. They were thick and looked like lumps of blistered skin. I hadn’t even noticed.
“I’m not leaving my husband.” I’ll stay here until I pop, if necessary.
Dr. Steele sighed. “I thought you might say that. There are a few rooms available for those of us on call to use to get some shut-eye. Chase will never forgive me if I leave you sitting in a chair all night.” He faced Kim. “Will you be staying?”
“As long as necessary.”
“Okay. I’ll have a nurse show you where to go.”
“I’m not leaving Chase.”
“You won’t be. There’s a phone in the room. I’ll have someone call or stop by to tell you how the surgery is progressing. You won’t be any farther away from him there than you would be sitting here. You need to put your feet up.” His voice grew stern. “No argument. I’m not afraid of you, young lady, but I do not want to have to answer to Chase as to why I didn’t take care of his wife.”
He waved, and a nurse hurried over. He gave her instructions before turning back to Kim and me. “I’ve got to get into surgery. Ms. Benson will show you where to go. Whitney, feet up. Hear me?”
I nodded weakly, feeling like a child banished from the festivities. “But Chase…”
“We’ll do everything we can for him. He’s in good hands.” And he turned and was gone.
Good hands. Everything we can for him. That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I wanted Dr. Steele to say, “He’ll be fine. Everything will work out.”
But he hadn’t. No guarantees.
The sleeping room was as cramped as the waiting room, but it had two beds, a recliner, a telephone and a small television set. I promptly lay down on the bed to get some relief for my aching back and realized how tired I really was. My bones ached. My skin ached. My aches ached.
Kim covered me with a blanket and brought me an extra pillow to shove under my abdomen so that I could rest on my side.
“Sleep if you can. I’ll be awake to talk to the nurse or pick up the phone.”
�
��How can I sleep with Chase in the operating room? He might be—” I stopped, unwilling to say aloud what I was thinking.
“I know you’re scared, Whit, but you’ve got to pull yourself together. This baby…”
“Kim, Chase has been bugging me for weeks to get our wills written.”
That got her attention.
“He’s been absolutely obsessive about it. I dragged my feet, but he got it done in spite of me. He said it was ‘just good sense’ to plan ahead. Maybe he knew something I didn’t. Perhaps he had a premonition…”
I tried to rise, but Kim pushed me back onto the bed.
“He’s a sensible, responsible man getting ready to become a first-time father. Kurt did the same thing before Wesley was born. I told him to quit fretting about actuarial tables and life expectancies, because it upset me. When it was finally done, though, he settled down. Chase is like Kurt. He wants to take care of his family.”
Tears leaked down my cheeks. Why hadn’t I been more in tune with him? Guilt reared its ugly head and moved into my head and heart, taking up residence right next to my fear.
“What am I going to do, Kim?”
“Trust the doctors, for one thing. And trust God, for another.”
Kim picked up her large shoulder bag and pulled a Bible out of its depths. “I make it a policy never to go to the hospital without one of these.”
I felt an unfamiliar bleakness overtaking both hope and faith, a terrifying, empty resignation as to what the next few hours would bring.
Where are You, God?
“I read Jeremiah a lot after my surgery,” Kim continued. “‘Oh, Lord, You alone can heal me, You alone can save. My praises are for You alone!’
“I find it comforting to think that the One we depend on to save us from our sins is the same One who can heal us. If I’m counting on the Lord to get me to heaven, then I can certainly count on Him for everything else, right?”
Some of the knots binding my heart loosened a little.
I will give you back your health and heal your wounds, says the Lord.
“Make it so for Chase, make it so.”
The minutes passed like hours.
It was worse, I decided, to lie down than it was to stand and pace. I walked the length of the small room dozens of times before Kim sent me out into the hall, where I could stride out, instead of suffering more mincing footsteps in the crowded room.
Finally, when my legs throbbed, I sat down in the battered Lay-Z-Boy and ratcheted my feet up to keep them from swelling even further.
“Let me help you.” Kim bent to pull off my shoes.
“Wait. My feet are too swollen. If you take them off now, I’ll never get them back on.”
“You can wear my shoes. My feet are bigger than yours.”
“Then what about you?”
“I’ll have your mother bring more from home. I talked to her on the phone while you were in the hall. Everything is fine there. She wanted to come back to the hospital, but I told her to wait until later. Chase is going to be here a few days, so we need to spread out our man—and woman—power so someone is here all the time.”
My head snapped up. “Do you think he’s so ill that we don’t dare leave?”
“No. I think you are so stubborn that you won’t leave the hospital, and someone has to be here to watch you.”
“What’s going on in there, Kim? It’s been hours.”
“No, it hasn’t. It just seems like hours. Why don’t you try to sleep? I’ll wake you if anyone comes by.”
“Would you be able to sleep if it were Kurt in the operating room?”
“Of course not.” She smiled faintly. “But I thought the suggestion was worth a try.”
We visited the vending machines, read large-print Reader’s Digests and played twenty questions. Still no word.
Kim rubbed my back, massaged my feet and helped me clean my purse. No word.
“Where is Dr. Steele?” I wailed. “He said he’d be back—”
At that moment, there was a knock on the door and a young nurse entered.
“Chase?” I rocked forward to rise from the chair.
“Dr. Steele called to say that they are still in surgery. He’ll be out when he can.”
I grabbed the woman by the front of her jacket. “That’s all?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Andrews, that’s what he said, nothing more.”
Kim pried me off her and nudged me toward the bed. “Lie down, Whitney. You’re going crazy. You’ve got to get some rest. When Chase does come out of surgery, you don’t want to be the one going in. You’ve got to take care of yourself, for him and for the baby.”
“What if he dies in there, Kim? It’s taking too long, and you know it.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions.”
“I can’t believe Chase did this!” An unexpected avalanche of anger swept down on me. “He knows how important he is to me and how much I need him. How dare he…”
There I was, building up a head of fury toward a man lying on an operating table. Fear and logic do not cohabitate.
I glanced frantically around the room, looking for something to distract me. If I started to cry now, I doubted I could stop. I would weep until even my poor baby’s watery home went dry. My gaze fell on a calendar with a photo of a majestic bald eagle soaring across a bright blue sky. The bird’s wingspan was enormous, and his eyes were bright, sharp as pinpricks as he dominated the sky. All strength and wild beauty, the eagle soared effortlessly above the earth.
As I stared at him, so magnificent and strong, I recalled a verse from Psalms. He will shield you with His wings. He will shelter you with His feathers. His faithful promises are your armor and protection. Do not be afraid of the terrors of the night, nor for the dangers of the day, nor dread the plague that stalks in darkness, nor the disaster that strikes at midday.
In other words, “Don’t worry, Whitney, I’ve got it covered.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
I finally slept, and when I opened my eyes I saw Dr. Steele’s imposing frame in the doorway.
“Chase…” I struggled out of bed, wondering why, just when my body was most disobliging and otherwise engaged, I needed it most to cooperate.
“He’s out of surgery and in intensive care, Whitney. You won’t be able to see him quite yet.”
“But he’s alive?”
Something flickered in Steele’s eyes, but he said calmly, “Yes.”
“What can you tell us?” Kim, fortunately, was as clearheaded as I was fuzzy.
“Frankly, it was a messy business. Secondary peritonitis. This occurs when there’s a spillage of bacteria into the peritoneum. Now that we’ve removed the source of the infection and identified the microorganism, we can treat him with the proper medication.”
“Peritonitis? That’s very serious, isn’t it?”
“It is potentially life threatening, but Chase is on antibiotics to control the infection. We’ve begun an IV to restore hydration and have him on morphine to reduce the pain.”
The room began to swim, and I felt myself spiraling downward in an eddy of panic. Dr. Steele caught me when my knees buckled.
“I’ll get a nurse.” But before he could pull away, I grabbed his arm.
“I’m okay. Just the shock…” I fixed my eyes on his, and it was excruciating to see my own concern mirrored there. “What are his chances?”
“He’s a strong man, Whitney. His immune system is not compromised. He’s athletic, has a good heart and is a nonsmoker. All that is in his favor.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
Dr. Steele sighed and pulled the one straight-backed chair in the room toward me. He straddled it and rested his arms on its back to face me.
“Chase would want me to be honest with you. I know how much he loves you, and how he admires your strength and courage, so I’ll be blunt. I can’t give you a prognosis right now. Given a little time, we’ll be able to see how he responds. I’m hoping that we ge
t the infection under control and that the worst will be past.”
“And if not?” I had to ask the hard questions.
Dr. Steele considered a moment before speaking. “There are several complications that can arise. We haven’t seen any of them yet, and may not, but I think Chase would want you to know what we’re facing.”
Because I’m courageous, right? As courageous as the Cowardly Lion on the way to Oz.
“The first danger is sepsis. It’s the body’s response to infection going into overdrive, and causes a cascade of events that lead to widespread inflammation.”
“And if it does?” I noticed that behind the doctor, Kim had sunk onto the second bed and was ghastly pale.
“It can cause multiple organ failure. Of course, I’m not saying that’s going to happen….”
“But it could?”
Do not fear the terrors of the night nor fear the dangers of the day.
“If there is considerable spread of the infection, we may also see abnormal blood clotting,” Dr. Steele said doggedly, “or lung infection.”
“His lungs?” Kim blurted. “But I thought he had appendicitis.”
“Respiratory distress syndrome. The infection can travel through the entire body.”
“But you’ve got him on medication,” she said.
“We are counting on that to work.”
“Why wouldn’t it?” The baby in my womb was cart wheeling with anxiety, a mirror image of my own distress.
“Listen, Whitney, you don’t need to—”
“I do need. I need to know what I’m facing. I need to know my husband’s condition. I need to know what to expect. This is my life, too, you know.”
Don’t leave me, Chase.
“Some forms of peritonitis don’t respond well to treatment,” Dr. Steele said resignedly. “But like I said—”
“You said you don’t know.”
“I’ve given you a worst-case scenario, Whitney. We’re doing everything in our power not to let it get that far.”
“You aren’t making any promises, though, are you?”
He shook his head. “You know as well as I do that medicine doesn’t always lend itself to promises.”
