Saturday, February 20, 2010

A Split Second

This week has been tough on a good friend of mine. His father had a heart attack last Saturday. He was flat-lined for 10 minutes before the paramedics revived him back, but he fell in to a coma. Last Monday the docs did brain scan and it showed some damage. How bad the damage could only be determined after he woke up and did a series of test. At this moment, it's a waiting game for them.

What happened to their family, brings back my nightmare.

For half an hour I stood there alone watching medics tried to bring back my father. I couldnt call my mom and brother about it because they were still on their way, it would only sending them even more frantic in the middle of Jakarta's rush hour.

For half an hour I stood there, in disbelief that it was a flat-line that showed on the monitor attached to my father. I wished it wasnt true. I looked at his doctors friends standing there in silence, trying not to catch my eyes.

For half an hour I stood there, pleading him to come back. Just long enough for my mom and brother to say goodbye.

For half an hour I stood there, in the room or at the door, trying to be brave for him. I didnt want him there without his family, but it pained me to see him like that.

He came around not long after my mom and brother arrived. We took turn to whisper to him and he turned his head to the side where someone talked to him. When it was my turn, he look at me and tears ran down his face.

They took him for a two hours surgery. I signed his inform consent. It felt weird.
That night he passed away. I signed his death certificate. It was surreal.

We were lucky that we didnt have to decide to pull his life support. My friend and I discussed about that option the other night. They wont let him to be a vegetable.

Until it happens to you, you have no idea how it feels to loose a parent. You might be independent from them, you might not be close, you might even not share his blood. But a death of parents still affect you.

A split second disruption turned what was a great day into a terrible one.
But that's life, and we move on.

4 comments:

colson said...

A very, very moving account. One everyone who had remotely similar experiences can identify with.

Your last line is true of course: we have to move on. And we do. Yet,personally, about thirty-five years on, these very emotional days of my parents' deaths keep popping up in my mind.

triesti said...

Does it as hurt as it did 35 years ago? I hope it does. But it doesnt feel like it is any less at this moment.

colson said...

No, it's not pain I experience. More a kind of a strange mix kind of mild sadness, love, tenderness and longing.

colson said...

So sorry. It should have been:

"No, it's not pain I experience. More kind of a mild sadness, love, tenderness and strange longing".