Chapter 3: Hospital

In the mean time the nurse took me to my son.  He was hooked up to so many machines.  He looked so helpless!  My legs became weak and needed to sit down.  I sat with my son and held his hand.

I asked over and over, “why is this happening?” “Why is God Punishing me and my family?” As I held Normie’s hand I told him “Normie, Mom’s here, please talk to me, please don’t die.”  I told him how much I loved him and needing him to fight for his life.  I continually asked God for help. I cried very quietly so no one could hear me, I am a very private person when it comes to crying.

My husband arrived and he spoke to the doctors right away.  When he was done finding out the prognosis he came to Normie’s bedside.  We stayed with our son until early morning.  The nurse came into the room and said, “We should go home and get some rest.”  “I told her I was not going anywhere and that my son needed me.”  She told us that we should let our family know what happened.  I still did not want to leave my son.  It was my husband that convinced me to go home and make the calls.  He wanted his father and the rest of the family to know.  Then we could come back to the hospital.

I went, but I went reluctantly.  We went home and made some calls.  I broke down on the phone as I called everybody.  All of the family came rushing over to be by our sides and give us support during this horrific time.  I told them that Normie wasn’t going to survive this.  All I wanted was to be back at my son’s side.  I started crying and saying, “Why my child, WHY?”

We went back to the hospital after some time with the family.  I was holding my son’s hand as tight as I could.  I never wanted to let it go.  Knowing my son, I felt he knew I was there no matter what anyone said.  When I talked to him he would squeeze my hand.  I knew he could hear me. Everyone said, “he cannot hear you.”  But a mother knows.  I knew my son was trying to talk to me.

There is a memory I will never forget; the awful sulphur smell when I held his hand.  This is one smell that is engraved in my memory forever.  It was so hard to see my child so helpless.  I just wanted to crawl in bed with him and take all his pain away.  I protected him all his life.  Now I couldn’t do anything except sit there and ask him to fight for his life.

The nurse at the hospital told us we needed to contact our family doctor. It might be a good idea so he could give us something to help us get through this nightmare.  We did and he sent over some medication.  I still was walking around in a daze. I still couldn’t believe this was happening to us.  All I could think was that someone shot my son, and that he was going to die.  What could I do?  Not a DAMN thing except pray for him to come back to us, so I did.

As the day progressed, one of my sister-in-laws called a pastor to come and give him his last rights.  I kept saying to myself, “why is this happening to us?” The pastor started the last rights.  The tears came rolling down my face like a faucet.  I slightly lifted my head and as I looked at Normie, all of a sudden I saw something over our son. It was like a cloud or a film of smoke.  I wiped my eyes to see if it was just the tears blurring my vision, but it was not.  Something was floating over him. Whatever it was lifted toward the ceiling and seemed for a couple of seconds to hover over him.  Then it slowly went up and disappeared.

I knew from that moment my Normie was starting to leaving us. I put my head down on him and prayed,” God please give my son back to me.”  But nothing happened. From that point on things became hazy.  I took some of the pills that were given to us by our doctor and that put me in a daze.

The nurse said we should go home for the night, but I did not want to leave.  My husband once again convinced me to go home and try and get some rest. I cried all night and my husband held me until the medication finally put me to sleep. The next morning the hospital called and told us Normie’s blood pressure was dropping.  They wanted us to get there right away.  I didn’t even shower, we just went.  All I wanted to do was get to my son as fast as I could.

The ride seemed to take forever.  We got to the hospital and I ran up the stairs because I felt the elevator was not coming fast enough.  I got to our son’s room, took his hand and said to him, “please, Normie. I LOVE YOU, DON’T LEAVE ME.”  I kept saying it over and over.  Then his blood pressure went up.  I spent the day holding his hand and talking to him.  I told him how much his father, brother and I needed him.  I told him again “please don’t die.”

The nurse suggested that I should go and get something to eat, but I was so afraid to leave his side.  Some of my other family members wanted to spend some time with Normie.  So I decided to go home to shower and eat. I tried to eat, but nothing was staying down.

No sooner did I walk in the house and the phone was ringing.  It was the hospital telling us to come back.  We left again but we didn’t make it in time.  My Normie died without me, in my sister-in-laws arms.  I think Normie was afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle the shock of him dying while I was there, so he waited until we were home.

The hospital asked if we wanted to donate his organs. I didn’t want to talk about it at the time. All I kept saying was that I brought him into this world whole and I’m can’t think about this now.  I couldn’t make that decision.