Aside from enjoying a relaxing weekend away, our camping trip earlier this month served another purpose. It was my opportunity to spend some time with my dad before he went under the knife on Monday morning.
The last few weeks have tossed me into emotional turmoil for many reasons, none of which I'm ready to face. Suffice it to say that if I were five, I'd be hiding in the clothes hamper with a book and a flashlight, my chosen coping mechanism as a child. But I'm an adult now, so instead I've resorted to a loss of sleep, pacing the floors, and snapping at people for no good reason. Plus, I no longer fit in the clothes hamper.
The gist of the surgery was an attempt to fix my dad's hip replacement that was completely worn out and causing him a great deal of pain for over a year now. He's had several of these surgeries but the last one was over thirty years ago. At that time he was told the prognosis wasn't good for another one if needed down the road. The technology was limited and they had done all they could with what appeared to be his final hip replacement. If it slipped, the consequences could be as severe as amputation. Not a fun thought to have hanging over your head.
So, thankfully, it lasted over thirty years until last summer. He avoided the issue and dealt with the pain for quite a while before facing the doctors, out of fear I assume, but it was inevitable. Around Christmas time they scheduled his surgery for June 11th at the VA hospital in Manhattan because the local doctors wouldn't touch him.
My dad ended up having one of the top surgeons from New York University Hospital and, even though he gave him no guarantees whatsoever going in, he actually managed to start a new hip replacement. The good news is that thirty years of advancing technology and one amazing surgeon came together to do what would have never been possible back then. The bad news is that he was only able to start the replacement; he needs to finish it a few months from now once the bones have a chance to grow and secure the new socket. Until he goes back in and attaches the ball, my dad's thigh bone is not connected to his hip, which means a few months in a wheelchair while nature takes its course.
The planned three-hour surgery was more like six, the quality of aftercare he got there was so horrific it ended in a transfer to a VA closer to home, and his actual stay in the hospital was much longer than planned or anticipated. He finally came home today. And while all of the gory details can take up an entire post on their own, that's not really what I need to write about.
What I need to get out is the startling revelation that my parents are, well, aging. And that's a hard pill to swallow.
I think children tend to naturally view their parents as invincible, and that image doesn't disappear once the kids reach adulthood themselves. Parents are strong. Tough. Able to handle any situation. They always know just what to do. From boo-boos to hunger pangs, broken hearts to toothaches, parents have all the answers. They can skip meals, survive on minimal sleep, and travel a million miles a week running kids to soccer practice, ballet class, and piano lessons, and still have time and energy to help with homework, prepare dinner, do laundry, work a full time job, and leap tall buildings in a single bound.
I'm fully aware that I'm a stone's throw away from forty, so obviously my parent are not. Even with my sub-par math skills I can do that calculation, but yet somehow in my mind they've remained forty-something. Yes, aging is a gradual process, but I've blissfully ignored the signs. And all of a sudden reality smacked me square in the face.
My parents get tired now. They can't go nonstop all day like they used to. The grandkids really do literally wear them out. My mom's comment about her recent new car purchase may very well be true: it might be her last one. My dad's rebound from this surgery wasn't immediate, not because of the scope of the operation, but because he isn't forty anymore. Reality is that they are both only a decade away from the point where my grandmothers both suffered severe health problems. And ten years can go by in a flash.
I'm just not ready for this. We haven't had enough time. I want them to run and jump and ride roller coasters again. I want them to be strong, healthy, and live forever. I want them to see Punky graduate from college, and get married, and give birth to their great grandchild. The truth is that they may not even see her graduate high school, and that thought makes me cry. In fact, it's had me crying for weeks.
I'm having trouble coping with this revelation the way it is, and my uncle's passing in the midst of it just drove the point home even further. The tables turned while I wasn't looking. Suddenly I'm staring down the other side of the mountain, and I don't like what I see at the bottom. I want my superheroes back. I want them to shoot spider webs out of their wrists and climb back up to the top. I want them to fly again. I want them to swoop in and save the day like they've done so many times.
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