Help in the Hospital Hallway

My first cathartic experience while reading a blog happened today. Here is the link.

In it, a young lady tells a story about a woman who comforted her outside of her mother's hospital room. I will not excerpt or paraphrase her story. You can read it.

The blog touched me, because I too had found help in a hospital hallway.

Five years ago, our middle child was in the hospital having been diagnosed with Type I diabetes. It was late one night/early one morning, we had been in the hospital for about 18 hours.

In an effort to reduce her blood sugar level, she was on an insulin drip and the nurses were testing her blood every hour. As soon as a nurse would come in to the room, I would rouse myself from the twilight sleep I was trying to fight off.

Finally, at 5 a.m., I heard through the haze of real sleep, a nurse saying "Dad, Dad" and then my daughter calling "Daddy, Daddy"

Sound asleep. I had let my guard down and had allowed the exhaustion to win. My daughter was only eleven and she wanted me awake for this test, it was a large amount of blood. When the vials were filled, she fell right back to sleep.

I left the room, which was at the end of the wing and started to walk. By the time I reached the middle of the hallway, where the nurse’s station stood, I had tears running down my face. I was letting the whole thing: the shock, the fear and the exhaustion get the upper hand. And I couldn't let this happen, because my daughter would be up again in an hour for another blood test and she would need me.

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder, I turned it was a nurse. She said,"Dad, it’s going to be alright," then gave me a hug.

I hugged back and said "thank you."

I continued walking to the end of the hall. I looked into each room seeing parents, sitting, sleeping, pacing. Children with casts, with breathing apparatus with shaved heads. All of a sudden I understood.

"Dad, it’s going to be alright."

The nurse could not say that to all these parents. In some of those rooms it would not be alright.

I turned at the end of the hallway and marched back. I wasn’t exhausted anymore. I wasn't afraid. I was ready, and when my daughter woke up for the next test, I would be there for her.

Many times since then my wife, my daughter and I have gone back to that same hospital hallway to help newly-diagnosed families come to terms with the shock. I tell them about the help in the hallway and I assure them it is going to be alright.

I feel that I owe it to them and I owe it to the other parents, the ones that will never be able to hear those words.