My Week From Hell! (Part 1)

Yet again I have been AWOL, with far less posts than I would like, but my reason this time is even more genuine than previous ones!

Life had been ridiculous as always, but over the past couple of weeks my husband had complained of various muscular aches and pains in his right leg and hip. Then, on Friday 23rd, after a heavy day at work, he bent down to pat the dog on the head, and 'bam!', he couldn't get back up.

He was in agony. Thinking it was a muscular spasm he tried to walk it off, but the pain only increased. He reached a point where he could not move, sit or stand and was left propped against the dining room table in excruciating pain. After an hour and it not improving I called the out of hours Doctor service. They called back and advised that he had to go into hospital as he was in such acute pain.

The ambulance came and took about an hour getting him onto a gurney. They then took another hour getting enough pain killers into him for the journey to hospital. During this time I was organising my eldest son's girlfriend getting picked up (I was supposed to drop her home - it was the first time she had come round for tea, I think we may have scared her!), packing stuff for my husband for hospital, and getting my 4 kids and the dog sorted so that I could go with my husband. It was manic.

At the hospital we had to wait in the hall for a bed to become available. Then getting him onto the bed was a tremendous challenge, as every little movement caused him to scream in agony. They x-rayed him as they thought it was a broken pelvis or hip, or a bone fracture - but nothing. Each test took ages to happen. Here's the photograph of husband's arm 8 days after he was out of hospital. The bruising is a result of their four botched attempts to take blood for testing:

Yes, he cried when they tried, even on morphine!

Pretty gruesome! This is when it was better!

Because things don't move fast in hospitals, unless an emergency, I was about to go home (he was on a lot of pain meds by then, so snoozing lightly). I turned my back on him for a moment, and when I turned back his eyes had rolled into the back of his head - he was unconscious.

I had to stand in Accident and Emergency shouting for help, and when they got to him they realised he wasn't breathing. They started CPR and chest compressions, and one nurse tried to take me off to a 'relatives room' to wait as they worked on him. 'It's not nice watching this,' she said. 'Come on, you don't want this in your memory bank.' I was probably looking a bit panicked, but I remember saying to her 'I'm alright. I won't get in your way, but I don't want to leave him. If this is the end, I want to be here.'

I remember standing there talking to God in that moment. We had gone in with my husband in pain, a muscular problem we thought. And in that moment I was faced with perhaps walking out of that place, never seeing him again. All evening we had been praying, praising and reading the Bible, crying out to God, but I remember wondering how his death could possibly be part of God's plan. It was dreadful, and scary and I think, life changing. Everything falls into perspective when you're met with that.

Praise God they got him breathing again. They don't know why it happened, possibly pain, shock and medications. But they said that had they not intervened there was no guarantee he would have started breathing again as he'd stopped for longer than people usually do in that type of faint. Praise God I was there and turned to look at him in that moment and noticed. Praise God he's not dead.

After that I wasn't about to go anywhere and couldn't take my eyes off him to see if he was breathing! They did various test throughout the night, ruled out fractures or bones and offered a diagnosis of muscular/ nerve/ tendon, but nothing more. He showed no signs of improvement however until friends started praying around 6.30am, then he improved just enough to be able to shuffle to the loo by himself, albeit on morphine, valium and an anti-inflammatory drug. Because his pain was being 'managed' (he still couldn't move or do anything) they said he could go home.

Somehow I managed to fold him gently into the car, and after over 30 hours without sleep (plus an awful lot of stress and adrenaline) I drove home (whilst praying I could keep my concentration). After settling him on the sofa, I scuttled off to bed for a couple of hours' sleep.

The shock of it all - the sudden intrusion of pain into our lives and the trauma of seeing my husband almost die - has taken the week to wear off. Some of it I'm sure I'll never quite manage to 'file' properly in my head. I don't know how to quantify near death experiences like that. But in spite of it all, I can see that God has been with us in it. Even when I stood, all alone, watching them resuscitate my husband, I am sure Jesus stood next to me and reached out to hold my hand, and whisper 'Don't worry, it will be OK'.

There was quite a lot preceding all this drama, and little did I know there was more to come, but I shall tell more in Part 2, tomorrow or the day after (time allowing, as I am now working full time at our business and managing kids, meals, husband etc, as with him not working if I don't work we don't have any income). But apologies for my absence. Hopefully a clearer month ahead as he improves in health.

More Soon, be blessed : )