I’ve been finding myself stuck lately. Like…I stop where I am and I can’t move at that moment. I can feel this darkness fall over me and when I’m able to put one step in front of the other again, I feel heavy. Sometimes I’m sitting at my desk at work or on the couch at home and I appear to be lost in thought. Yet it’s more that I’m trying not to cry because I’m feeling everything that I’ve lost and about to lose.

I’m lucky in the fact that I get to see my husband every day still. I know others don’t have that luxury. Is it hard watching him slowly die? Fuck yeah, it is. There are days that I want it all to be over. And there are days that I hope it never ends. Humans are full of contradictions, aren’t we?

The past 2-3 weeks have been challenging. Wal’s health declined suddenly–including severe leg weakness and a dizzy spell that has left him with some short term memory loss. (Possible stroke?) I’ve mentioned before how congestive heart failure (CHF) is one of those staircase diseases. You go down a step, and then you plateau. But you keep going down the steps, not back up. Your health will just continue to decline until you die. In just a 4-day period, Wal was no longer able to go up or down stairs and had a bit of memory loss. Once again, his heart isn’t able to pump blood the way it needs to. This is what CHF does.

When my husband has a new decline, we have some serious conversations, but ones we’ve had before–where will he be cremated, who to call, etc. This time, however, was scarier because the thought of Wal having a stroke that completely takes away any of his autonomy is our worst case scenario. We ended up talking with his hospice nurse last week about when a hospital bed would be needed and Wal was worried about where it would go. (Right in the living room, I assured him. Right where he sleeps in his “forever chair” now. Not to worry.) I also started to apply for Paid Medical Family Leave for when I need to be home more. I know I need to change my schedule now, but I want this all squared away first and we’re still waiting on Wal’s doctor to finish up some paperwork. But even through all of that, humor still found our way into our conversation one night. “I know this disease is supposed to be like going down a staircase,” Wal said, “but now it feels like a ramp!” We both laughed because there was nothing else we could do.

Talking about a ramp…we now need one or Wal won’t be able to leave the house most days. Yesterday he had a rare good day and we ran errands, with him in the car most of the time. It felt good to finally get him out of the house after over two weeks with being unable to. Going back up the steps was not easy and I basically pushed his body and helped lift one of his legs for every step. But we did it! Thankfully, we have some incredible neighbors who are going to build us a ramp soon, which will make our lives a lot easier for when Wal has to or wants to leave the house.

I want you to know that our lives are, believe it or not, not all doom and gloom. Are we all a bit depressed most days? Yes. Of course. Mondays for me, in particular, are awful. I go to work and I really do feel like there’s a dark cloud following me about. It’s difficult for me to smile on those days and I know I have an aura of sadness. I can tell just by the way my co-workers interact with me. This was confirmed last week when a co-worker, an absolute sweetheart of a human, told me they just don’t know what to do for me or even how to be around me sometimes. I was so grateful for their honesty, but also I wasn’t sure how to respond. I wasn’t really surprised by their statement and yet I was still caught off-guard. I can only hide so much and I guess I was really sucking at hiding the grief. So I told them that they could always say they were sorry this was happening to me and to keep making me laugh like they usually do. Laughing is the best balm for all of us right now.

So, my friends, find something that makes you laugh today. Cat videos, a dad joke, a funny film, a Far Side comic strip, a Weird Al song, whatever! It’ll lower your blood pressure and increase your endorphins. And if you’re like many of us, if you laugh hard enough you might pee a little, too!

Hugs to you all, friends. ❤