**Written 18.25pm Sunday 5th July***
1 week ago to the minute I was sitting waiting for an old couple to leave their parking space. They were taking forever but I wasn’t hysterical. I generally believed when Grayson was taken in the ambulance with Ashley an hour before it would purely be for monitoring.
I can’t believe how wrong I was.
As we sat waiting for Paeds to come from the ward I was reminded of the last time we had been in that hospital. A hospital that had failed my son over 5 years before, we joked of the fact that nothing had changed. The peeling wall stickers were the same, the toys barely updated, we people watched as I stroked Grayson’s tired head. If only we had realised what was really happening.
The past 7 days have not felt real, I feel like I have lived in this alternate reality. Till today. Today it is hitting home, today I feel sick to my stomach with so many emotions, so much guilt, anger, thankfulness and love.
My heart rate all day has been elevated. I dread to think of my BP. I had to leave the house today just to stop myself having a breakdown.
A week ago my son was laying in A&E. 4 hours from now we are told he has a bleed on the brain, 6 hours later he is intubated, 7 hours he is put in an ambulance without either of his parents (this has never happened before), 8 hours from now I see him wheeled into Kings, sedated, out of my control, 8 hours and 5 minutes from now I am told that my son is having “life saving brain surgery” and “we are not sure he will make it”.
I am numb, I sit in a corridor planning how I will tell my other children their brother has gone, I don’t believe in Heaven but think what will I tell a 2 and 4-year-old. I think how will I ring and tell his grandparents who are laying awake 2 hours away that their Grandson will never come home. I think to planning a funeral, living a life without him. It was the longest 4 hours of my life. Sitting in that hot sticky corridor. Knowing nothing, I watched the sunrise and realised it was red, the old wives tale my Nana would sing “red sky in the morning shepherds warning” playing over and over.
I would fall asleep and then run to the toilet and cry with guilt that I slept as my son was in an operation.
I am still numb, I feel sick being back in our house, I feel helpless.
Grayson is home, by some miracle my superhero did what no one thought possible, he fought again, he used another life, I have no idea how many he has but he has used so many. He is now giggling to Mickey Mouse, trying to walk around like nothing has happened. I am so frightened. I want to seriously wrap him in cotton wall. I barely slept last night, watching him over and over. Worried.
I am not sure how I will go back to feeling normal again ? How will I move on ? How will I stop feeling angry ? There are so many questions, so much uncertainty.
We were in a good place, we were embracing happy as a family, we were having adventures, living life, we were excited for what we could achieve. I need to find a way back.
