The Dudeism Forum

A very dudely quote.

Like many before I have only just come across this and truly wish you and yours all the best. If there's something you need then feel free to ask. It's a bit hollow to say charity begins at home but since this place is home to so many, ..., we're all here for you.
Ironically I am due to get married next year on the 27 may which should have been a special day for you too. I will save a special thought for you.
Hang in there dude. Like the Sunday golfer who gets a hole on one, you'll spend the rest of your life trying to do it again.

Thanks Milnie Dude.

It's been a while again since I updated everyone on Chantelle's Status.

Tomorrow is my birthday it is also exactly nine months since the accident.

Chit has been in the neuro care home for 6 weeks now. She has her own room and we(her parents and I) have decorated this and put a lot of Chantelle'sown effects in there, her favourite paintings and pictures, some of her furniture and some childhood soft toys.

The wound where the trachy was is healing nicely and physically she is mostly healed, the only physical concern I have is where the skin graft was taken to mend the massive bruise on her shoulder, caused by the seatbelt. It bleeds easily as does the donor site on her thigh. She is on Warfarin to prevent clots but of course this prevents the wounds from healing quickly.

As for her mental capacity, well there are good days and bad days..... sometimes she will sleep all day other days she is alert and attentive. Today was a good day. Chantelle stayed awake all day and was smiling and moving her thumb when asked and also followed her parents with her eyes when they talked to her. She even managed to stay awake for me after I'd finished work... (I don't get to see her until 18:30 on a work day and she is normally asleep by then) and although I didn't get a smile she moved her thumb as soon as I asked her to.

Tonight I played her favourite CD which is a compilation that she calls her "Sleepy CD" She used to play these songs to help her sleep and to get her through some tough times. It was when she played one of these songs to me last year that I realised exactly how much she loved me and what I mean to her...talk about a thunderbolt...the instant I heard the track I knew so many things about her and about us. I felt true love and the deepest compassion for her. I felt in that instance that we had always been and always would be together.

This is the song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VE6rMq5wmg

When I heard the track tonight it was as if she was whispering to me through the music and telling me that everything will be ok....

Anyhoo I will keep on keeping on dudes. I love my blue eyes and she will get there....just as I get there everyday...one foot in front of the other, a minute, an hour, a day at a time.

I drove passed where the accident happened tonight...it's 3 minutes from my home...that's all it takes guys, for a world to shatter...

I thank you ALL once again for your Dudely thoughts and kindness.

Namaste

As I said before CD you're an example of abiding for all of us. And of many other things too.

It feels pointless to keep saying it, but all our thoughts are with you, we hope what you hope, we wish for what you wish for mate.

It's not pointless mate. It lets me know you lot are there and thinking about us.

Do you know it is exactly 153 of my paces from the entrance to Addenbrookes hospital to neuro intensive care unit and that if you drive into the Oak Farm neuro care home at exactly 24 miles per hour you can do a handbrake turn on the gravel that will park you exactly next to the ambulance station. Also I know how to get free parking in the N&N University Hospital.

Things I have learned in the last 9 months!

I wrote this the other day....thought I'd share.

When I hold your hand now, and you squeeze it when I ask
I don't wish to make it hard for you to or to make it such a task
It means I want you to get better and I'm trying to help you mend
I've been here since the start of this and I'll be there at the end

I'm being oh so patient but sometimes that runs out
That's when I leave and hide a bit and silently shout
You lay there, oh so quietly but your eyes tell me what's right
Like "help me John" or "stay with me" or "please don't say good night"

But I have to leave you everyday no matter what I feel
Cos although this isn't happening, unfortunately it's real
Our lives have just been broken, shattered into smithereens
But I love you forever and remember all our dreams

I will never ever leave you no matter what the cost
Because you came back to me when I thought love was lost
You treasured me within your heart and believed I was "the one"
And I will honour that with you until our time is done.

J. x

As always we are all thinking and wishing for you.

I have very little I can say but I hope she pulls through and is back with you soon.

Me too.

Beautiful poem/ song, man, strong men also cry. Hope shit works out, positive vibes from uk.

Caesar Dude,

I am a newer member here and have only just discovered this thread, but I wanted to let you know my most sincere sympathies are with you and your beautiful Chantelle, and that love and positive thoughts are being sent to both of you.

Your love for and dedication to Chantelle are evident in your words.  The doctors might be helping her body to heal, but you are helping Chantelle the person to heal.  Your dedication and presence of mind in these difficult times is truly inspiring.

Peace and love.

It's time to update you guys on Chantelle's situation. Next Tuesday (25th) will be exactly one year since Chantelle started her big sleep. I won't be in any fit state to write then and tell you what's been happening so I'm doing it now.

I've just read through all of my posts in this thread and every word and every emotion feels to me  as if everything happened an hour ago...it's very raw and it hurts.

I indicated that Chit was smiling and responding when she first moved to the care home....unfortunately shortly after she moved there she was rushed into hospital with a suspected pulmonary embolism (she was coughing up black blood and was very distressed....they also suspected she had some sort of seizure....

(I was actually sitting in my promotional interview at the time) anyhoo I rushed to A&E where I found her to be quite calm and looking fairly ok....I'd only been there a few minutes when she started coughing and spitting out blood...probably not good..however I could see the blood was fresh and bright and not dark  blood as would be expected from a blood clot on the lung, I opened her mouth to ensure she could breathe and seen that the inside of her mouth was cut...I called the doctor over and together we diagnosed that she had actually bitten her lip and the blood must have accumulated previously before she coughed! She can't spit and would clearly not have wanted to swallow! So.... after a few hours of observation they decided that she was ok and sent her back to the care home. All good.

However Chantelle was clearly fairly traumatised by these events and decided to go back to sleep for a week!! She would open her eyes occasionally look around then shut em again...no smiles...no thumb movements!

After a week we noticed that she wasn't opening her left eye at all and when I opened it I could see it was extremely red...off to the eye clinic! Chantelle suffers from dry eyes at the best of times and the clinic found that crystals or filaments were growing on the eye and the eyelid which must have been immensely painful. They prescribed drops and creams which were duly administered every two hours causing her distress and pain as every time they opened her eye these filaments would scratch the surface of her eye I cannot imagine how much that must have hurt her. This went on for about six weeks until they finally got the correct creams and drops. Obviously while this was going on she didn't want to open the other eye either...so unfortunately all further progress stopped...if she cant see she's not being stimulated and the pain must have driven her to distraction anyhow.

On top of all this we noticed that she was putting on weight, she is 5'1" and normally weighs between 8 to 8 and a half stone...we asked for her to be weighed and found that she was now 10 Stone!!! That's a lot for a wee lass...turns out they were giving her too much high protein food! So the dietician has now dropped some of the feed they give her!

All of these setbacks have combined and we are now back to where we three months ago.

However it's not all doom and gloom. Tonight I read to her and she had her eyes open and she moved her thumb for me again after a lot of persuasion and cajoling and basically bullying!  Those smiles are going to be hard get back but I'll keep trying.

I've been in tears all day dudes, it's getting close to that one year point and her stuff is still where she left it in my bedroom. Her toothbrush is still next to mine and the little things she did are evident everywhere in my flat. I have to accept that she's never coming back here to live and maybe never at all. It doesn't mean that I have given up on her regaining some sort of life with me but it just cannot be remotely the same. That sits hard with me but is a truth which I have not wished to confront before.

I love my beautiful lady and will always be here for her for as long as she needs me. I will always look after her and cherish her and support her and her family in every way I can and maybe one day she will be able to tell me again that she loves me.

This is as hard today as it ever was on day one. I can't go near her house or the road the accident happened, I can't even go to her parents house as doing so reduces me to an absolute mess.

I'm fucking fantastic at work when I can throw myself into the mundane nonsense and forget that I have a personal life. I've been fine here on the boards where I can use my juvenile sense of humour to distract me. I'm fine with my son when  he's around as he's such a positive lively individual and I'm fine when I've had a skin full and can sleep for several hours without interruption but I'm not fine dudes....not fine at all.

Thank you for reading and thank you for being dudes.

Peace.

C dude, your openness and honesty is inspiring; seriously dude, very touched deeply here by what you have been sharing. Hang in there, you're a brave dude. Still continuing positive vibes and prayers your way for your special lady friend and yourself.

Well CD, I'm pretty much speechless and impressed by your determination to stick with her in these hard times, hope the parlance is correct. So I'll just say that both of you are in my thoughts.

You're an inspiration dude - thanks for being as transparent as you are, and sharing your guts with the rest of us. Makes me appreciate what I have, that's for sure.

Peace and love dude...