From the vortex of grief: The game of life and death

My time in the hospital has been one of the darkest periods of my life. I spent 2 weeks in the corridors of the ICU, and these two weeks that have aged me by a lifetime.

One day, my in laws, husband and mother stepped away to have a cup of tea, while I sat there in case we were called. I was sitting on that ratty chair, trying to relax, when suddenly the overhead speaker system came alive. It announced a code blue in the very ICU I was sitting outside of. I froze. Doctors and nurses came running, and the crash cart followed. Finally, the paddles were wheeled in, and by this time I was shivering. There was absolute silence in the corridor, and I knew what every person sitting there was thinking. Which patient is it? My hands were frozen, and I couldn't do anything except think this one thought repeatedly "Let it not be my dad". An hour later, I found that it wasn't him, but that someone else in the ICU had gone into arrest and couldn't be resuscitated. My happiness was tainted with the realization that someone else lost their loved one.

Another day, an agitated group of people were standing near the entrance. The guard came and told them something, and then the woman broke down weeping and wailing in public. I asked my mom, what happened to these people? She said that the lady's husband(in his 30s) was admitted to the ICU a couple of months back. He had multiple surgeries and the lady kept paying in the hope that he would get well. She had taken loans, and pledged away all her jewellery. After two months of all this, he suddenly died that morning. The guard had asked them to go to the morgue and collect the body. I have always had this idea of being dignified even when grieving, and so have never cried in public. But my heart went out to this lady, who had given away everything she had, and was only getting the dead body of her spouse in return. I cried into my mask that day, feeling horrible that life was this fragile and unpredictable. I thought of saying something to that lady or her mother, but I couldn't find any words.

On yet another day, another person who had a stroke due to a blood clot in his brain underwent a surgical procedure to remove the clot. The procedure was successful, and his paralysis was reversed. He walked out of the hospital on his own two legs, accompanied by his family, and they were all very happy. I felt happy for them, but my happiness was tainted by my sorrow. My own father could not have that surgery, because of his age and other complications. He could not even be given medicines to dissolve the blood clot, because he had complications from months of taking blood thinners. All the advances of science were closed to my Dad. The doctors didn't even recommend physiotherapy, because they felt it was risky. What do you do when science throws up its hands in the air and tells you there's nothing left to do?

This game of life and death plays out every day in the hospital, and I shiver and huddle. There were people who died, and people who were miraculously healed, while my Dad is stuck in a limbo between the two. Only time will tell which way the balance tilts, and until then, I must find the strength to inhabit this torturous limbo.