Double Lives

Two weekends ago, my husband and I were meeting with realtors and discussing our growing comfort with transferring to very warm Coast Guard stations in San Juan, Miami, and Key West. Why not relax and have a place for our immediate and extended family to enjoy? Ben had put in for a few early transfers, and we feel fortunate that our house wasn't under contract. Because on that Sunday afternoon, my husband told me he was having double vision and wanted to go to Bethesda for evaluation.

You want to give as much control to your spouse as possible, after all after any averse diagnosis it’s like having control over a situation just walks out of the room. Everything becomes tumor first; patient second...  the conditions that hospitalized them are quite real to the hospital staff as the patient’s new normal… but not necessarily yours or your family. The week prior, he was just in strategic planning meetings, driving boats, throwing Teddy around, letting me rest as much as saintly possible, filing transfer picks, and doing training evaluations. Sudden seems to be an understatement. There were the headaches coming with more frequency by only recently, and only recently did they not respond to over the counter efforts. The double vision was quite new to the fold, otherwise it presented like an ocular headache. Why worry? He’s healthy.

Our lives may be different right now. Diplopia (def. double vision) continues to come and go with and without headaches. He looks and acts most of the time like he would without having received this diagnosis (helping me out around the house probably more than he should). There are a few times that his health lands him on the couch for a day (like yesterday), where you can tell that the double vision and his efforts to correct causes actual pain. So we learn our limits and adjust. We weigh the pros and the cons, trying to find that comfort in what we might anticipate and try not reading the internet too much but updating friends, talking with family, and finding safe resources. We are waiting for results. We continue to find a new normal that is until the next new normal finds us.

Sentiments of care and concern help you feel not alone (which is the opposite of what they teach in school- crazy). That reality of being all too human crashes into view…  I cannot take away that pain and fear affecting my husband, but I can be there as much as possible. I made a promise to swim along side of him and care for him and our family no matter what. It means celebrating in the little achievements like when Ben has a moment of conquering the double vision by making a toss into an incredibly small cylindrical object in the sink.

It’s why I refuse to let this eat our family whole. We've got a toddler who plays with oversized trucks on his cousin’s matchbox set, loves bath time like a playful sea serpent, and points out what objects don't belong together (as of today), and asks his playmates for space when they enthusiastically run up to him while he puts away his coat overwhelming him (parenting still needed)… all while using words like stuck in the proper context, trying words like "at" to say cat, or "oat" to say coat. We let you stay up just a little later to have more fun with together as a family.

Baby #2, who is remarkably shaping up to be a Nicholas, continues to grow in healthy ways despite these sudden emotional experiences from mom. He doesn’t seem to be responding to them like his brother did, but he continues to march to his own drummer. He’ll have to for a short time to redraw attention to his needs – it’s going to be pretty busy very soon. (Your dad already talks to you. Your brother has ensured that you have a whole host of clothes for a number of seasons.)

My husband was more than a diagnosis long before he came into my life. He is so much more to me than it. He lights up a room to me whenever he comes in it – especially in our son’s face. He holds my hand when I’m anxious (or makes the silliest of faces when someone’s giving me a shot and I am being a total baby). He sounds interesting when explaining the density of gasoline during cold winter months and warm summer months. He walks with me around the neighborhood when it’s warm, and he doesn't mind holding me when we’re sitting in front of a Christmas tree and a warm fire. He’s also the one who has gotten me to jump out of a teeny tiny airplane from high altitude, and of course, continues to beat me at slugbug and scrabble despite rumors.

San Juan will still be there. The Coast Guard will still be there. We hope we’ll one day be there too.