Mark Goes For a Ride With Some Firemen

There's a subject I don't talk about too much on my blog. Mark's health. Mark is a lot more seriously ill than I let on. In the last month or so he has been losing his ability to walk. So I prepare and serve him all his meals in bed. I empty the pee bottle that he uses, wash it out, and return it to him. (Mark pees a lot.) Much of my day is taken up with schlepping things for Mark, boxes of tissue, beverages, snacks. As a man of low energy, I usually don't have any left for myself after all that. As of last Tuesday, when Mark informed me that he would have to be using a bed pan because my dragging him into the bathroom wasn't going to do anymore, I knew I needed to do something. I wasn't going to deal with pooping into a bed pan. So on Wednesday I called for an ambulance to come and take him to the hospital. We needed to find out why he was no longer able to stand or walk. According to the doctors, it's a mystery. They couldn't really tell me anything new. On Saturday Mark was moved to a nursing home for two weeks of physical therapy. Damn, I hope they can get him up and moving again. For the health of both of us. Now deep down I did cheer a little. I know, I'm horrible, but I looked upon these two weeks as a vacation for me. That was until the phone started ringing. It turns out that Mark hates the place he's scheduled to stay in for two weeks. They don't jump to his every command like I do. I've spoiled the man. Every thirty minutes the phone rings and it's Mark complaining that they haven't fed him. They haven't given him his meds. They haven't given him his oxygen. That last one freaked me out. So I called the main number like I had earlier in the day. This time nobody answered the phone, so I immediately drove over there to find out why they weren't providing oxygen. The nurse who came down to talk to me, assured me that Mark had oxygen. Mark had his meds. Mark had food. I called Mark back and he agreed, they had provided all that and that now he was tired, and he hung up.  So far it's been a hell of a vacation.