You Made It

“MOM!” I heard a call from the living room.

“What is it?” I asked, walking in the room.

“Evie stole my doll again!” Holly whined at me. I looked at her and then turned to my second daughter and saw that she was happily playing with her older sisters doll.

“Evie, did you ask Holly if you could play with that?” I asked. The four year old didn’t answer, instead just shook her head and didn’t even look at me. “Aren’t you supposed to ask to play with her toys and not just take them?” I asked again, this time she nodded at me. “Why don’t you say sorry then and play with one of your own?”

“Sorry Holly,” Evie said quietly, holding the doll out to her.

“Thank you,” Holly said flatly, taking the doll from her and walking away.

I loved my two girls but sometimes they were a lot of work. Managing a nine year old, a four year old and a job whilst having a husband who still toured, was a lot to handle, but I did it. I had some help from both our parents, but this was my family and I loved them.

I carried on doing chores around the house while the girls played. Every so often I would hear them shouting at each other and then the next minute they were playing well with each other again.

John was at Kennedy’s house taking over a few of Evie’s old things, as Kennedy and his wife were expecting their first child and were a bit under prepared. We’d kept a lot of the girls things over the years, sometimes for sentimental value, others because I just couldn’t bear to part with some of their old baby clothes and toys. We decided giving some to good friends of ours seemed like a good idea. I had no idea how long John was going to be at Kennedy’s for, as those two could talk for hours.

Whilst John was there, I was going about the house as I normally did on a Saturday, doing bits around the house, letting the girls play and then cooking dinner. But at that moment, 5.20pm exactly, on a warm afternoon in March in Chandler, my whole world began to crash around me as my phone rang.

“Hello?” I asked after I answered the call.

“Hi, is that Mrs O’Callagan?” a female voice asked at the other end.

“Yes it is, can I help you?”

“Yes, I have you listed as the next of kin for John O’Callaghan,” she continued.

“That’s right, he’s my husband,” I told her.

“OK, I’m calling from St Luke’s Hospital,” she said, and I felt my heart drop. I knew if she was calling, something bad had happened. “Your husband has been in an accident, we need you to come down as soon as possible.”

“Is he alright?!” I asked, panicking.

“Please just come to our ER as soon as you can, Mrs O’Callaghan, we can explain everything then.”

“I’m on my way.”
I hung up and immediately starting trying to put my shoes on and grabbing my bag, before turning to see my girls still playing happily in the front room.

“Fuck,” I said to myself, knowing that I couldn’t take the girls with me just in case what ever happened was that bad that they shouldn’t be around it. I grabbed my phone again and started calling my mom.

“Hi, you’re through to Sara Simpson, please leave a message and I’ll call you back as soon as I can.”

“Mom, I could really do with you answering your phone right now! Call me when you get this,” I said to her voicemail. I then rang another number straight away.

“Hey Linds,” Lauren said to me, answering quickly.

“Lo, thank fuck you answered, I need you to do me a favour,” I said, hurriedly.

“What’s up?”

“I need you to look after the girls for me right now and I’m not sure how long for,” I explained.

“Of course, anything. What on earth has happened?” she asked.

“John’s been in an accident, they won’t tell me if he’s OK, just asking me to get to the hospital like now!”

“Fuck Linds, do you want me to come with you?”

“No, just look after the girls for me so I know they’re safe, please,” I told her. “I’m leaving now and I’ll drop them off, alright?”

“Of course, I’ll see you soon.”

“Thanks, Lo.”

I hung up and grab a pair of shoes for Holly and Evie each and walked into the living room trying to be as calm as possible.

“Hey girls, you’re going to spend some time with Lauren now, OK?” I told them and they both grinned at me. “Alright, lets get some shoes on, Holly can you do yours please?”

She took them from me whilst I put Evie’s on quickly, my hands shaking with nerves thinking about John. Within 5 minutes, I had them both in the car and was driving down the road to Lauren’s house. Luckily she still lived nearby, and I was definitely driving over the limit, so I was at hers quickly and as soon as I pulled up she came out of her house to collect Holly and Evie from me.

‘Hey guys,” she smiled. “Ready to spend some time with your cool Godmother?”

The girls hugged her as they got out of the car and I looked to Lindsay.

“Thank you so much for this, I just don’t know what I’m going to be dealing with and it will be easier if they’re not there.”

“Don’t worry about it, now go, John probably needs you right now,” she told me. “The girls will be fine with me and don’t worry how long it takes.”

“Here’s a key to my place, you can take them there if you want, if it gets late and they need to go to bed and it’s easier,” I told her, handing a spare key over.

“Thanks, now go!”

I jumped back in my car and drove to the hospital. Again, driving over the limit the whole way and shouting at cars that got in my way. As soon as I got there, pulled into a space and ran towards the building entrance. Looking for some sort of sign pointing me towards the emergency room, I accidentally knocked into a few people as I wasn’t looking around me properly.

“Excuse me,” I said, running up to a nurse at a desk hoping she could help. “I’m looking for the accident and emergency?”

“Straight down the hall, you’ll go through two automatic doors and then turn left and it’s there,” she explained.

“Thank you!” I called, already walking away.

Once I followed her directions, I ran up to the desk there and started asking questions to another nurse.

“Hi, I’m looking for my husband, John O’Callaghan? He was brought in not long ago, I got a phone call telling me he’s here. I’m his wife, Lindsay O’Callaghan. Can you tell me where he is?”

“OK, let me just find out where he is for you,” she said, walking over to a wall with a lot of things written on it. She looked at it for a while before speaking to another nurse. I stood with my arms resting on the desk in front of me, putting my head in my hands. A couple of minutes later, she came back and lifted up my head. “OK, he’s in surgery right now, but if you follow Nurse Peters here, she will explain.”

“Surgery?” as all that escape my mouth. I followed the person who was apparently Nurse Peters down the corridor to a small room which she led me into and shut the door behind me.

“OK, hi, Mrs O’Callaghan, as you know, I’m Nurse Peters,” she began. “So you’re husband was brought into us about 45 minutes ago, he has been involved in a car accident, between himself and another vehicle, we have been told a truck. He has suffered a few injuries, broken bones in his arms and legs mainly, however he has also had some bleeding from his head. Because of this, we have had to take him into surgery immediately, as if this is internal, this can cause major damage to his brain.”

“What does this mean? Is he going to be OK?”

“I can’t say, I’m sorry. Right now, we’re doing everything we can to just stop the bleeding,” she continued. “The next hour or so is going to be crucial for us to do anything at all. We will keep you updated.”

“Can I see him?”

“Not until after he is done in surgery, unfortunately, but once he is out, I will let you know.”

“Thank you,” was all I could say. I wasn’t sure what to do or say or think. I follow Nurse Peters back out of the room.

“If you want to take a seat and we will keep you update on the progress.

So I sat down. I didn’t know where John was. I didn’t know how he was. But I sat there, watching the minutes pass, growing more anxious with every one. I felt like everything around me was happening at 100 miles an hour, meanwhile I was stuck in slow motion.

I saw doctors and nurses running in and out of rooms frequently. I heard constant beeping from monitors in various rooms. I saw people coming out with arms and legs in casts. I sat there watching all of this and just feeling completely vulnerable and incapable of dong anything.

The minutes passing had become an hour and I became increasingly more anxious as I hadn’t heard anything from the doctors or nurses. During this time, John’s parents had joined me and I had phoned Lauren a couple of times to check on the girls. My mom had finally returned my call so I had to explain what had happened to her as well.

“This just doesn’t seem real,” I sighed, sitting back down next to John’s mom.

“I know, we’ve been here so many times before for broken bones but never anything this bad,” she said quietly.

“Mrs O’Callaghan?” I heard a nurse’s voice say.

Me and John’s mom both looked up at the same time and spoke in sync, “yes?”

“Sorry, natural instinct,” she half smiled. “Hi, I’m John’s mother and this is his father,” she said to the nurse.

“Good to meet you,” the nurse smiled. “Would you all like to follow me, I need to update you on what we’ve doing for John.”

The three of us followed the nurse a little ways down the corridor to a different room from where I went last time. As we sat down, I could tell from the look on the nurses face that this wasn’t going to be good news.

“OK, so there was some internal bleeding on the brain and we have been working for the past hour to stop this,” she began. “Now around 90% of bleeding has stopped, however the part we cannot stop is on a very sensitive and important area of the brain and due to this, we cannot get to it as easily to stop it.”

“What does that mean?” his dad asked.

“It means we will keep trying, but the chances of us being able to operate on that area are not high.”

“And what does that mean for John?” I asked.

“At this point, we cannot give a definite answer, however we will be doing our best to keep him comfortable.”

“IS HE GOING MAKE IT?”

“As I said, we cannot guarantee anything at the point, Mrs O’Callaghan.”

“I’ll you alone to talk,” she said, before leaving the room and closing the door behind her.

As soon as the door closed, I broke down in tears. John’s mom did the same and his dad wrapped an arm around me tightly.

“He’s going to be fine,” he soothed.

“How can you know that?” I sobbed out. “I can’t live without him, I don’t know how to be without him. And what about our girls?”

“You won’t have to be without him, my son is a strong man, he can get through this and he will.”

So many thoughts ran through my mind, so many possibilities, so many things didn’t know yet. So many more memories for us to make.

Once again the minutes began to pass and I went from pacing around the room, to pacing up and down the halls, constantly hoping that someone would come and tell me good news soon. I knew which was John’s and would hover outside for a few seconds in between my pacing. I could hear things being said but most of it didn’t make and sense to me, too much medical talk that meant nothing to anyone else.

And then I knew it was coming.

“His organs are going, he’s going into shock,” was all I heard.

At that point, it was me that went into shock. I stood there staring blankly at the wall that separated me from the man I loved. From the man I couldn’t do anything to help. I stood there, no part of my body moved, I didn’t blink, I didn’t even think was breathing.

“Lindsay? What’s happened?” Jenny asked, walking towards me after I’d been stood still for several minutes, but in fact felt like hours.

I turned my head slowly and looked at her. She was that old herself, it wasn’t fair that she was going to lose her son. It wasn’t fair that I was going to lose my husband. It wasn’t fair that his children were going to lose their dad.

“He’s not going to make it,” I said, flatly.

“You don’t know that, you have to keep positive thoughts,” she said.

I shook my head, “I just heard them, he’s going into shock.”

Jenny looked at me and didn’t say anything. No more positive words. No trying to lift my mood. And I knew at that point that even she didn’t believe he was going to OK.

“Come on, let’s go sit down, they’ll be out to update us soon, I’m sure.”

I gazed in front of me, people moving around me turning into blurs, the voices becoming just muffled noise.

---------

The doctors and nurses said to prepare for the worst and hope for the best. They said to be ready for any eventuality. I knew it was their way of saying there wasn’t much more they could do. I had called Lauren and asked her to bring the girls to the hospital. Telling them was the hardest thing I had ever done. Making the decision to tell them was difficult in itself, they’re just children, they shouldn’t have to be around this or even have to know about this sort thing yet.

I sat with Holly, Evie, John’s parents, my mom, Lauren and John’s brothers, just waiting. I had no idea how long it was, but it felt like hours. Lauren kept distracting the girls while we waited so that they didn’t ask too many questions.

At the sound of a door opening, our heads all turned to find out who it was.

“I’m sorry.”

It was the two words I had been dreading. The moment the doctor said them, I felt like my own heart had stopped. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move.

“We did everything we could but it wasn’t working,” he continued. “I am so sorry. You can see him if you wish.”

I immediately stood up.

“Please,” I struggled to get out.

“Follow me,” he instructed. I stepped behind him and felt John’s parents walk behind me.

He led us to where I’d stood before and opened the door to let me go in.

“I’ll give you some privacy,” he nodded.

Taking one step forward towards the door, I noticed Jenny and Jay weren’t following me anymore.

“Aren’t you coming?” I asked.

“You go first, we’ll come in in a few minutes,” Jay said.

I walked into the room and saw his body laying there and that was the moment it hit me. The tears began to fall and I collapsed next to his bed. Taking hold of his cold hand, I gripped it tightly, stroking my other hand over his forehead.

“You were supposed to make it,” I cried. “You always made it, at the last moment, you always came through.”

The tears continued as I look at the man I loved laying in front of me, lifeless and helpless.

“You were supposed to be here, for me, for the girls. Please John, please come back to me. I can’t do this without you,” I sobbed out, my head falling against his arm. “I love you, I always have and I always will. I don’t want to believe you’re going to miss the girls growing up. They will love and miss you everyday, just as I will.”

I sat in silence for a few more moments, not letting his hand go, not wanting him to go and for this to be the last time I see his beautiful face and only be left with the memories.

“Why didn’t you make it?” I cried out again, as I felt as if I was about to completely collapse and I felt arms wrap around me to hold me up. “He didn’t make it,” I repeated.