“She’s Not Breathing!”

I stare at the sand, inches away from my face and examine bits and pieces of grain sized rocks, seashells and sea glass. I take a deep breath and watch as I let it out and dusty sand blows across fragments of a whitewashed shell.

I hear my Dad’s laugh across a cluster of beach umbrellas where my family is sprawled about, sitting in beach chairs, lounging on towels, or laying directly in the warm sand. My eyes and face are covered by my pink Ronald McDonald House Charities baseball cap— excusing me from joining the conversations lighting up around me as my extended family talks, together and all at once. I consider sitting up and being present, but I don’t. Instead, I begin to draw circles in the sand.

I take another breath – this time deep and full — I feel my belly push into the sand, but even still, my chest feels tight and my breath, shallow. With each breath in, I draw a circle in the sand.

Suddenly, I hear my Dad’s voice, “Do we know who is with Everett?”

All at once I sit up – panicked – I look towards the shore, but I can’t see past the tight clusters of umbrellas. My heart races as I stand up and say, “Tyler took him down to the water.”  

I hear my Mom’s voice from under a shady umbrella, “I see them Jesse, they’re digging in the sand by the water.”

I lower myself back onto my belly — heart racing, breath shallow. I point the brim of my hat downwards and burrow my hands beneath the warm sand, digging and pushing until I reach cooler, cold sand. I lower the side of my face onto my arm. My heart continues to race. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. but I can’t slow my heart beat. It’s happened more than once these last few days.

I told Tyler yesterday I’ve been feeling “off”, and “out of sorts”, knowing he would give me opportunities for space – for moments alone— moments to rest, to recharge and to simply breathe.

I open my eyes and free my hands from the sand. I begin to draw arrows all in different directions— compasses pointing east and west, south and southwest, overlapping and colliding against whitewashed fragments of seashells and small stones.

It seems like, over the last few years about this time in the summer, the last week of June, the first week of July, I find myself feeling off; my heart skips beats unexplainably, my chest is tight, my breath is shallow and I numbly go through the motions of my day.  

I choose not to remember the exact date, but I know it could have been today (five years ago) that my 3-month- old baby, Nora, lay seizing in an ER hospital bed surrounded by a medical team in a trauma room at Children’s Hospital. On that day, I couldn’t slow my heart. On that day, like today, my breath was shallow. On that day and in the days that followed, I was numbly going through the motions.

I don’t know why the medical team allowed Tyler and I to be in the trauma room, but I think it was because Tyler was so calm. Even when a doctor yelled “She’s not breathing!”, even after a nurse answered with, “just give her a minute!”, even when a medical team intubated Nora and she lay completely still, except for the movement and motion of her breath, her chest rising and falling. I remember my shoulder shaking uncontrollably and my teeth chattering, like I was going numb, like I was frozen, like my body was ice cold.

I watched a respiratory therapist pump a green bag with her hand near Nora. The bag attached to the tubing in Nora’s mouth and throat – the therapist moved the bag in the rhythm of breath – of life. I didn’t understand the tubes and motion or the numbers on the monitors, or the beeping that was somehow still ringing in my ears. I didn’t speak or understand the language of this room – this world of medicine. I thought the respiratory therapist and the green bag were breathing for Nora.

A medical resident asked about the green bag, to better understand the rhythmic pumping and motion and the respiratory therapist answered with a slew of foreign medical words and then asked the student, “Do you want to try?” I stared at the green bag and her hand, breathing for my daughter, while everything inside me screamed and begged “No” — please no— don’t let him practice on my daughter. She’s not for teaching! Please don’t let go of the green bag… but, no words came out. I couldn’t find my voice. I just held my shoulder tight to try and stop the shaking.

Last summer, July 1^st 2018, was the only other time I’ve felt my shoulder shake and my teeth chatter uncontrollably. I was (again) at Nora’s ER hospital bedside, holding her hand and talking to her as she lay, seizing and feverish surrounded by a team of medical helpers. And eventually, exhausted, my voice disappeared like thin vapor in wind. Tia flew from Colorado when she heard my crackly whispers over the phone. Later when Nora was home recovering, I told her about my shivering shoulder, my out- of- sync heartbeat, and my shallow breaths. She told me our bodies remember things — she called it muscle memory. Memories that are a part of us— our stories — our past and our present.

“Do you want some wine Jess?” one of my aunts asks from across the cluster of beach umbrellas.

“I would love some.” I say as I start to sit up.

I rub my hands together, wiping away grains of sand as I reach for the wine. I take a sip of Rose, and then another. I reposition my hat and stand up— scanning the shore for Tyler and Everett until I see them building a sand castle in the wet sand. I ask my mom to keep an eye on Nora as I walk towards the water.

The sea wind rushes towards me as I move closer to the water, reminding me to breathe again. I look down into my glass of wine, grains of sand swirl at the bottom of my cup as I step across uneven sand. I lift my hat, off my head and allow the wind blow my hair forward, backward and side to side, around my shoulders and face.

Inhale. Exhale.

I don’t know what healing looks like from summer 2014, from summer 2018, or from this path of medical and emotional complexities. I don’t know how long bodies hold tight to muscle memories. All I know is, my body is begging for new ones.

I reach the shoreline, plant my wine in the sand and cover the cup with my Ronald McDonald Charities ball cap. I step into the ankle-deep water. Everett runs towards me and wraps his sandy arms around my legs. He takes my hand, and reaches for Tyler’s too.

Suddenly I realize, my body will remember this. This is muscle memory, too: His wet hand on my leg. Or Nora’s body tucked around my hip, her sandy belly, white, like the inside of a beautiful shell. Or Tyler brushing the side of my face with his hand.

Everett pulls us further and further into the water – screaming, joy filled. 

“High! Higher! Highest!” we say as we lift him over the frothy waves rolling toward the ocean shore. This I know: my body will remember all of it, and more.