Air in the Line

Without fail, Craig’s IV pump will loudly beep, beep, beep in indication that there is “air in the line”. We wake up, silence the alarm, call the nurse, and stand guard to silence the alarm again, and again, and again until a nurse comes. More times than not, it’s the lipids…ahhhhhh, the lipids. Here in hospital world, we’ve come to know that the fatty lipids have a hard time squeezing down the thin IV tubing. Quite frequently (as in every 5 minutes), the poor little lipids get stuck in the line creating air pockets, and the nurses have to come by to scoot them along. We could tell the lipids to go on a diet, but that would defeat the purpose of, well, fat (since that’s what lipids are). Besides, Lawlers are pro “healthy at any size” and anti diet. As the saying goes, the root word of diet is “die”. We want the lipids to “live strong” and add a bit more meat to skinny ol Craigery. It’d be great if medicine would embrace the fuller sized lipids and fit their bodies with a slightly larger IV tube instead of squeeze them into “pants that don’t fit”.

Lipids or not, it can take up to 30 minutes waiting for a response—30 exciting minutes of pushing the silence button every minute and a half. One night, I had been quietly standing by Craig’s bed, silencing his IV stand for 30 minutes when he awoke, looked at me, and then called the nurses again to say “we STILL have air in the line”. Big brother always looking out for us…

When Jill was here, we’d rotate whose turn it was and somehow it fell into a subconscious rhythm. No matter how dead asleep we were, we instinctively knew whose turn it was. That instinct is the same when responding to Craig’s late night vomiting. You could be out cold but somehow pop up, wide awake just before he starts, so that you can have bucket in place and water on the way. We are always eager to help, to comfort him whatever the hour.

and, so it goes.

~E