Last week, we finally got Jae admitted to a proper hospital; it took until Thursday, a week after we first brought her to the main hospital as we had been instructed to do. I appreciate the confidence everyone has displayed in me by assigning me credit for getting her placed, but I’m afraid I had very little (if anything) to do with it; after a week of inquiring, researching, making phone calls, talking to social workers and other staff, crying, complaining, pleading, demanding answers and otherwise attempting to move the mountain of indifference with which I had been confronted, a spot opened up in a hospital I was told she wasn’t being considered for admission to, and within a few hours she was admitted. And with that, we have probably reached the end of the fast-moving part of her recovery; I’ve been told the next stage will probably go on for about as long as everything from the accident until now, and maybe even longer. In other words, from now until probably late October or sometime in November I’m not going to have a lot to say about the subject. This doesn’t mean I’m forgetting about her or that I don’t think y’all will be interested; I’m still going to be visiting her at the hospital every day and her other close friends will be visiting as often as they can, and as the doctors feel her condition is improving we’ll encourage others to visit as well. What it does mean, however, is that the changes will be less profound and more incremental, and that the amount of change in a week may be easily covered in a mention in these diary entries rather than requiring the whole entry.
The important things are that she’s safe, she’s getting proper medical care and she’s in Seattle where her friends can visit her without having to fly or take an all-day drive. And one result of this change is that, on some unconscious level, my brain has decided it’s safe for me to collapse. I’ve been running at full throttle (emotionally speaking) since August 16th, and though all my friends (not to mention readers, supporters, doctors, nurses and nearly everyone else) have been warning me that I need to take care of myself physically and emotionally as well, I didn’t really believe that until about nine days ago. Oh, I intellectually knew that they were probably right, but another part of me was saying, “It’s sweet and wonderful that everyone’s thinking about me, but with the exception of a few tough spots I can handle this pretty easily; after all, I’m Maggie Fucking McNeill the Wonder Harlot.” And naturally that was the voice I preferred to listen to (and at the time, the one Jae really needed me to listen to). But once we got into emergency room limbo my strength started to falter, and on the afternoon of Sunday the 20th I just collapsed in tears when Mistress Matisse arrived at the hospital to take over for me for the evening. She, Savannah Sly, Abby May and my other friends are now enforcing my resting and recuperating nearly every night, and not one of them has breathed a syllable that sounds anything like “we told you so.” I’ve never been someone who needed help to get to sleep at night, but now when I put my head down my brain starts processing the last two months at double-time. I’m alternating now between various means of inducing restful sleep provided by various friends, and last Saturday night it was the visiting Elizabeth Nolan Brown’s turn; she chose good old-fashioned alcohol, and let me tell you it worked just fine. Don’t worry, readers; I’m not going to poop out on Jae, and the wonderful ladies of Seattle are going to be sure that I don’t overdo it too often. I’m going to keep working wonders as expected; I’m just going to make sure I recharge my super-batteries with enough wonder treats and super-sleep.
