convulsing in resus

It had been months since I had gotten sick and our entire lives had changed. Rooms that used to be filled with mundane things like random deliveries whenever I got bored in the middle of the night, were now filled with little carts with meds and the equipment that kept me alive every day.

We had finally gotten into some sense of normalcy after everything changed and you kind of felt like a pro in taking care of me.

But you can tell something is wrong from the second I wake up that morning. I'm quiet, just sluggishly following you around the house, barely laughing as you attempt to joke with me like usual. But you try to brush it off, I had bad days sometimes, we both did.

We're sitting in the couch watching some cooking show you liked, or rather you're watching it and I'm just sitting with you so you can keep an eye on me.

My eyes lose focus before I have the time to warn you, my neck arching backwards and eyes rolling in the same direction. You're alerted by a strained little moan making its way past my parted lips.

"Oh baby..." You mutter gently, gently easing your hand behind my arched neck and your arm under my stiffened legs, scooping my spastic body upwards before gently laying me on the floor.

"Let's get you on your side hmm?" You coo, keeping your voice gentle even if you're not sure that I can hear you during these episodes. You stroke my hair as you roll my little body onto its side, bending my right knee just before the tonic phase launches into clonic, my body starting to convulse violently on the floor.

Even though it's been months, it still hasn't gotten easier to see me like this, my body hostage to my damaged and misfiring brain.

Within seconds the sound of vegetables cutting and food sizzling on the tv is drowned out by the sound of gurgling and moaning as my body struggles to cope with the signals being sent out.

"I know baby, I know, just a seizure. Nothing we haven't dealt with before, you got this.." You say softly, more to yourself than to me at this point, a hand rubbing against my spasming thigh in any attempt to comfort me as the minutes continue to tick by.

You try to stop yourself from panicking as you notice the blue starting to creep onto my usually pale face, I'm struggling to take a breath and you rush towards my med kit, fumbling to find my oxygen mask.

When you find it you can't help but let out a shaky sigh of relief, you clamp it over my spasming face, eyes rolling around in their sockets. "You gotta breathe baby, take a breath sweetheart..." You rub my back a little more aggressively than usual, desperate for me to take in a breath. I had just been in the hospital a few weeks ago, you wanted to avoid going back at any cost.

But I'm not making any improvements, my brain too overwhelmed to focus on taking a breath when I'm convulsing so violently, my chest and throat so locked up that there's no room for air to come in.

The seizure hits five minutes and I'm still not breathing, getting progressively more blue by the second. So you're forced to reach for my rescue meds.

You lift my oxygen mask, grabbing gently at my cheek to keep my twitching face still enough for you to insert nasal dispenser into my right nostril and press the button to administer it to me. You hold my nostril closed for a few seconds before lowering the mask back over my face. "Come on baby, come back honey."

My body starts to slow, convulsions weakening to twitches before going limp on the floor, your hand flying to my neck, pressing two fingers to my pulse point. You feel your heart sink when you don't feel a familiar thump against your fingertips.

"Baby? Baby?! Come on...Come on sweetheart!" Your voice cracks, immediately pulling your phone from your pocket and dialing 911, barely registering the operator at first as you place your interlocked hands at the center of my little chest.

"I need help! My girlfriend...she has epilepsy...she had a seizure and she doesn't have a pulse! Please help us!" You scream, hoping it's loud enough to reach the phone that's abandoned by your side.

My eyes are half lidded as they stare blankly through you, your hands repeatedly crushing my little chest, weak huffs escaping my lips each time a pump reaches my still heart.

You tilt my head back, placing your soft lips onto my cold and blue ones, pushing a breath down my throat and watching my belly inflate and the deflate as the air leaves me afterwards. Going right back to compressions.

You don't know how long you've been alternating between chest compressions and rescue breaths into my desperate body before the paramedics rush in and you're dragged away from my lifeless body. And you're left standing in shock in the middle of our living room.

Credits to: Digital02

She collapsed unconscious during a workout and has gone into full cardiac arrest. She needs hard compressions immediately, and defibrillation as soon as possible.

they're intubated and vented and on the LUCAS. still in the chaotic wreck of a trauma bay. life suspended without a flurry of hands. there is nothing else that can be done. all else has been tried.

the team of doctors and nurses and medical staff have al but given up. still holding out hope, but part of them knows it is hopeless. they stand a pace away from the body on the table. waiting. watching the monitor. watching as the only activity is the violent beating of the LUCAS on the poor patient's heart.

the patients chest caves in, ribs shattered and sternum cracked under dozens of rounds of compressions from hands and the LUCAS alike. the piston is relentless. beating in the patients poor sternum to pump the heart. their belly bulges with each one, violently slow, even in the most toned of patients, just because of how forceful the compressions are on such a slack body.

their eyes are staring at nothing. all the light has left. their mouth is held open by tubes and airways and gauze ties. their throat pulses with agonal gasps and gags and spasms, that and the harsh pulsing of the LUCAS. their chest shifts with each breath given.

they're shirtless. abandoned on the gurney. chest, bruised and broken, on display. perhaps glossy from conductive jelly. or maybe AED pads cling uselessly to the lifeless chest.

their arms strewn out and hanging with IV lines from when efforts were still being made, when there were efforts that could be made. there's fluids hanging to one. a syringe of epi still connected to another, about to fall from the bed and hang from the hub line.

there's a sheet over their legs, it's soiled with urine, as a catheter was first an afterthought, and now placing one feels like one last insult to the patient's dignity. hours of resuscitative work, from this code and the codes prior, have kept their struggling kidneys producing fluids that the bladder has failed to retain during the ins and outs of their weak heartbeat.

their skin has lost all warmth. it's greying and cold. their lips are a shade ranging from crimson purple to nearly white, depending on their prior complexion. their eyes have sunken in. there is no life to be found in their face.

and yet still. the LUCAS pumps pumps and pumps away. the ventilator hissssss. click. hissssss. clicks over and over. the two in tandem.

the doctor eyes the clock. one more minute. then his watch. just one more, they can do it. a nurse looks back.