Joi in my heart

No, don’t write me and tell me to use spell check when I  do these posts. I didn’t misspell joy and I will explain now.

It took me a long time after Kerrie was gone to turn on the TV. It was on 24/7 when she was home and at the hospital. Every show, every sound just opened wounds for me. Finally one day the house was so quiet I turned on something neutral, the news or whatever and little by little, gradually I’ve begun to watch some things. I even watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy once in a while (but I think that’s because Kerrie wants to watch it and makes me turn it on…..she’s still making me eat chocolate too, but that’s another story).

Last Thursday night a new show came on…..Eli Stone. I had seen the previews and thought I’d give it a try. It’ s about a young lawyer who has visions. I have been reading so much about after death communication, visions, telepathy, etc. and thought it might be interesting. It was a cute show with a message. Good lawyer up against bad guys, wins for the good guys thing. Some drama, some humor and poor Eli seeing these visions that makes everyone thinks he’s crazy (except for the Chinese ‘healer’). And then his doctor brother diagnosis him with an inoperable brain aneurysm which is the cause of his “hallucinations about talking to his dead father, etc”. Uhmmm….. where have I heard that explanation? In just about every ‘medical’ text/article that refutes the claim that people have had contact from their loved ones on the other side. Try telling a hospice nurse or holistic healer that they are hallucinations.

At the end of the show Eli carries out a wish from his father he had seen in a dream and took his ashes to a mountain top and spread them in the wind. By this time I am in tears and just sat there as the news came on. Just couldn’t get up yet. I was only half watching when the newcaster said something about a new way medications are being prepared for patients in the hospital and the next thing I knew he said

“at Henry Ford Hospital this is how it is being done and one of the nurses, Joi Horvath, will show us how”. I sat there absolutely stunned.         JOI  !!!!!!     Kerrie’s JOI  !!!!!              And there she was on P2, talking about the medication system, taking medications to a patient, talking to the patient (and I’m pretty sure it was in the room next to Kerrie’s last room because I could see what was outside of the window). Then she was at the computer in the computer room right across from another room  Ker was in.

I was transported right back, I could hear her voice, I could hear her talking to Kerrie, I could see Kerrie’s face when she would walk in the room….”My Joi! ……   My girlfriend!….”.  I checked my phone and I still had the number for the nurses phone in Kerrie’s unit and I called it and Sue, one of the nurses who took care of Kerrie many, many times, answered and we talked for a few moments. When we were done I could hardly catch my breath. It was as if we had not been away. All of the faces came back, the voices, the smiles, the tears. It was a difficult night and very emotional.

But it also prompted me to do something I had been putting off for months. I finally finished the letters to Dr. Jana, the staff and Joi and put them in the mailbox today along with the pictures I had taken while Kerrie was at Henry Ford. I told them that Jenn, Ron and I talk about going to visit someday, but we don’t know when. And to be truthful, I don’t know if we can do it. But it is so difficult . We were so close to so many of those people, it’s hard not to have some closure. My counselor says we don’t have to make ourselves go if we don’t want to, maybe the letters will be closure enough. We’ll see.

Well, that’s my story………..gotta go now, I hear some chocolate calling ……….”Darn it Kerrie, stop it!!!!”

Take care

Love you all

Joan