My "purple heart"

The Purple Heart is a United States military decoration awarded in the name of the President to those who have been wounded or killed while serving with the U.S. military.

It occurs to me that many of you may not know the exact story of what happened to Andie. In a nutshell, he had heart disease that led to a fatal arrhythmia while we were on vacation at my family reunion. One minute things were fine, the next minute they weren’t. It was sudden, and unexpected, and traumatic.

It was like I entered a war zone. This is how I received my “purple heart” for being wounded in the line of duty as a wife.

While the emergency team worked on him in the ER they allowed me to sit beside him and hold his hand and talk to him. They even got me a stool and I remember being concerned that I would be in their way. I never let go of his hand, and never stopped telling him that I needed him to hang on. The doctor told me that they had gotten to a place where they needed to stop trying to save him, but that if I wanted them to they would keep working on him a little longer. Of course I asked that they continue, all the while knowing that even if they got him back he had been without oxygen long enough that there would be permanent damage, and he would not be the Andie that we all knew and loved. After another round of medications, and shocks, and CPR, and all efforts- there was still no heart beat. The doctor looked at me and our eyes locked, and I knew what the next moment would bring- I had to let him go.

It’s funny the things you think about in moments of extreme stress. I looked at the clock and it was roughly a quarter to midnight, and I asked if they could wait and not call the time of death until after midnight because then it would be 6/19- I did not want him to die on 6/18 because that was his niece’s birthday and I didn’t his death to overshadow her life. The doctor told me that it was too long to wait and they needed to go ahead and pronounce him. All I could say was, “okay”. I stayed on that stool holding his hand, kissing it, and caressing it on my cheek for what seemed like an eternity.

The necklace I wear with Andie’s wedding ring on it was put on me that night by a nurse and I haven’t removed it since that moment. The trauma team had gone and a nurse came in to turn off the machines. I was in the room alone with him and the nurse, and she asked me if I wanted his necklace. I said I did, so she removed it from his body with such tenderness; almost like she was afraid to hurt him. She went to the sink to wash the vomit off of it and brought it back to me. She asked if I wanted to wear it, I said I did. In that moment of silence as she put the necklace on me and clasped it, my world shifted. The finality of all that had just happened hit me. The necklace that I had never seen my husband without was now around my neck. In that moment the nurse showed me the meaning of human connection- silence between us with a thousand words unsaid. I don’t even know her name but she will always hold a very special place in my heart and in my memories for her loving act of compassion.

So I wear his necklace with his wedding ring on it like it is a war wound, my “purple heart”, my “medal of valor”. It’s my symbol to the world of what I’ve been through. I feel almost as strongly about removing it as I do my wedding rings. I find myself toying with it during the day, slipping his wedding ring on my own finger, touching my hand to it when I speak of him. Often I don’t even know that I’m doing it, it’s like my subconscious way of reaching him.

That necklace is a symbol of our last moments of connection as husband and wife. Where he ended, I began.