It’s storming outside and inside though the wind is picking up and the turmoil of my soul is calming down. Nothing was wrong, but the unknown consumed my day from noon until late last night and anxious thoughts are still ebbing and flowing. I feel safe today in the knowledge that all turned out well, and strength for the coming crisis isn’t needed. When the children were little, and I had a scare, I would hug them extra close. There was reassurance in the smell of their heads, the weight of their bodies on my lap, the warmth of their hands patting my arms. I keep wanting to hear Sophia’s voice, to see her smile, to have her within arm’s reach. Having adult children out of state is so hard.
Sophia had a panic attack yesterday. She had a couple of them in high school. She knows what to do to calm down and bring herself back. When it happened yesterday, she left the situation that triggered her and sat on the steps of an empty stairwell for some privacy. A fellow student found her before she was able to catch her breath and called an ambulance. Sophia doesn’t like to be touched when she’s in the throes of a panic attack and the paramedic evaluation pushed her further into a panic mode. She was calm by the time they reached the hospital, but she had yet to pass hospital admission 101 where you learn that you have to advocate for yourself to get released from an ER. Her phone was about to die, so she saved the battery by turning it off. She knew she’d want to make one last call to have a friend come pick her up. Seven hours later, when all the blood tests were in, she begged them to let her go and signed the release forms they required. She made an appointment with the professor to talk about what happened. She emailed the teachers whose classes she missed. She made an appointment to meet with the administration so that they would have a plan in place should she have another anxiety attack. Then she noticed the massive number of calls and texts from her parents and gave me a call.
I checked my phone after my last class before lunch, when I was gathering my things for chapel, and saw a missed call from Sophia’s university. The voice message hadn’t come through, but it was unusual enough that I stopped and called the number back. It could be a promotion of sorts, but it could be something about my daughter.
A woman answered, Dr. Something or Another and said, “Mrs. —–? Your daughter Sophia was found unresponsive in a stairwell. We think she had a panic attack, but she won’t communicate with anyone. The paramedics are examining her and will be taking her to the hospital.”
I listened to every word not wanting to miss anything, but I felt like I was underwater. I listened from a distance as she explained that I was being notified because I was Sophia’s emergency contact. The woman had called Mike when she wasn’t able to get a hold of me, and he was on the other line. I hung up. He was the best contact person. I had more classes to teach and needed the administrator to be able to reach us, needed to know every update she could provide.
I wandered the school halls in a daze. My lunch had been left in the car that morning. My friend Mary and I went to Starbucks for a quick bite in the forty-five minutes we had left. The cell phone dangled from my hand, volume turned up, silence off. Mary prayed with me while we waited for our order. I waited for my sandwich, for my drink, for a call or text that wouldn’t come.
Mike called me as I pulled into the parking lot. Mary went into the school to give me some privacy as I connected Mike to his cousin’s wife Dina in Atlanta in a three-way call and the three of us made tentative plans for a rescue operation should one become necessary. Dina is such a good friend. I loved her from the moment we met when Sophia and I stayed with the Atlanta Ruehle’s on the drive out to Macon, Georgia. They live an hour and a half away from campus.
I wanted to be with Sophia, to go to her like I went a couple of years ago when her high school called me. I had been able to ground her and lead her back to functioning, to protect her from people who wanted to harass her, and give her the space she needed. I felt a pain in my gut like the phantom limb of the placenta that used to connect us. I also felt a kinship to the millions of mothers of adult children who don’t know what their children are doing right now. I fill my days with work and laundry and spending time with the kids at home, blissfully unaware of the motions of my adult children as they go about their lives until a moment like this when I want to pull my family close and feel how out of reach everyone has become. Esther was not amused by my efforts to call her during classes, and hour after hour passed without a word from Sophia.
I made it through Algebra and called Mike during my next break. No word except that the hospital verified that Sophia had arrived. Privacy issues. Covid issues. Even if I was there, the hospital might not let me in. It could be nothing. Emergency rooms always take so much time. Did she even have her phone? Or something could be very wrong. Sophia could be lying comatose in a cold, sterile room isolated, alone. Why wasn’t she calling? I reached out to a couple of people who keep Sophia in their prayers.
The calculus students learned about position, velocity, and acceleration, first and second derivatives. They copied every example written on the board, and I answered their questions without hesitation. I knew math. I wished I knew what was going on with my daughter.
Life had to go on. During my next break, after checking in with Mike, I registered Basil with the driving school so he could continue his on the road classes with them and have access to their website to log his hours. I returned to school to wait for Jonah to take archery. The rest of the kids walked home. It was a nice, cool fall day in the seventies, perfect for enjoying a walk.
The kids wanted chicken dumplings for dinner. Mike and I went out for Mexican food. I inhaled my dinner and was anxious to race home and try calling the hospital again. Mike suggested that I make the call. The attendant said that the blood work would be back soon. My daughter was fine. They didn’t know what they would do with her. He hung up. Fine. What does fine mean?
I worked on a lesson plan for next week and watched “Full House” with the kids. It was eight fifty four when Sophia called. She sounded like her cheerful self, as happy as she sounded when she called on Sunday to tell me that she had made it home from her fall break at my aunt’s beach house. I rushed downstairs to our bedroom where Mike was sitting reading so that he could hear her voice too. She told us about the day and was so adult and mature about it. She had adulted her way through the situation completely unaware that we had been notified at all. Lessons had been learned. Plans were being set in place. She didn’t need anything from me except a promise to pay the medical bills.
She was tired and hungry and had so much work to do. She spent all of seven minutes updating us before hanging up. After all, nothing really happened. It wasn’t a big deal. It wasn’t her fault that the hours of not knowing had been like a bucket of ice water waking me up from my blissful unconcern. It would be weird for me to fly out there to hug her, just to make sure she’s really okay.
How do mothers do this? I’ve thought every stage of mothering has been difficult. Give me back the days of diapers and naps. I didn’t appreciate those stages of connection. I went to vespers tonight and found some comfort. I feel thankful that all is well for now, but I also feel powerless. It’s hard to rely on God’s grace and prayer. “O LORD, You have searched her and known her. 2 You know her sitting down and her rising up; You understand her thoughts afar off. 3 You comprehend her path and her lying down,
And are acquainted with all her ways…”
The rain outside the window has let up. I took a break from writing this to cuddle Justin. He’s the last child who still fits on my lap. I kissed the back of his neck and hugged him close. Too soon he will be off too. Maybe by then relying on prayer will come more naturally. I pray that it will be so. Lord have mercy on my children and my future grandchildren, and Lord have mercy on me.
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