Breaking Promises

I had made a promise to go and visit Julie today in the hospital: we had made a plan to go for lunch in a nearby cafe.  Slowly, she is finding things that she wants to do, and things that she wants to talk about.  It is as if life is being slowly breathed back into her.  Her latest plan is to save up enough money to buy herself a laptop: she is full of schemes of how she is going to raise the money by making and selling things, or doing odd jobs.  It is hard work keeping up with her once she begins to recover, but she is still fragile and much of the time my job is to try and encourage her to take it easy and build in the time to recouperate.

So it was painful to have to break my promise at the last minute.  I had been taken ill, and had to get to the GP today: the only slot available was during lunchtime.  I phoned Julie up at the hospital as soon as I realised, feeling bad about letting her down.

She seemed alright about the change of plan at first, but I asked staff to keep an eye on her.  I know she finds change difficult.  They were kind, and even phoned me back in the middle of the day to report that she seemed to be managing fine.  I breathed a sigh of relief.

Sadly, her equilibrium did not last.  I phoned her later in the afternoon and I could tell from her voice that she was not really managing.  She sounded so far away, and I so wished I could be with her.  I was still too ill to drive over: there was nothing I could do.  Finally staff phoned in the evening to say that she had gone out for a walk and cut herself quite badly on the leg with a piece of glass that she found on the ground.  Fortunately no stitches this time round... another heartfelt thanks goes up to the person who invented steri-strips.  I spoke to her and she was feeling awful about it: every time she self-harms she feels guilty.

Inevitably I do feel guilt too - that I had to let her down.  Even though I know there was nothing I could do, no magic that could have teleported me to her side instead of sitting in the waiting room of my GP.  I try to give her clear expectations of the future - we often plan out home visits in meticulous detail - but I cannot legislate for the unexpected.

Of course in the long run Julie has to be able to manage a change of plan, and during her better spells, she is able to do so.  It is just so hard for her while she is so vulnerable.