Mrs. Monitor

Hospitals are a serious learning place. I've been coming and going there for five weeks now and just like that I acquired a new skill today. Who'd have thought it was time for something new?
In exchange for a steaming hot cup of black coffee I get to stare at a monitor for a full hour. Checking up on Kenji's heartbeat and saturation. Pressing the reset button every few minutes if the saturation meter stagnates. Well ain't that cool...

After ten months of hospital experience I sort of know where the numbers are supposed to be - and when to push the emergency button. I actually monitored Big Brother like this when he was in the neonatal unit. But watching my husband? On his chest lies a weight wrapped in a plastic blanket to firmly press the wound of his puncture. Red rash marks his skin: another manifestation of the acute graft versus host disease. His beard consists only of some left over stubbles and besides his hair, half his brows and lashes are gone. The chemo, the transplantation with it's creepy complications, but above all the in-fi-ni-te waiting have turned him into a shadow of his true self.

I'm supposed to keep a close eye on the monitor but I cannot stop staring at my love.