“This is delicious.”
Mum always loved her food. She loved the experience of going out to dinner. She loved wearing her best clothes, putting on her makeup, doing her hair. She loved quality restaurants and good wine. And she loved the food; the sociability of it, the way it brought people together.
Mum’s favourite things were driving up the coast or into the Hinterland to some amazing little cafe, having dinner with family or friends, drinking champagne with some panoramic vista or throwing dinner parties and afternoon teas.
So that evening, even though she wasn’t feeling that well, Mum had come with us to Steam: an Asian fusion tapas restaurant on the Mornington Peninsula. It was the day before New Year’s 30 Dec 2014.
It had been a variable day. I won’t go into that but let’s just say there’s a reason our family had a certain euphemism known as ‘The Twelve Apostles’. Those who know, know. And those who know also know why I’m leaving it vague.
So Mum wasn’t that well but she soldiered on. Maybe we should have stayed home. Insisted she stay home. And maybe nothing we did that night mattered at all. In the end it was just her in that ridiculously-overpriced little restaurant inhaling duck pancake and letting us know through ecstatic bites that, “This is delicious”.
I’d love to tell you when exactly I noticed. When that moment was. Or how I knew. I was sitting opposite her and I remember looking at her sliding slightly into Dad on her chair, her left side drooping and her eyes unfocused and I just knew.
“Oh my God, she’s having a stroke,” I said.
I remember fragments after that. I ran to her side of the table and took the food out of her mouth. I was worried she’d choke.
Then I grabbed my phone – uncharged, almost drained, goddamn me and my stupid games – and called 000. At some point, Max offered to take the phone and stay on the line to emergency services. I gave him my phone and he went outside to wait for the ambulance.
Mum was moaning and she couldn’t see and she desperately wanted the jasmine tea she’d been drinking. I remember someone claiming to be a doctor telling Dad it was fine to give her some and me wanting to ask him what he was a doctor of – Philosophy, Podiatry? Because even I knew you don’t give stroke victims fluids in case they aspirate it.
Idiot.
I remember being obsessed with us paying our bill. I mean, we were all about to leave the restaurant and if we did that they’d think we’d run out without paying. I went to one of the wait staff and actually apologised (!).
“I’m terribly sorry, we have a medical emergency and we’re going to have to leave suddenly,” I said. No, really, I actually said that. Like my mother’s stroke was going to be terribly inconvenient for them and I was dreadfully sorry to put them out. “I’m going to need to cancel the rest of the food and settle the bill.”
“What’s wrong?” they asked me, mildly concerned.
“Oh, I’m pretty sure my Mum’s having a stroke over there,” I replied, waving vaguely to where my mother looked like she was about fall out of her chair.
In the chaos, the next few minutes were a blur but I remember being annoyed that the restaurant didn’t seem to understand the urgency of me paying the bill so we could leave. The next day I realised that’s because they couldn’t have given a toss about it right then and they probably couldn’t understand why it was so important to me either.
But you don’t leave a restaurant without paying and we needed to leave. As soon as the ambulance arrived anyway.
So I paid the bill and the ambos arrived and they concluded that, yes, she was definitely having a stroke. They were amazing; calm and efficient. They assessed her and put her on a stretcher and then she and Dad were taken off to Frankston hospital.
Max’s parents came and we piled into the car and headed off to the hospital. But once we got there w didn’t really know what to do.
Mum was still being assessed in emergency. We needed to tell people but didn’t know what to say. In the end, I rang my one of my other brothers and my Aunt. And maybe Mum’s brother as well? And then we had no choice but to drive back to Rosebud and try to get some sleep.
And amazingly, we did.
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