What you can handle

God doesn't give you more than you can handle. It's one of those sayings like everything happens for a reason that doesn't sit right with me. Still, this was my prayer today:

I can't handle more. Please. 

My dad got very ill suddenly back in October. He was taken by ambulance to the hospital with a raging fever. "Sepsis," my sister told me when she called. Hearing the word, I could see it on Henry's death certificate. The word infiltrated my brain, spreading, growing, like the infection itself as I waited for more news, tried to figure out if I needed to go.

I did go that afternoon. As soon as I parked in the hospital garage, I was in in hospital mode—purposeful, quick, tense. I figured out where the stairs were and how to wend the maze that all hospitals seem to be. When I went in to see him, my dad was joking, shaken, but himself. They figured out the source of the problem. Treated it, got a bunch of antibiotics in him, sent him home with a plan for surgery in several weeks.

My dad had surgery on Thursday. It seemed to go well. Thursday night, he joked about going to work on Monday. Yesterday he was in a lot of pain. Today more. And he didn't seem right.

My dad was rehospitalized this evening. We're in the waiting stage now, waiting to see if a CT scan gives useful information. Right now, we don't know if there is really something to worry about. I'm waiting for the call, or if it's really late, an email from my sister and I keep thinking:  I can't handle more. December is enough already. I can't handle more. Please.