As the water rushed toward me, Teale stood in the bathroom, in shock. Water flooded around her, through the bathroom and out into the hallway. Mark went running to the main water line, I pushed past Teale to turn off the water to the toilet. Of course, the water in the tank, had to empty completely. The shock of what happened was enough to stop Teale’s bad mood in its tracks. So Mark and I worked to clean up, as fast as possible. Sadly, it went through the floor, to our master bathroom below. Our new Master bedroom and bathroom, only completed 6 months earlier, would also be damaged. Living with Teale can frustrate beyond words, but, both Mark and I are good at compartmentalizing. It’s her brain damage/mental instability that causes these rages and frustrations, it’s not her fault. We often go back to her birth, and how her brain damage could’ve been prevented. This may sound like we are stuck in the past, and not moving forward, but I think in some ways, it just helps us to deal with the present. None of this is Teale‘s fault. Doctors failed her and us. If she haven’t sat in Maconian for hours and there had been a emergency C-section, would she be okay today? I often pray in these moments of frustration. I pray for clarity, for peace, for calm, for Teale to feel loved, and respected. If I can get myself out of my head and my frustration, in the moment thinking about her, and how it must feel to be her, it helps me. It helps me to look beyond my anger, and pain, and to just focus on her being a child of God.
Mark and I continue to clean up the mess, we are pretty good at this kind of thing, both grabbing fans, and the dehumidifier, trying to dry it all out fast is the key to not having lasting damage.
Somehow, we also pull her and ourselves together. We get Teale ready and out the door for the van. Teale’s day program runs from about 8 AM pick up to 3 PM drop off. This time gives me the opportunity to do other things, besides care for Teale.
With her out the door, I call our friend and handyman. He has worked with us for a few years now and has witnessed Teale in rages. He knows the power of her and how our life is often controlled by her moods. I explain what happened and that we’re going to need a new toilet. He comes over that day to remove the broken toilet, capping off the water lines. I’ve been wanting a new floor laid in this bathroom, and I actually already had the flooring bought. We discuss his putting the floor down, during this time that the toilet is removed already. It will delay the process of getting a toilet in, but in the long run, it will be worth it. He is a busy guy and can’t get to my job right away, but will be back later in the week.
I’m gonna skip ahead here… He comes back and lays the new floor, which takes approximately a day. I’ve ordered a new toilet and pick that up. As the guys at the store, loaded it into my car, I hear what sounds like something broken. When Mark and I open the box at home and take a quick look, we don’t see anything wrong, so we just shut the box back up. This will come back to bite us…
The night after the floor has been installed, I get up to go to the bathroom about 3AM, and there is water, raining through my ceiling, again. I wake Mark and run upstairs to look, sure enough the capped off lines are leaking all over. The shut off valve is shot and I can’t turn it off. This time we have to turn off the main waterline to stop the leak.
Mark and I go into clean up mode again hoping our ceiling isn’t further damaged.
When our handyman returns the next morning to the news of what happened, he discovers there’s water under the new floor he had laid. It all needs to be pulled back up, to dry out completely. Plus, installing the new shut off valve’s isn’t something he’s comfortable doing, so a plumber has to be called in. More money, more time… Here we thought the toilet was going to be installed today, but instead, the flooring is pulled back up. Fans running to dry out underneath the vanity, don’t seem to be working so he drills holes through it to try and get some airflow going. The plumber comes, we have new shut off valves installed in both the upstairs bathroom, and in our powder room, as a preventative measure. The costs are adding up and I just keep telling myself, be grateful you can do all this, without too much hardship.
The next day our handyman comes back to lay the new floor, again. Sadly, when he goes to put the new toilet in, it’s discovered, it really is broken. At this point I’m more mad at myself, for not going with my gut that I heard something broken. Back to Home Depot, I go, to return the broken toilet and get another. I’ve lost another day. It’s now the weekend and we still don’t have a toilet, in the upstairs, five days after the incident.
The next Monday, the 2nd new toilet is finally installed. Our handyman needs to go back to a job he has abandoned, to fit us in, in this emergency. So he can’t do all the trimming out of the floor at this time, but he’ll be back.
In the end the new flooring is nice, the bright side of this whole disaster.
When I think about all the different things that have happened in rages. From broken car windshields, to a broken toilet, I am grateful Mark and I get through these crisis’ without it hurting our love for each other. The reality is, couples like us, often break up. The stress, and often, couples blame each other. When Teale was born, we were told the divorce rate was approximately 90%, when it comes to couple’s, of a child, with disabilities. Somehow that percentage, made us fight harder. I guess I’m grateful, that we’re both stubborn, and saw that statistic as a challenge. May love prevail and hope, always endure.
