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I still had a hospital wristband on when my mother signed me out against medical advice. The nurse positioned herself between us and the elevator, repeating that my oxygen levels were unstable, that I needed another night of observation, that leaving could send me straight back to the ER. My mother didn’t even glance at her. She simply said, “She’s coming home,” as if the choice were hers to make.
Two days before that, I had collapsed at work in Columbus, Ohio, after a serious respiratory infection spiraled into complications I could barely process through the fever. I remember the ambulance siren, the harsh fluorescent lights, the tight mask pushing air into my lungs. I remember the doctor saying, very clearly, “You are not safe to leave yet.”
