August 25, 2016

They say I’m a good father, I don’t know, I tried and am still trying.  What I do know is that you were and will always be the Best Son, Inspiration and Friend anyone could ever have.

A trailer. A campsite.  The normality of a family on vacation.  Then, all of a sudden, Papo has a heart attack caused by electromechanical disassociation.  The worst and most lethal that you could ever have. Above all, if you have a heart that was as beaten up as his.

Papo fights a desperate battle to stay alive, but his chances of survival are very few.  Papo slips into a coma.  After two days, he suffers serious brain damage and is kept alive by extra-corporeal blood circulation and a respirator; his kidneys are in dialysis.  And then the end of it all.  They decide to do an encephalogram, but the machine stops before.  His face and chest are swollen, because the fluids aren’t gable to circulate well, his legs are cold and livid, cut and drained to avoid amputation.  All his organs are damaged.  Everything possible – and even more – was done.  Two hours of a cardiac massage while going from the camping place to the ambulance to the emergency room. Dialysis to save his kidneys, and various operations on his legs to give him a future standing up.  And maybe, in the attempt to find some reason to hope, we even went a little too far.

Papo was officially declared dead at 3:15 pm on August 24th.

But to be honest, Papo had already said good-bye when le lost consciousness. He was in a hurry to go have some fun somewhere else, this is for sure. He’s having fun and probably (despite everything else) he is running and jumping around like crazy.

In those two desperate days in the hospital, he stayed around just to get us used to the fact that soon he would no longer be with us.

Papo is this super cute little guy in the picture, and here are some of his phrases that we’ve chosen to say good-bye to his friends.  Beauty and irony are some of the typical features and the super powers of our Super Hero.

Lunch with his grandparents, Papo: “It’s so exciting to hear my name being called when someone comes in with a plate of lasagna!!”  While Papo wolfs down the lasagna, Nonno tells the story about the 4-year old boy who fell into the gorilla cage at a zoo and how they had to kill the two-ton animal.  Papo was shock: “So they didn’t shoot the child….?!”

Awake, in the trailer, coming and going from the bathroom, the door stays open, and a terrible smell invades us.  Me: “Nik, close the bathroom door, someone just pooed”.  Totta: “No Daddy, I just farted….”. Papo: “Mom! Shut Totta up in a locker!”

Papo, talking with his aunt who is pregnant with her first child: “Zia! Have you been practicing to become a mom!!?”.

In the dog area, Luna and another two dogs are playing kind of rough and from one moment to the next, they go from wagging their tails to snarling and showing their sharp teeth, forgetting how playful they were just a couple of seconds before. Papo shocked: “Dad, I think these dogs have Alzheimer!”.

Papo frowning and confident: “I’ve got plans, and I would care less about what others say to me!”. Me: “Good job, Papo, I’m proud of you! And what’s your objective Papo: “Watching the movie tonight, even if I watched cartoons this afternoon and played with the Wii”.

A little evening walk, some pieces of grass bunched up together look like something not too reassuring.  Papo and Totta whisper to each other, and Papo crushes one of the bunches with his foot. “I’ve destroyed it! There no chance of survival now whether it was an alien pod or a Chimera egg!”.

Papo, just after waking up: “Hey Dad: I dreamt I was a velociraptor werewolf, I was fighting against King Kong who punched me in the face and made me lose my sense of humor”.

Have fun and have a good cry! Because this story can make you laugh…..and cry.

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