Alone on the Oregon Trail Read Online Free PDF Page A

remove my husband’s leg from his body and I could never bring myself to talk about it again. It was the most horrifying thing I have ever done and could never do that again.
    I cleaned him up, wrapped him up and did everything he had told me to do, and I was again waiting in agony to see what would happen. I never left his side and could not even get up for fear that he would die.
    He slept through the night and he awoke the next morning very weak and not able to talk much. Although he would tell me that he was doing well, I could see that he was not.
    A week or so went by as we waited to see how he would be, and each day drug by. I continued to keep him clean, fed him and took care of him and one day he was able to sit up, and a few days later he was able to stand.
    He was slowly getting better with each passing day. My heart was filled with joy and such hope that I was lifting my heart in praise of such a merciful God. How easy it was for me to forget that I had doubted this God that had brought my husband through.
    It began to look like my husband had made it through the dangerous part and that our life would go on. My heart was filled with terror at the thought of him losing a leg as well. I could not bring myself to accept that fact and I was handling it worse than Nathaniel was.
    He tried so very hard to lift up my spirits but each time he would look at things positively, I would shoot it down with the negative blows. I am sure that I made it very hard on Nathaniel as he was trying to recover, but my weaknesses began taking over. I could never quite climb out from the dark hole I had fallen into.
    I watched his eyes of tenderness upon me as I would toil away now doing jobs that he would have normally been doing. I could see he had his moments of guilt burden his heart and he tried desperately to make up for how hard I had to work.
    As I look back now I know that it was not the physical work that had me in such despair, it was the fear of the unknown that ate away at my soul. With every lift of my hand at manual labor, I would be worrying about everything and anything I could. Nathaniel had always been the rock in our relationship and I was failing miserably trying to take his position over.
    I sometimes wonder now if I would have let him continue to be the rock and not try so hard to replace him, maybe I could have relieved myself of some of the heavy burden. It seemed I thought I had to take it all on my shoulders and I was not able to.
    Each day brought a new surprise to us whether it would be a spark of energy that would surge through his body or whether it would be some delightful attitude that was so contagious, it came like rolling thunder tears through the skies. He would wake up one morning and be filled with so much energy and it would set my heart on fire with hope.
    The next day he might lie there all day looking into the empty space of the entire day, and I would be left trying to figure out what just happened. It was a roller coaster ride every day until the day my husband took his final breath.
    I had no medical training so I was not aware of what was happening. I found it so odd then that the times when he was so functional mentally were the days when he would teach me about the wilds. Every time he would be energetic he would also have a lesson for me to learn and frankly, I was tired of listening. I so wanted him to get up on his feet and do things himself and to take back his role of caring for me. I was not made to be the provider and protector, and I certainly was not capable by this time to be the spiritual leader either. I honestly felt like deserting the entire situation.
    A couple of times as he lay sleeping into the late morning hours, I would wake from some place I had ran off to. I would open my eyes and find myself even a mile away from him, where I had taken off alone to be by myself. I think my mind wanted to run, to run as far from him as I could.
    It was not because I did not love him