Until Her Dying Breath…
I awoke to a nightmare as my wife fought for her life.
“Wake up…”
I slowly became aware of hands shaking my shoulders, pulling me out of a heavy sleep.
The shaking grew more urgent.
“Please, Tommy… wake up.”
I opened my eyes to see my wife Elizabeth sitting at the edge of our bed, hovering over me with a worried look. I’d been home with our three-year-old son Brendan while she’d gone into the city several hours earlier to perform in The Savoy Company’s opening night production of ‘The Mikado’ at the Philadelphia Academy of Music. “What’s the matter?” I asked, still a little groggy. “How was the show?”
“Something’s wrong…I can’t breathe.”
I quickly sat up in bed and got the full story. Liz skipped dinner before heading to the theater and had grabbed some food that’d been set out in the green room offstage just before the performance began. She felt her lips, mouth, and throat begin to itch and immediately recognized the symptoms of an allergic reaction to tree nuts. During intermission, she repeatedly took puffs from her asthma inhaler while a fellow cast member offered her Benadryl. She felt a little better but decided to skip the cast party to head straight home instead. While en route back to our house, her…
