Only One

Yesterday was our last day as patients at Rainbow. No, we haven’t magically moved to some elusive category of you’re-so-healthy-you-need-no-more-follow-up-care (but if such a category exists, I’d sure like to be placed in it someday). No, no, instead, we are switching hospitals.

I know, that one came as a shock, right? We love Rainbow, that much should be obvious. We have been thrilled with the care we’ve received there over these five long years and I can honestly say that I feel at home whenever I walk through those revolving doors. So this change is not exactly our choice, but it’s necessary nonetheless. We’ve been chasing health insurance for a while now, constantly switching carriers in order to stay at UH, with ever-dwindling options. Our most recent best option shouldn’t ever have the word “best” attached to it as we’ve been paying 80% of our care at Rainbow out-of-pocket since January. With a kid like Austin, let me just say that that ain’t cheap.

But we’ve been unwilling to leave Dr. Auletta until we felt confident that Austin was well, and reluctant to leave him even then. And now, alas, he’s leaving us. It is for the best, for him professionally and certainly for his family. And we support him in this move entirely, knowing that he can achieve greatness in a position created especially for him and his expertise at Nationwide Children’s in Columbus. Yesterday was his last day at Rainbow, hence the uncharacteristic “clinic of miracle.” There’s a reason those patients were his; he made those miracles happen. He absolutely put his heart and his mind and his energy into caring for his patients every single day, going above and beyond for all of them. For all of us.

So yesterday, we said goodbye to Dr Jeff. And with his departure and Austin’s good health and our ever-changing health coverage, we said goodbye to everyone else too. To the nurses and receptionists, to the ultrasound technicians and coffee baristas. Most of the goodbyes were silent, in my head only, as it would have been too hard to verbalize all that I felt. There were a lot of “It’s not goodbye, we’ll come back to visit.” And we will.

As we meandered the hallways moving from one department to another, I was keenly aware of the days and weeks and months and years we spent inside that hospital. Over many seasons, from one hot humid summer through several seemingly endless winters. A couple of springs and even more falls. For holidays and birthdays, Austin morphing from a nursing babe-in-arms to a toddler in a stroller to my current tumbling schoolboy cartwheeling down the hallways (yes, he did that). He entered that hospital not yet knowing how to walk and he leaves it having just learned how to read.

He grew up in that building. We all did.

And when we walk into the Cleveland Clinic next year, there will be no familiar faces, no exclamations of “Look at him! Is that really our little Austin?” No friendly waves as we pass by no-longer-needed departments, no hugs as we step onto the elevator to find a friend, no chance for Austin to say, “Hey I remember that fountain. I love it there!” I’m sure the Clinic will be fine. I’m certain we’ll receive good care there.

But there’s only one Rainbow.