Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Hard

The end of this month will mark 6 months since my mother passed away. Every day I keep telling myself that I need to write down all of the things I want to make sure I remember about her but after 6 months I have learned that the passing of time has not made things easier.

The past couple of days have been especially hard. I suppose it has to do with Mother's Day coming up. There are traces of tears still in my eyes from crying all night last night and the crying I've done today. I am reminded of my mother at every turn and despite not being about to record my memories of her I welcome the crying. It is during those moments that I can see her and feel her the most and even though my heart is breaking and I'm sobbing uncontrollably I don't want to stop crying for her.

Is this abnormal? I don't know. For the last few years of her life I guess you could say our roles were reversed and I was the one taking care of her. I filled out her pill boxes and made sure she took her medications, made sure she ate right, and I gave her insulin shots every day. I worried about her and even scolded her when she ate the wrong things. Don't get me wrong, I let her eat whatever she want, within reason, she just liked to eat more than what she should and was always the wrong thing. In retrospect I wonder if I should have just let her eat as much as she wanted but then I know that the diabetes would have probably created major problems that would have been a slow death. As it was she died unexpectedly which neither of us considered a possibility. We both always thought that complications from diabetes would eventually fall upon her and she would die a slow lingering death. Instead she was helping me with laundry one day and the next day she was gone with no warning whatsoever.

Would I want her to suffer a long, slow death from a stroke or some diabetic disease? No, I know I'm glad she didn't have to suffer for long. It's my own selfish need to have a last moment with her to tell her how much I loved her even though I told her that every day of her life... I still feel the need to tell her again so that there's no doubt at all in her mind how much she meant to me.

As bad as I feel, I feel even worse for my brother. Since 2003 my mother lived with me and my husband in CA and my mother and I only visited TN one time, in 2006. He didn't get to see her everyday like I did. They talked on the phone but that's not the same. I called him the day after we admitted her into the hospital and told him what the Drs had told me and that was that she was doing okay and was preparing to do an endoscopy. It was probably an hour away if not less that I had to call him and tell him that she stopped breathing and they were giving her CPR and then would find another hospital to put her in. She was taken to St Mary Medical Center, down the mountain, and it took my husband and I a while to drive there (about 45 minutes). When we arrived they were giving her CPR again, I watched while they vigorously compressed her chest over and over again and then finally pronounced her.

Mother's Day is May 11th. I know I need to do something but then I wonder why. All of my preconceived notions about what happens when one dies has been tossed out the window. Ironically, my family has stores/tales of being visited by departed loved ones and I've never doubted their validity. In fact, when my closest friend Tony died a few years ago I felt his presence come to me to help me deal with his passing. Various members of my family have seen the spirits of others who have passed on. At times I think I feel my mother, and I seem to hear daily noises throughout the house that are reminiscent of noises she would make when she wondered about the house while alive.

Is she here? I don't know. I hope she's found peace and no longer feels pain. I'm grateful I don't have to give her insulin shots anymore - or check her glucose levels because those little lancets hurt like you wouldn't believe.

What do I now believe? I believe I'm just lost and won't know the answers till I find out for myself when I pass on.