I haven’t written much lately. I think I’ve just been lost in my own head about things and there’s been too much going on around me to stop and write things down. Right now, I’m procrastinating. I have another phone call I don’t want to make, but have to. Today, my dad went to the doctor to get the results of a full body CT scan he had done; I’m assuming there’s nothing really wrong because if there was, they would have had him in the office much sooner. (I learned that the hard way with my mom. The day of her CT, her doctor called and said he wanted to see her first thing Monday morning. It was Friday.) But still. It could be ‘something’ and I don’t know how to handle ‘something’. Yes, the days are easier now that my mom has been gone for six+ months, but they aren’t ‘easy’. I don’t know that they ever really will be. People I know, women, who have lost their moms have told me time and time again that they still cry 8 years, 10 years, 15 years later. I don’t cry every day, even when I want to. But still. It’s never going to be easy again and I’m just not ready to deal with not easy when it comes to my Dad.
I still find myself looking for my cat’s water and food dishes every morning, and almost every time I walk into my kitchen. It was such a habit to look, to check and make sure he had enough, that it’s hard to break myself of it. I miss him, too. I miss the way he used to head-butt me, rub the top of his head on my nose. Sure, I don’t miss when he had teeth and used to bite my nose. Damn that hurt. But still. I do miss him; I noticed the picture of him on my desk today. I haven’t actually looked right at it in a while. He was much younger and healthier in that picture, which is how I remember him. Having a good memory like that is helpful; it helps to stop me from crying anytime my daughter runs up to me and says “MOM…kitty!” and I have to explain again that he is not with us anymore.
I know that there are certain things that we should probably do now, that we haven’t done yet. Like help my Dad go through some of my mom’s things, like go through her jewelry, her books, her clothes that he still has. But I’m not there yet. In my head I know that it’s what needs to get done and all that jazz but the rest of me, just doesn’t want to. I think that there’s still a part of me that’s in denial and that’s how I get through the day-to-day. Denial probably isn’t a good place to be and to stay at, but it’s an easy place to get comfortable. Some days, it doesn’t feel like anything is different because it isn’t – I didn’t talk to her often, I didn’t see her all the time so I don’t necessarily ‘miss’ her every day; I don’t feel the void every day because I’m not forced to see it or hear it. I think it’s only because I don’t have to think about her every day like my Dad does. If I did, I would miss her every day and I would probably cry a lot more than I do. When I pass the blue sign for the hospital in the morning, many times I look away so I can pretend its not there and it doesn’t represent what it represents for me now and forever. That’s the last place I saw my Mom alive, if that’s what you want to call it. and I try to remember that fact, too. She wasn’t really ‘alive’ when we turned off the machines. That wasn’t a life; she wasn’t conscious – even without medication, and when we knew that was the case, I knew it was time to let go. They stopped the morphine and lowered the pain medication as much as they could and yet, there was no response from her anymore. She wasn’t there, it was just her body. But still. That body was my mom; it yelled at me, it laughed with me, it smiled at my daughter, it made idle threats to my dad and sometimes it was down-right hysterically funny. And I miss that body. I hope that her spirit, or whatever you want to call it, is out there somewhere enjoying its new existence. But I miss her, and I wish that I could turn back time just a little bit so I could appreciate the spirit and the body just a little bit more, for just a little bit longer.
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