New Year - Thank God

As I sit here, waiting for 2014 to end, it's hard to forget where I was last year right now. Physically I was here, in almost the same place on this couch. But in my mind I was somewhere else. I was still in my parents' house, where I had been earlier in the day, convinicing my mom to go into the hospital. We convinced her to go, after she spent I don't know how long refusing to see my sister and I and telling my father to tell us to go home. We sat at their kitchen table and told her that no, she wouldn't be on one those machines with the tube in her throat and no there would be no catheter. Little did I know that less than 24 hours - probably closer to 12 hours - after getting admitted that all of it would come true....making me feel like a liar. I still feel like one today.

I feel horrible about that day. And I don't know if I will ever feel normal about this day again. I'll always remember that conversation, her refusal to go, her reluctant agreement to going. And I will always feel badly about it. I think she knew for a lot longer than any one else did that something was wrong. I think she didn't go to the doctor, didn't tell the doctor, because she knew. She didn't want to have cancer, she didn't want to die the way her mother or grandmother did so she ignored it. Which ultimately led to her demise. I wish she was still here but the reality is that unless it had been caught almost two years ago, the outcome probably would have been the same.

I truly hope that 2015 is a much better year than 2014. It started with loss, continued with loss all year long. I am hopeful that the next year will bring happiness and a lot less tears of sadness. I need more happy in my life and I hope I can find it early in the year. I've had enough heartbreak and sadness in one year that I don't think I need more - I can use what I've got to spread through into next year.

Happy new year - May you be joyful, healthy and loved.

19 Days

I want the holidays to be happy, especially for my daughter.  I think I’m doing a pretty good job of keeping my chin up.  Rob and I are back to a happy place again, which is very nice since things have been tense lately for a whole host of reasons – my crankiness being one of them.  I’m not obsessing over things that have happened, although it’s hard to keep those thoughts at bay.  By this time a year ago, I knew.  I knew she wouldn’t make it much longer, and I had told Rob and my friend Brian as much once I left the doctor’s office.  I knew I would have to call my sister and tell her what was going on, and that I thought I had a road ahead of me that was much different than the one that we ended up on. I remember saying that I didn’t want to do this – the phone calls to doctors, the doctor appointments, the tests, the results, the treatments, possible surgery, the hospitalizations,  I didn’t want to do it but I would do it again because it’s my mom and someone has to step up and take care of it all.  I had prepared myself to get to know new doctors, find new doctors, schedule appointments and figure out how to make it work around my schedule  Little did I know what was coming up so very quickly – 19 days later, to be exact.  Although I guess she was really gone before that; the last time I communicated with my mom was January 4^th, the second day on the respirator.  She became unresponsive after that and never woke up again.  I try to find solace in the fact that she looked at pictures of my daughter and listened to the stories of her recent shenanigans and smiled and I hope that she remembers those stories and pictures, where ever she may be.

Right now I’m occupying myself with thoughts of baking and wrapping and cooking and holiday movies.  I’m not thinking about all of the other stuff, or at least I’m doing my best not to.  It’s very hard, impossible at times, to remember those last days with her before she became unresponsive.  I wish I had known that it would go so fast, the time that we had left with her.  I would have done things differently, I would have said and done more, I would have been there more for her and for both of my parents.  But I can’t turn back time no matter how much I want to.

So today, I will do my best to be okay.  Some days, I’m lucky to reach a level of ‘okay’ and today, I’m striving for it.  I miss my mom so very much – its incredible how much I can miss someone who drove me as nuts as she did.  And I wish that she were here this holiday to enjoy it, to celebrate it, and to see the little face of her favorite person on the planet light up when she sees her first bike.  I hope that she is with us that day, somehow. I know that I most likely won’t feel her if she does show up, it hasn’t happened yet and at this point I’m not holding my breath (although some psychic guy on FB told me that I have to believe I will hear from her and not just hope or doubt it because then she won’t come through – I know my mom and if I hope for it, she will most likely do the opposite just to be stubborn and defiant).  I just hope that she’s celebrating the holidays with people she loves, where ever she is and doing whatever it is that she’s able to do now that she’s somewhere else.  I miss her, and I hope she knows that.

And today, somehow, I found Emily’s missing Curious George and blanket by the side of the road.  I have looked there who knows how many times since we lost them the night of December 4^th, and today there he was.  I remember driving past that field so slowly that night, hoping to see them and they just weren’t there – I have blamed myself for almost three weeks and have felt horrible about it, I’ve cried over it.  And I found George this morning, his red shirt caught my eye and I threw on my flashers, jumped out of the car and got him out of the field he was lying in (almost directly across the street from Emily’s school).  And I went back in the afternoon, something told me the blanket was there and it was. Neither look all that worse for wear, which tells me someone dumped them there last night in the hopes that we would find them today – or some parent would find them and bring them to school, thinking they belonged to someone there.  I don’t know what it was, but I have to wonder if this is my mom’s gift to Emily this Christmas.  Today, a year ago, we found out she had a tumor on her kidney, with ‘some spots’ on one of her lungs and 19 days later she was gone.  It’s been 19 days since George and the blanket disappeared, the irony is not lost on me.  Not at all and I have to believe it was her – finally, I hear from her and I couldn’t be happier in what she has done for my daughter.  I’d hug her if I could.

No Expectations

I don’t expect everyone to remember what day my mom passed away. She was my mom, not my boyfriend’s mom or the mom to any of my friends.  So I don’t expect it – but I would expect someone, my boyfriend in this case, to ask if it’s okay that he’s out of town around that timeframe.  He should remember that it was not long after the holidays that she passed and that it might be important for me to do something like go to the cemetery or to church with my dad. He should remember that it was in early January, January 2^nd to be exact, that she went into the hospital and it was just a week later that she died.  But he didn’t.  He booked a trip that weekend to see his kids.  Now granted, he is staying home for Christmas so that I can work both the Friday and Monday after the holiday and he’ll be home the following weekend because flights are just too expensive.  But he went and booked it, no questions asked.  In fact, he was sitting there booking it this morning when I walked up and asked what he was doing and he said booking flights, I asked for when, and that’s when he told me.

And just now, he asked if I can get the babysitter for Saturday – to which I responded I would ask her and I also  need to ask her about the 11^th. He responded only to talk about this weekend, no question as to why I needed her on the 11^th.

I don’t expect it to be an important day to him.  I don’t expect him to sit and look at the clock and feel empty inside, like I did that day when I looked at the clock when I took my seat by her side as she took her final breaths or like I did that morning when we left for the hospital, or like I did walking up to her room, or like I did when I told the nurse to order the morphine (I will never, ever forget that moment. Ever.  And I will never stop remember what it felt like to say those words, and how it feels to have been the one to say them.).  I don’t expect him to cry that day; I didn’t expect him to do anything with me that day at all.  I was going to go to the cemetery, go to the mass my dad is having said for her, and maybe do a little crying along the way. Okay definitely do some crying along the way.  But now, I’m not sure that I can do any of that.  Because it’s not important enough to him to remember it, and it’s not important enough for him to consider.  It’s important to me, which I think should make it at least important enough to ask about.  Again the grief and the mourning have made me feel alone, again someone who doesn’t understand has made me feel like this is my burden to bear.  I didn’t expect him to remember, but it sure as hell would have been nice if he had.

I Miss Vacation

We went on a week-long vacation with family to the Dominican and, I must say, it was lovely.  It was warm while it was cold and snowing at home. It was nice to sleep in, without waking to an alarm.  It was fantastic walking to breakfast and seeing peacocks and flamingos and beautiful flowers blooming everywhere. Sure there were toddler tantrums and judgmental sister-in-law issues but whatever – I was in the sun, in the pool, and I had a cold adult beverage whenever I needed or wanted one.  And there was barely a hint of the impending holidays which may have been my favorite part, aside from the free drinks at the pool of course.

As soon as we got home, literally on the way home, it hit me that it wasn’t the summer, fun time was over – it was Christmas time, and I needed to stare it in the face as the flickering lights and reindeer and snowmen lit up the highway.  I cried.  It was hard not to, remembering all that I had in front of me.  And I have tried to avoid it all, very much on purpose, because I don’t want to deal with it.  I don’t want to remember last year’s holiday, I don’t want to remember that I have to go through this year without my mom and with the family that is still mourning her.  I don’t want to start a new Christmas tradition of missing her annual lasagna, although I guess that started last year.  I just don’t want to deal with it.

But – I have to.  I have a child who deserves a happy holiday. I have a significant other that deserves the same, and a family who deserves to at least see me attempt to be jolly.  I have to do my best to not look at the date, to not remember what I was dealing with just 365 days ago, and to not focus on the fact that she’s not here.  It’ll all be okay once I’m on the other side of all of this – which is February, but still.  And yes, if I could sleep and/or drink my way all the way through all of it I would do that happily, but I can’t.  My job frowns upon drunkenness in the workplace (bastards).  I struggle with the idea of a Christmas tree with lights, I struggle with the idea of decorating while watching a Charlie Brown Christmas; I struggle because of the memories she won’t be a part of anymore.  The ones that I have I’ll continue to hold onto, but there won’t be any more stories of how excited Emily was when she opened a certain gift and how happy that made my mom.  There will be no stories of how happy my mom was to see Emily eat her lasagna and ask for seconds and thirds.  That makes my heart and my head and everywhere in between sad.  But I have to suck it up, at least on some level, and make sure that the holiday is as happy as it can be (I type this as one of my mom’s favorite Christmas songs – The Christmas Song sung by Nat King Cole – plays on my radio.  I miss my mom, not a day has gone by that I haven’t thought about her and missed her.  I would lying if I said that I didn’t almost cry at least once while on vacation and I tried to pretend I was talking to my mom when I told him all the details about the vacation (I normally would gloss over the details for him because he doesn’t really care, while she wanted to hear all about everything and everyone, so I tried to find a happy medium for myself).  I wish she was here; I know I can’t bring her back, I know that I can’t change what happened and I know that even if she was diagnosed earlier she most likely wouldn’t be here now.  But it doesn’t make it hurt less.  And it doesn’t make it easier.  The Christmas songs hurt, the decorations hurt, it all hurts.  I guess I just have to find a way to make it hurt as little as possible, or at least make everyone think that I’m not hurting as much as I am.

Gee, thanks Hallmark

I can add Hallmark to my list of stores I’ve cried in in the last week.  That was me, the girl in the aisle looking at ornaments and then some other stuff – what, I don’t remember – with tears in her eyes who, at one point, had to take out a tissue.  A very old tissue, at that.  Yeah, that was me.  It’s December 1^stand while the world is merrily hanging up their lights, putting up their trees, taking out the Menorahs and candles, I’m crying in Hallmark.  Yeah, happy holidays indeed.

I wasn’t walking around there on purpose, searching for some item to make me cry.  Hi, it’s hard to avoid the big MOM sign directly next to the Dad cards.  I didn’t pick any up, I didn’t even read any of the fronts.  Knowing that they were there, and this year I wouldn’t be buying one, was enough; its actually a very strange feeling to know that I won’t buy one.  Seeing the ornaments that I would have bought for her – she loved Tigger from Winnie the Pooh – and smelling the candles that she loved was also enough (I didn’t actually pick any of those up either, the smell is quite strong over by where the ornaments are).  Anything that had “Grandma” written on it was just icing on the cake.

I can’t believe it’s already December.  How did we get here already??  Sometimes it feels like just yesterday I was fighting with her over going to the doctor, making the CT appointment, ranting to my sister about how stubborn she was.  But it wasn’t just yesterday.  It wasn’t just yesterday that I heard her voice for the last time, or that I saw her light up when my daughter walked into the house.  And it wasn’t just yesterday that I knew she wouldn’t be here now.  It was almost a year ago, and that’s a tough pill to swallow.  I know that my journey is far from over; this is a life-long road and things will become manageable, things will become easier in some regards but they will never be “okay”, they will never be “normal” again.  Both are long gone; I left them in that hospital room, in that funeral home, in that mausoleum.  I think they left the building when I told the nurse to order the morphine; I’m pretty sure that’s the moment my “normal” went away.  And where I am now on this journey is a place that feels all too familiar – I am sad a lot, I am difficult a lot, I am a bitch a lot even though I don’t mean to be. I replay those days in my head, feeling guilty for not doing enough or for the things that I had to do because no one else could.   I feel alone a lot, and I cry a lot more than I have in a while.  I’ve been here before (maybe this is a bad real-life version of Monopoly and I just got sent to Jail).  I’m hoping that this time around, I come out the other side a bit more relieved, a bit happier, a bit more myself than I have been lately.  I wish I could just put on a happy face for everyone around me so I didn’t snap their heads off for stupid reasons like leaving the butter out on the counter all morning or for throwing a bit of a fit when they don’t get their way.  But I can’t do it.  No matter how hard I try, the happy face doesn’t seem to fit these days without busting the stitching and there’s no one around to sew up the seams anymore.