Dreams

My dreams have been mostly of loss lately.  Whether the subject be my mother or someone else, or things, or intangibles, the theme has been loss.

Yesterday I had these dreams.

The first one featured my mum.  She and my dad and I were sitting in a living room, the two of them on the couch.  We were all chatting and at one point I realized that, Hey!  Mum is back!  And her brain is working perfectly!  After that, once it became apparent that I was dreaming, the dream ended.  I can’t remember what we were talking about, unfortunately.

In the second dream, I was in some kind of tricky situation where I needed to escape from someone.  I don’t remember that part of the dream.  It was out in the country, in a rural upland.  There were poorly developed roads – maybe dirt, maybe gravel – with trees and shrubs growing right up to the roadway.  I was driving a sedan.  It was summer and I had the window open.  I crested a slight rise and looked out over a wide valley.  What I didn’t realize was that the road turned sharply to the left, but I didn’t.  The car went soaring through the air and nosedived into a lake.  The water was very green.  As the car was flying through the air I saw what was happening and many thoughts flashed through my head about how to survive the situation.  I couldn’t remember if the window should be up or down.  I took a deep breath.

The car hit the water and plummeted like a stone, like a steel coffin.  I freed myself from behind the wheel and struggled my way out of the window.  There were bubbles everywhere.  Green water and bubbles.  I kicked my way to the surface of the water.  As I came up for air, I saw that I was not far from the shore.  I swam a few strokes and found myself standing on an underwater ledge.  I looked back at the car and saw that it was now on the ledge as well.  My thought was, ‘at least it won’t be too hard to get it out of there.’

That’s all I remember.  A strange night's sleep, for sure.

Some good stuff

Here are some good things that have brightened my days lately.

1) The Kid is moving back to the Pacific Northwest!  Yes, it's true!  Finally!  Zoe's man got a job at that big computer outfit near Seattle and they are headed this way.  I am so effing happy about that.  There are lots of details to work out, of course, but the thought of having her just three hours away is fantastic.

2) T got a job!  A real 40 hour a week job!  True, it's a 6 month temp but they told her at the interview that they want to make it permanent.  Now we just have to set an intention that they find the funding and hire her permanently.  And the best part?  It's doing maintenance at the Zoo!  She started this week and is already thrilled with it.  I told her that if she gets on permanent she'll have to stay for 20 years so that she will have a retirement.  She is so happy!

3) My two best friends are coming for a long weekend, starting tomorrow!  Lisa had been planning on coming for months, she wanted to see my mum one last time but this was the soonest she could get away.  Of course, it's too late for that but she is coming anyway to cheer me up and just hang out.  Then, last week, she told T that she was planning a surprise and bringing my other bestie along for the weekend too!  I'm not supposed to know but T told me because it's hard to hide details like getting out the air mattress and planning for more than one house guest.  I'm sworn to secrecy and I will be the most surprised person ever when KA shows up!  I'm just so happy to have friends who care so much about me.

I'm grateful.  Very, very grateful.  In the midst of my sorrow, here are reasons for gratitude.  Thank you, Universe.  I haven't felt happy for a long while, and here are three outstanding reasons.

xoxoxox

22 November 2011

Today is my Pop's birthday.  He is coming over to my house for dinner and dessert.  It'll be quiet and low key, which he likes, and just the three of us.

Today is also the 20 year anniversary of the day the kid and I escaped an abusive relationship and landed in Portland, at my parents house, with the clothes on our backs and very little else.

We've got things to celebrate.

A brief sketch of my parents

I wrote this down back in 1992 or 1993.  My daughter and I were living with my parents at the time in a lovely, large house in Portland.  Some friends of the family had just left after a weekend visit.

We are sitting on the front porch, Mum, Dad and me, discussing which friends and relatives of Janet and Al they had met.

Dad: "I'm thinking of that tall Russian or Slavic fellow who cooked."
Mum: "No, no.  That was Michael.  He wasn't really Russian, he just pretended to be."
Dad: "Well, he sure could cook.  I think he was queer."
Mum: "He wasn't queer - just swishy and posing.  He and I had a good hoohaw about French reductionism."

At this point I start laughing.  "What's so funny about that?" asks Mum, tolerantly amused.
"The idea of having a good hoohaw about French reductionism with bogus Russian queers is giving me a good hoohaw.  French reductionism!" says I.

We return to the discussion of other people's relatives.

Thursday

I did, actually, take a shower.  And it felt good, and healthy.  And I'm sure I smell better.

But, I did not make it to work.  I tried to psych myself up for it, but it just wasn't there.  Technically, we are allowed to take three days off for a death in the family, and I can see that being adequate for some distant relative... but I feel like three weeks or even three months might not be enough to come to grips with the loss of my mumsey.

I went over to their house yesterday, to check up on my pop.  We were sitting in the living room talking.  All of a sudden my head snapped up and i looked down the hall.  I heard my mum coming.  It was as strong a sensation- both intuited and felt - as I can swear to.  Of course, I saw nothing.  I felt her presence strongly, but I saw nothing.  My pop was blathering on as though nothing had happened.  (I shouldn't say 'blathering', my pop doesn't blather, maybe he was 'holding forth'... he is a retired college professor, after all.)

I had an email from one of my mum's best friends.  She encouraged me to 'stay strong' as, she said, Kathryn would want, no, demand.  Well, that may be true.  My family is fucking stoic.  While we are quite loving, we do not express ourselves fully or dramatically, or effusively, or even physically.  We hugged my mum.  We give pop a 'hearty handshake'.  That's his comfort level.

I'm going to chat with my therapist tomorrow.  I will probably cry.  I have to believe that I will be in a safe space to do so.  Although, being raised as I was, I tend to repress those emotions (obviously) and when they are expected is the time I feel least likely to display them.  Oh, what a complicated thing is life!

I may just take this whole week off.

What's next

I really should take a shower.  My hair is sticking up like fried bread.  I went to the store like that yesterday because I just don't care.  Of course, it's worse today.

I really should drag my ass to work.  At least for a few hours.  I don't want to be around anyone though.  Maybe I'll go in the afternoon when most people are gone.  Actually, that's a pretty good idea because it will also get me away from the people in my household.

Sigh.  That sounds so grudging and hostile.  T is being great, of course, very solicitous, very caring.  But she is emotionally needy as well.  And is frustrated because she wants to hear all the details and I just don't want to review them.  I mean, I told her plenty about the end already but she just wants more than I feel capable of giving.  She keeps suggesting that I should 'talk about it'... like a '70's after-school special or something.  It's just not my way.

So, if I'm going to try the office today, I'd better not drink quite so much...  that'll be my goal.

Google reader

If an older post pops up in your reader, don't bother with it.  I edited it to delete my darling mumsey's last name. There are a couple of computer savvy relatives that I would rather didn't read my personal stuff...

Cheers, all.
e

Gone from our sight, Forever in our hearts

The end was rough, my friends.  Her breathing became labored and raspy, and then gurgly as her lungs shut down and filled with fluid.  Her body was working so hard to keep going.  Near the end, I begged her to let go.  I turned to all corners of the room and looked up in the ceiling and told her that it was okay to go, that this was too hard and that it had to be better on the other side.

I quoted some poetry and prose that seemed meaningful to me and that I knew she liked.  I held her hand.  I stroked her brow.  I kissed her.  I promised her that we would never forget her and that we would love her forever.

I gave her the liquid morphine.  My pop asked me to do all the medicating.  He called the hospice people and got instructions from them regarding the morphine and the atropine.  We gave her the extra morphine.  They upped the dose.  We gave her yet more.

My pop and I were both there most of the time, but taking turns going to the bathroom or making a cup of tea.  I went to the kitchen for my tea run. I sat down at the dining room table and put my head down.  I may have been out of the room for three or four minutes.  Then my pop came down the hall and called to me.  I went into the bedroom with him.  She was gone.  He said that her breathing slowed down and became uneven.  She took a couple of breaths and then a long pause.  Another breath.  And then no more.  I wonder if she was waiting for me to be out of the room when she finally gave up the bodily life.

He wanted me to check to see if I could find a pulse.  I couldn't.  Not in her wrist or neck or axially.  Her eyes were vacant.  We sat with her for several minutes.  Then Pop said that he had to go get my brother.  He walked over to my brother's house (it's only 7 blocks) and back.  While he was gone I kept checking for a pulse even knowing that she was gone.  I held her hand.  I told her how much I love her, even though she already knew that.

Pop and I dressed her in her favorite pajamas and put her favorite slippers on her feet.  I crossed her legs.  She looked relaxed and stylish.  While we were waiting for the undertakers (or whatever they are called) I sat on the bed with her and read.  I stroked her forehead and gave her the occasional kiss and told her, again, how much I love her and how much I'll miss her.  The undertakers came and took the empty shell of my mother away.  The three of us stood on the front porch and waved until the van turned the corner.

It doesn't seem possible that she's gone.  Her vivid presence, her intelligence, wit, warmth and love can't be gone from this world.  My mum was the heart of our family.  And the reigning matriarch of our extended family.  I know with my bodily senses that her corporeal self is gone, but her spirit, her essence, the vibration of her can't be gone from this world.  At least, not as long as those of us who knew and loved her are still living.

Not sure what to do now.  I'm not really taking it in yet.  I guess that happens over time.

Thanks for all of your love and support during this time, dear blog friends.  I haven't shared this much of the journey with anyone else.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

The ties that bind

What is it that keeps us tethered to this life?  Family?  Ambition?  The will to live?  The determination not to die? Obviously, I have no answer to that question.

What is it that keeps my mum tethered to this life?  Family?  My pop, me, my brothers, the grandchildren?  A desire to live longer than her siblings have done?  A thumbing of her nose to those she doesn't hold in high regard?  Again, no answers from me.

Whatever those ties that bind (and, other than family, I don't know what they are) they are slipping, loosening, letting go of my mother as she begins her journey to the other side.

I have spent the last three days sitting beside her.  Holding her hand, stroking her brow, petting whatever part of her I could reach.  And, she has responded in kind.  Holding my hand, and squeezing it; directing her gaze up at me; reaching out to touch whatever part of my body she could reach.  Often, there are not words.  Or, at least, words that I can decipher.  Sometimes she is speaking clearly but mostly she is murmuring under her breath.  My pop wrote down all he could of what she said from 2:30 last night until 6:00 this morning.  She is having conversations with people who mattered in her life.  Sorting stuff out.

The hospice nurse came today.  She said that it looks like we have 1 to 3 days left, but certainly not a week.  Now, I know that we had that expectation before, but this time I don't feel confident of a rebound.  For one thing, mum can't stand anymore.  She has no physical strength left.  She is surviving on will and determination alone.  When those go, she won't have anything left.

I'll be spending the next few nights at my parents' house.  I'll keep you updated as i can.
Please send up a prayer for an easy transition for my beloved mother, Kathryn Elizabeth.  I know she'll be ok, I just don't want her to be met on the other side by people she didn't like on this plane... but that's just me...

Peace,
elizabeth

In bed

Mum didn't get up today.

Yesterday she got up and made it all the way to the living room, but did so with a ride on the scooter (the walker, or rollator as they like to be called).  Once she got to the living room she fell asleep in the wing chair.  She stayed there until I left, once my pop was up and about.  I went back over in the evening to help get her to the bathroom and then to bed.  And that all went well.

But, today, she's still in bed.  I'm afraid that may mean that she is staying in bed.  Yesterday she said, a couple of times, "I can't do this anymore."  That sounds like she is loosening her grip.

I spent a big chunk of the morning sitting next to her bed, holding her hand.

Not sure where we go from here.  Or if we go anywhere.