10/20

It's been a rough week. Emotional. Ups and downs. Grief here and there, flitting about. Annoying as fuck.

It's bulk pick up with the township. I put out Mom's walker. I felt her as I wheeled it slowly down the drive. The shuffle of my shoes mimicked her shuffle and it brought me right back to seeing her ubiquitous usage of this damned contraption for the last three months of her life. Two months maybe? Who knows. I felt her with me, her presence. Was it real? Maybe. It was comforting. I put the fucking shower chair down there too. Reminds me of my last good laugh with her, her last shower. She called "Lisa!" And i turned around to her pointing the spray at me, and laughing as I jumped. I remember the echo of our voices in her bathroom. I remember her thinness, her frailty, the way her skin sagged off her bone. I remember her collarbone. I had never seen it before. Her thinning hair, her ashen skin, her mouth pulled in pain. Her attempts at patience with the whole fucking death process, and her frustration at her inability to just die already and not have to be put through each long boring day. She didn't want to be with her thoughts. she was ready to go.

Tomorrow's my birthday. My first without the woman who brought me into the world. It pains me. It makes me feel lonely. I miss her. I feel Maddie's worry about me. I reasssure her I'm fine. Penny has her surgery tomorrow, so I will be focused on her, which is good. Part of me wants to pretend it's not a special day. The other part wants to celebrate because it's through her that I'm here. And I'm grateful and glad to be here for sure.

Maddie told me that she has so much she wants to tell Grams. I hate that she knows how that feels. She's too young, and yet it's part of the gift of empathy that she has. A double edged sword to be sure.

I feel like from here on until April 16th I'll be reliving 2015-2016, reliving the feelings as we went through her journey together. I hope I did enough. I hope I made the right choices, the right decisions. I wish I had urged her to go to the doctor's earlier.

But today, right now, I wish myself peace and a quiet day tomorrow to celebrate myself and who I am and who I am because of Mom.

Wisdom

I just read this on the grief board and was struck by the wisdom of it.


Thanks Lisa.  The devil is in the details.  Sometimes the smallest things, smallest memories, smallest actions, have the biggest impact.  Maybe that's why grief takes so much time because there are so many little things out there just waiting for you to realize them.  Hugs back to you sweetie.

It reminds me of the many times I think of mom and miss her. Over and over.

Confusion WRITTEN ON 9/1

I am overeating.
I am compulsive shopping.
I am having emotional outbursts.
I feel out of control.
I can I focus either at home or work.

Is it denial

Is it stress

Is it anger..

Yes to all.

Action plan: text Tatiana and get in to see her

Fuckity fuck

Am I keeping my mind on anything but The pain of losing mom. Is there pain?

Talked with Maureen today. Cried a bit.  Just sadness remembering the struggle of going through doctor visits etc

Ask T. Is it normal to dissect the experiences to work through the emotionality?

Labor Day

Had a rough week. I became aware of warning signs all over the place. Reaching for sugar. Eating till overly full. Lack of sleep. Clenching back teeth. yes, there were warning signs galore. I felt wound up, exhausted, tense, jittery, unable to focus. I went in to see Tatiana Saturday and let it all hang out. Yes, as Reg has pointed out, this is no time to be fucking around with my anti depressant. I went back to the regular dosage. T thought as I agree, that will help even out the rough patches.

so how do i feel about talking with Tatiana. She is very calm soothing and understanding. I feel validated. She refers to my caretaking as a traumatic event. a part of me feels like - finally, someone who sees the effect that had on me and recognizes it. who doesn't think somehow it should be ancient history. I'm so glad I did it, and have no regrets, but need to work through my feelings.

She says to write. I feel blocked. This is feeling forced. My shoulders are tensing.

Positives are that I am working out again. Joined TAC and am very happy about it. Also going to cape may this weekend. and celebrating Abby tomorrow for her 21st. All good things. Seeing M Thursday. My rock, my love. I'm looking forward to a good night's rest.

Silent Swimming

The laps are helping my body. It feels at ease in the water. After 46 laps my mind begins to loosen. I am in the cool down phase. This set called for a 200 of free silent swim. This is where you pay attention to how you move in the water. Am I splashing too much? Am I using my muscles the way I'm supposed to? After the hard work this is where I connect and review.

And apparently this is now where I feel. Emotions came to the surface today. 6 laps of a thought on a loop through my mind. "This is permanent. She's not coming back. You probably won't ever see her again." That last bit refers to my agnosticism and inability to believe in the happy afterlife where we are all together again. I'm in the midst of a crisis of faith and it's simply where I am.

I keep stroking away. Breathing to the right. Arms turning over. Legs gently kicking. Moving, listening. Hearing my body glide and my mind say goodbye. I am grateful for mirrored goggles which hide my reddened eyes. Grateful for the ability to keep my head in the water as I struggle to hold off the tide of grief. Instead of giving in to the grief I literally, physically, work through it. I flip to back stroke because it's hard to breathe. I stare at the ceiling and stroke and kick and mourn. Silently. Peacefully. I let the sadness float. I tell myself to get control. I'm in public. It that voice shuts up almost instantly. I tell myself to think of the good times. It feels trite. I wind up instead just letting it flow through me as I swam. Ten minutes later I pull my body out of the water, using the ladder to hoist myself because my body is weak from the workout. The tears, though - they have passed. Am I stronger for having acknowledges the scary thought of the permanency of death? Had that been a block in my emotions somehow? All I know is that as I towel off and make my way to the locker room I'm not on the verge of tears. I'm not happy either. I'm sort of just there.

And sort of just there is good enough for today.

The splotched pudding

I grew nervous when the hospital bed arrived and Mom was ensconced. I felt fidgety and anxious. Maybe I knew the harbinger it was.

The packet of Jell-o pudding had fallen off the bed tray between the bed and the wall. It was simply beyond me to get close enough to do more about the spill then pick up the empty container and spoon and make a cursory sweep at the mess with paper towels.  I really needed to move the bed to get to the mess. Which meant moving the oxygen tank. and fussing with the locks on the wheels. And mom feeling helpless and seeing me go to "all that fuss" which always made mom feel like I was overburdened. She liked it when I just sat and relaxed with her.

So for all these truly non-substantial reasons, the pudding splotch stayed until she passed. I felt it judging me as I cared for Mom, who was now morphined-out. I just couldn't bring myself to clean it up after all the other work I'd been doing. So I cleaned it when the bed was removed. After Mom had passed. It was maybe five days from the pudding falling to her death. I think. Time gets a little fuzzy for me.

I felt judged by that splotch. I didn't do enough. The nurse saw it. I felt like she was judging me for not doing my job well enough. Of course nothing of the sort was happening. I cleaned up the little spot and felt better though. The spot would have driven Mom nuts if she had known about it.

And today I sit on her sofa drinking coffee and still see the splotch in my mind's eye and I realize what confusion I had going on at that time, a mere three months ago. I see I was doing my best and that, yes, it was good enough. I see Mom everywhere. I wish I could stop seeing her in that damned bed. And I need to stop seeing the splotch and judging myself. 

I did the best I could. Mom told me no one could have done it better. She felt loved and secure and well looked after. I'll remember that, not one little splotch.

Finding peace

Life is full of noise. Constant movement. Peace is so hard to find. I had a peaceful evening. Everyone in the house was out. I took the dog for a nice walk. I played with my iPad for a bit on the deck then read on the porch for an hour before heading back inside to read in bed. I fell asleep without even realizing it, waking a couple of hours later when my husband came in. It was a valuable lesson. Unplugging truly relaxes me. Busy-ness isn't distracting. It raises my anxiety. I'm going to start some new routines to help find my peace better, which will involve less time on the Internet at night and more walks with the dog. Through grief I'm learning to nurture myself. Mom was always so empathetic when life would make me work hard, and I would smile and say nah, it's ok and be happy to be busy because her life seemed so bland to me in her retired unbusy-ness. I think she is still teaching me lessons.