Woke at 1.01am for yet another nocturnal "visit" and, still wide awake more than an hour later, I finally decided I might as well get up. The clock check was 2.22. I experience a lot of these nicely patterned times, especially at night (I've written several times about them before under the 'spookiness' tag) and I have no idea why. Maybe seeing patterns in things is a sign of mental illness. But there again, being able to wonder if it is is probably a sign that I'm alright. :o) But this post isn't about spooky patterns on the clock, or insomnia.
My Mum died on Sunday night.
Didn't get much sleep that night either, but more a case of never getting to sleep in the first place. At least, not until after 3.30. And then I was up again two hours later. Last night was a bit better (being knackered helps) but tonight it looks like I'm back on the merry-go-round of thinking of everything I need to do, and things I already did. Things I didn't do that maybe I should have.
I've been telling people it wasn't unexpected, and it wasn't. She had COPD, and everyone knows that's a one-way street, but more than that - after the events of recent weeks we would have to have been abnormally ostrich-like not to expect "the worst." But can you ever be prepared for it? Maybe on an intellectual level. Perhaps that intellectual preparation allows you to skip the traditional first stage of grief - i.e. denial. Although, you know, the irony of denying that I'm in denial is not lost on me. I seem to be missing out on the 'anger' part as well. Who would I be angry with? Mum? It's hardly her fault (apart from the smoking of course, but it feels like it's always been decades too late to do anything about that). The care home? They did what they could. God? Let's not even go there. And what would I be angry about? That she's free from pain? No longer has to fight to get every breath? That - the next few weeks of estate management aside - I'm absolved from the duty of those five-hour round trips to visit someone who had become unrecognisable as the woman most often referred to as "awesome" by my friends, old and new, and those of my in-laws that met her. Whose failing memory left her incapable of remembering conversations we'd repeated four times since our arrival not half an hour earlier? And, perhaps more significantly, of remembering that we had visited at all. Or telephoned, on the weeks we couldn't visit.
I'd rather friends remembered her as the vibrant capable welcoming whirlwind who cooked up a full fried English breakfast for eight when we dropped in unannounced one Bank Holiday Monday morning after an all-night party. That breakfast is still fondly remembered more than thirty years later by all who partook.
There's a lot more to say, but I have that happy memory in my mind so I'll stop for now.
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3 comments:
Grief is, of course, different for each person. When my dad died, I never felt any anger at all. I don't know as you might feel the anger so much when you see someone failing and could see it coming a long time. As you said, you do prepare for it intellectually but you can't let go emotionally, not really, not until it happens. I know you've been through this once already with your dad, and it must feel odd that you've lost both now.
The memories are really the important things, memories of them laughing and supporting you and being that awesome woman she was. That's what you lean on, that's what you must make yourself think of when the sadder memories threaten to take over. Tell lots of stories about her best days.
xo
John, my thoughts are right ther with you too.. xx
I will remember her as the feisty, funny lady I spent a few Christmases with - generous and good company... that's my memory of her... times spent opening pressies and eating lots of fab food. Good times.
xxx
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