Sunday, February 17, 2013

Mom

My mother died seven years ago today. I wrote this post a few months after she passed, after I started this blog, and thought I'd share it, along with some pictures today, and then just take the day off and remember .....
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I learned a lot from my Mom, and my Dad. I learned that roles people play aren't defined by gender; that what you do in a relationship, the part you play, can change over time. Mom's didn't just bake cookies and be a Room Mother; they weren't just Den Mother's or on the PTA. Mom's went back to school to become nurses so that Dad's could get a teaching degree after he retired from the Air Force.

And Dad's don't just throw baseballs with their sons. This son wasn't the best catch, and to this day, I still throw like a girl. But Dad's can also take their sons on bike rides; they can go to arts-and-crafts shows; they talk to them. Dad's can do the dishes and cook the meal's because Mom's working while he goes to school.

My Mom and Dad are those kinds of Moms and Dads.


My mother was diagnosed with lung cancer in the early part of 2006, and my Dad did what he does best. He researched and called doctors and spoke to people. He took care of my mother every day from the time she was diagnosed until the day she died. And that is not the easiest thing for anyone to do. But it's what Dad's do; Dad's who love their wives with all their hearts; Dad's who've been married to Mom's for over fifty-one years.

Carlos and I went to see my Mom and Dad just after her diagnosis. It was all good spirits and a happy visit, but lung cancer casts an ugly shadow over everything. The survival rate is minuscule; surviving even two years with lung cancer is rare. But he and my Mom went through all the tests and the chemo; losing the hair, the appetite; the sleeplessness; the days she slept too much; the forgetfulness.

In January of 2007, my Dad asked that I come out again. He was having a tough time being on-call 24/7 and he wanted a helping hand; he wanted an ear; he wanted a visitor. I stayed for about a week, and my Mom seemed in good spirits. We had fresh crab for dinner one night and Mom went crazy over hers. We told stories and laughed; we ate, we drank, we talked. And the clouds grew a bit darker.

A few weeks later my dad began using hospice care to help him care for my Mom. He needed a break every so often. It was a full-time job with no time off. I remember he gave me the name of the woman who handled the hospice care program and he asked me to call her. I had been asking him if he wanted me to come out and he said it was a decision I needed to make for myself.

So I called the woman from hospice and spoke to her; she told me my father had been working so hard caring for my Mom; she told me he was reluctant to ask for help. I told her he was stubborn as a mule--a trait all the family shares--and she said, "I can't say that, but you can." I asked if she thought I should go out there, and she said, "As soon as she can. Your mother really doesn't have much time."

Doesn't have much time. Awful, awful words.

So Carlos and I flew out to Oregon. My mother seemed all right. Alert. Awake. Happy to see us. My sister and brother had come up from California, so we were all together again, for a while.


It seemed as though, once she had her family around, my Mom knew she could go. The next few days her health began failing. She slept most of the time, but when she was awake, she would say the most wonderful things.

My sister visited the month before as well, and she told a story of having dinner, everyone around the table and Mom asleep on the couch. With the idea of death becoming more clear, my sister began talking about religion. We all have our own thoughts and ideas about religion, what's right, wrong, who to believe, what to follow. My sister said something about having so many choices, what do you believe.

My Mom woke up for a moment and said, "You take all the best parts of all of them."


Another time, in that week she died, Mom was asleep on the couch, and her legs slid off to the floor. My sister went and asked if she wanted to change positions and Mom said, "I'm just going to lay hear and let them all watch me."

I like to think she was talking about the people waiting for her.

Another day, after we'd gotten a hospital bed for her, i was sitting by her side, and she looked through the front window and asked, "Who are all those people on the deck?"

There was no one there, but she saw them, waiting for her.

A day later she died quietly and peacefully in her home. I was sitting in the living room, with Mom asleep across the room. I wanted her to go. I wanted her to be peaceful. I didn't want her to hurt, or to worry about us. I wanted her to have her hair back and her smile; and that laugh; and the way she would say, "Oh Bobby!" whenever I said something outrageous--which was, and is, often.

My Dad came out of their bedroom and went to stand by her side, and she was gone. That's a sound you don't ever want to hear, or will ever forget, the sound your Dad makes when he realizes his wife has died.

So, that's my Mom. I was glad to be there when she died; happy to hold her hand on her last day; to send her off with the sounds of her family and her dog, her husband of so many years. Not long after I got home from Oregon, Carlos and I decided to start house-hunting. Nothing seemed right. Too small; too far out; not enough trees. Then the realtor showed me another house, and I walked in the front door and you could see into the empty kitchen. I pictured my Mom, in one of her housecoats, sitting at a table we would buy, in that kitchen with her morning coffee, looking into our backyard.

That was the house we bought. And I can still see my Mom every so often, in that kitchen, looking into my yard. I think of her every day. I talk to her every day. I cry a bit, like now, as I remember and relive those last days with her. 


I've always said that it gets easier, but it never really gets better.

I miss you, Mom.
I love you.


12 comments:

  1. Profoundly moving, Bob. (It nearly brought on my own waterworks!) She would have been ever so proud of you - and what you've written in this blog. Hugs.

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  2. crying happy tears for the love you grew up knowing.

    thank you for sharing your mom with all of us.

    xxalainaxx

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  3. It sounds a bit like my own story, only it was my Dad who was sick. Hospice is a god-send. Maybe the pain of loving someone we love gets easier to live with but it never goes away. We just relish the good memories and try to shelve the bad. Spend today relishing the good memories!

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  4. a lovely tribute to a beautiful woman, dear. the pictures in your post tell the story of lung cancer's devastation on the body.

    the same illness took my FIL in 2005 the week before xmoose.

    how is your dad doing now?

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  5. @anne marie
    Dad's doing very well. I was really worried for him in the first year after my Mom died, but he made it through all those firsts [birthday, Christmas, anniversary] and now he's doing very well.

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  6. Great thoughts and memories in this writing Bob.
    It's not easy, I know how it is as my mother passed away nearly 20 years ago now (she and her mom died on the same day - April 19, 1993) but the memories are always there.

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  7. Lovely tribute! xoxoxoxox

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  8. What a beautiful post and ode to your mother. Loved the story about the house you purhased, I never knew that part. I imagine it's the worst feeling to not have a mother. Mine is one of my best friends also.

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  9. Bob,

    Thank you so much for posting this wonderful tribute to your mother. Reading it brought tears to my eyes and brought memories of my Mother back to me. Like you, I was very close to my Mother. I was struck by how much our mothers looked alike, even down to the same hairdo. I even have a picture of my Mother next to a blossoming tree like the one in your post.

    My Mother died two years ago. When she died I felt like part of me died with her. I would never be the same and I am not. Just yesterday my brother and I were talking about her again. As you said Bob, "....it gets easier, but it never really gets better."

    Thank you again Bob for sharing.

    Ron

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  10. Anonymous10:05 PM

    I know I likely said the same thing last year but this is a beautiful post and I'm sorry to hear you, like me, lost your mother.

    It does get better with time, but it's never as good as it was. Mine's been gone a decade now.

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  11. A very moving tribute to your mother and some wonderful photos. I can strongly relate to this. My Mom passed away three years ago and I never fully recovered.

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