It has been just about a month since my Mom died. I don’t think I have written in here since… and for a long period before I was silent about the whole thing. Near the end that meant I didn’t write at all because it was all I could think of when I sat down for a few quiet moments at the keyboard. Since Mom died things have changed. I no longer think about it every minute of the day and when I do my sorrow seems natural, not like before when there was some hint of salvation and I felt so powerless because I didn’t know what to do.

I don’t think I ever said much about her illness in here and even now I will be brief … but she was sick for a long time… ill to the point that she wouldn’t leave the house . No one knew what it was until later though she refused to see a doctor even when the symptoms got out of hand. In the end the only strength she had left went to hiding her true condition so we didn’t badger her about going to the hospital.. After the autopsy we found out she had an enlarged heart and although there were other problems that was the cause of her death.

I don’t feel as much guilt or anger as I expected to maybe because I felt it all before she died. I had enough time to work those feelings out while she sat there dying in front of me this last year. That’s when I was angry that is when I hit my stage of denial…Even at her worst , which was quite bad I had some fairy tale hope that I held onto. And when I went over to the house and was confronted with the situation directly I still tried to play her game of only talking about pleasant things because anything else would upset her. And later when I got home and I realized I had no spine I would cry for hours feeling so worthless and I was angry about that. I was mad at her for pushing me away, for not wanting to live for inconveniencing me by making me think about her all the time. I began to have nightmares so I stopped sleeping during the night … Well I was in bad shape.

The Saturday before she died I had planned to go over and celebrate Fathers day … Mom called first asking that we go to a movie or do something outside of the house… then she called said she hadn’t slept for 3 days and wasn’t feeling well enough to have any commotion what so ever. Usually I would respect her decision but I went over anyway … not for father’s day though. I brought her some Tylenol PM so she could sleep. Well that day she looked so weak that I just started to cry I couldn’t control it…. She didn’t notice at first but I made the decision to confront her … I had in the past quite a few times but I never got anywhere…. So I sat down and I told her how I was feeling and I told her I needed her to make a decision I wanted to know that she wanted to live and that she wanted to get better because if she had made up her mind that she wanted to die I would respect that…. I told her I loved her I told her I wanted her to see her grand children (if I ever have any) and I told her everyone would miss her… She told me she would try she said she wanted to get better she told me that she would go to the doctor on Monday and I hugged her and kissed her and I left because she said she just wanted to get some sleep…. On Monday morning my Dad called and told me she was dead, The call woke me out of a dream I was having … Mom was showing me around the house saying you can live here now … but she kept warning me that the price was pretty high…Ok one slightly less prophetic point of the dream: we for some reason had a bowling alley and an arcade in our basement.

Talking to Joe later he informed me that after I left my house on Saturday I refered to my Mom in the past tense.

Now after a Month… I feel OK I miss her… I want to be able to hug her …and I get sad, but I don’t feel any anger or really even much regret… I love my Mom very much and now when I think of her I think of how wonderful she was and not any of the rest of it. I mean I have moments when I slip back into a pointless Why?? Stage where I think about her death and the events leading up to it with an unwanted clarity… but for the most part I just feel a loss now and that is a sadness but I can live with that in fact I even kind of welcome it, because I want to remember her.

Joe is sick again today he gets sick way to often…it worries me. They called and asked me if I could come in to work today and I said yes because I was sleepy and I thought Joe was feeling ok but since he woke up he has run to the bathroom 3 times and now all I want to do is stay here with him. He threw up a few times last night while he was at work but he didn’t come home, he gets stubborn about things like that I can’t say anything I guess I have done the same but I still worry about him..