What YOU don't know is I started this blog over a year ago. I started it the day after my birthday last year (05.13.2010). I never published it but I think it's interesting to go back and see where you were to find out where you are. This is me a year ago:
"On Monday, April 19th, 2010, my mother had a stroke. I spent that day concerned over an excruciating headache my daughter had been suffering from for 3 days. She had her appendix removed on the 15th and the recovery wasn't going well. I ended up taking her to the emergency room late in the day. She was given a shot to allow her to sleep and to ease her pain.
"On Monday, April 19th, 2010, my mother had a stroke. I spent that day concerned over an excruciating headache my daughter had been suffering from for 3 days. She had her appendix removed on the 15th and the recovery wasn't going well. I ended up taking her to the emergency room late in the day. She was given a shot to allow her to sleep and to ease her pain.
Tuesday morning I had a very uneasy feeling. I went into Audrey's room, I woke her to make sure she was ok. She did come to and spoke to me briefly and went right back to sleep. I went to iron my clothes and noticed my phone was blinking - this meant someone had something to tell me, either an email, a text, voicemail. I looked, and there it was. I froze. This is the kind of news you fear - the phone call, the text, the knock at the door. You imagine, what will I feel when it happens, how will I handle it, what will I do when in one instant my world changes?
My brother sent me a text. "I thought you should know mom had a stroke yesterday. Joe took her to the hospital. That is all I know." Numb. Anxiety. Lump in my throat. Tears start to well in my eyes. My nose stings. I call Shawn who tells me she can walk and move her arms. She is confused but it certainly looks like it could be much worse. He will call me when he knows more. We hang up. I can't breathe and I start to cry but am trying to force myself not to. I can't move. The phone rings, it's Tracey, of course it will be Tracey - I press the green button but I can't speak. I don't have to it's TA. Shawn posted it on facebook asking for prayers. She knew - she knows the complexity. She tells me she is sorry. She asks what can she do and then I am done. She knows . . . . I let myself cry. I never speak, I don't have to, it's TA.
It has been 8 years, maybe even to the day - it was in April, since I have spoken to my mother. This wasn't suppose to happen like this. Had I not logged enough couch time, paid enough money to discuss my mother? Hadn't I come to the realization that I was fine not having her in my life? Hadn't I made peace with the thought that if she passed I would be ok? I had, I never took any of this lightly - this was a painful journey for me and I only did what I had to in order to protect me and to protect the kids. And yet the tears.
What was going to happen? What was Shawn going to want from me? What was I going to have to do? I am scared, I am confused and my poor brother. . . . what about Shawn? I can't let my brother go through this alone. My brother has and always will mean the world to me - I love him and would never leave his side. But I don't want to see her. I don't want to do this - I have to do this though. I don't remember much about Tuesday - there were tears and I had to tell the kids. They were 8 and 9 the last time they saw Nana. They were very close to her at one time and then it all ended. When I told them they looked at me and asked if she was going to live. Was she?
Shawn planned a trip to Aiken so he could go through our mother's things and assess the situation. I would go - I would go and be there for my brother. I would help him, support him do whatever he needed me to do - but see her, that I wasn't sure of.
Shawn arrived first and after he saw her he called me and he was in tears . . . now I am a "strong" person, so to say, but I am also a sap and for my brother to choke up - even a crack in his voice will do me in. But who was I crying for? He was telling me how sad it was to see her in the condition she was in - confused, words jumbled, weak. Again, I can be "strong" but how could anyone not have pity on someone who was in the situation she was now in?
Arriving in Aiken was difficult - I stopped downtown at a pub to have a pint before meeting Shawn to go through her personal items that were at Joe's. Shawn had told me of the squalor she was living in but it didn't set it until I saw it. A tiny little bed, ashtrays full of cigarettes, empty liquor bottles, clothes with dropping from rodents in her drawers - it was disgusting. With gloves and masks we went through her stuff, took what was necessary and left the rest to be disposed of in anyway Joe deemed fit. I took everything to the laundry mat and washed her clothes in the hottest water - twice, just to be sure everything was clean. I went shopping and purchased her new items all the time thinking, was I going to see her?
Shawn and I spoke that evening - he wanted to know that even with all that had occurred had I forgiven her? I explained that I didn't know if what I felt was forgiveness or a feeling of it isn't important in my life any longer - an indifference if you will. He felt it would be best if I saw her now so that if the time came where I had to be there in an emergency that wasn't the first time we saw each other. Made sense so I decided the next I would go with him to the nursing home she temporarily lived in.
I sat out in the garden and waited for Shawn to bring out our mother. What did I feel - amazingly I was calm. She came out and it was amazing to me how much she had aged. She had grey hair - not the blonde I was use to. Her skin was loose and she had the bruises you so often see on older people. Even with all the changes, she looked the same - the same petite figure that had been such a huge and missing part of my life. I stood there and she looked at me and said hello. She didn't recognize at first - she babbled a thank you and then it hit her. She said, "I know who you are" - she looked at Shawn and said thank you and looked at me and said thank you (in her own jumbled way that was now her speech). She smiled and I smiled but there was no physical contact - she cried but I didn't. I tried to be very aware of my feelings and for the life of me I just didn't feel. She spoke to us and it was nearly impossible to understand a word she said. I felt badly for her condition - but I didn't feel much else.
As we left, Shawn was choked up again seeing her in the condition she was and I too hated that but other than those feelings and being thankful she was in a nice clean place (given what she was living in), I felt confused. I think I thought I was suppose to feel more - I think I thought being that I can be putty that I would feel something. But I didn't.
It wasn't until the ride home that I realized the peace that I felt I had achieved . . HAD indeed been what I felt. And while that was a good feeling, given the circumstances it was a guilty feeling as well. And now what does all this mean . . . . .what am I going to have to do???? "
And now here I am 1 year later. Since then we moved her to Charleston - so not only is she in an assisted living home in Charleston, I have to tend to her, help her at times. It started out with the guilt of her situation and of her being her being so huge that I was there every weekend. It is now to the point where I do what I can when I can and talk to myself constantly to not let guilt take over my abilities of what I should do versus what I can do.
It's been an eye opener - I realize now more than ever . . . . . What I Know is, we come into this world with nothing and have to be tended to in order to survive. We work and fight so hard for our independence and possessions when, in the end, we end up once again needing assistance in order to leave this world, with, nothing.
Shawn planned a trip to Aiken so he could go through our mother's things and assess the situation. I would go - I would go and be there for my brother. I would help him, support him do whatever he needed me to do - but see her, that I wasn't sure of.
Shawn arrived first and after he saw her he called me and he was in tears . . . now I am a "strong" person, so to say, but I am also a sap and for my brother to choke up - even a crack in his voice will do me in. But who was I crying for? He was telling me how sad it was to see her in the condition she was in - confused, words jumbled, weak. Again, I can be "strong" but how could anyone not have pity on someone who was in the situation she was now in?
Arriving in Aiken was difficult - I stopped downtown at a pub to have a pint before meeting Shawn to go through her personal items that were at Joe's. Shawn had told me of the squalor she was living in but it didn't set it until I saw it. A tiny little bed, ashtrays full of cigarettes, empty liquor bottles, clothes with dropping from rodents in her drawers - it was disgusting. With gloves and masks we went through her stuff, took what was necessary and left the rest to be disposed of in anyway Joe deemed fit. I took everything to the laundry mat and washed her clothes in the hottest water - twice, just to be sure everything was clean. I went shopping and purchased her new items all the time thinking, was I going to see her?
Shawn and I spoke that evening - he wanted to know that even with all that had occurred had I forgiven her? I explained that I didn't know if what I felt was forgiveness or a feeling of it isn't important in my life any longer - an indifference if you will. He felt it would be best if I saw her now so that if the time came where I had to be there in an emergency that wasn't the first time we saw each other. Made sense so I decided the next I would go with him to the nursing home she temporarily lived in.
I sat out in the garden and waited for Shawn to bring out our mother. What did I feel - amazingly I was calm. She came out and it was amazing to me how much she had aged. She had grey hair - not the blonde I was use to. Her skin was loose and she had the bruises you so often see on older people. Even with all the changes, she looked the same - the same petite figure that had been such a huge and missing part of my life. I stood there and she looked at me and said hello. She didn't recognize at first - she babbled a thank you and then it hit her. She said, "I know who you are" - she looked at Shawn and said thank you and looked at me and said thank you (in her own jumbled way that was now her speech). She smiled and I smiled but there was no physical contact - she cried but I didn't. I tried to be very aware of my feelings and for the life of me I just didn't feel. She spoke to us and it was nearly impossible to understand a word she said. I felt badly for her condition - but I didn't feel much else.
As we left, Shawn was choked up again seeing her in the condition she was and I too hated that but other than those feelings and being thankful she was in a nice clean place (given what she was living in), I felt confused. I think I thought I was suppose to feel more - I think I thought being that I can be putty that I would feel something. But I didn't.
It wasn't until the ride home that I realized the peace that I felt I had achieved . . HAD indeed been what I felt. And while that was a good feeling, given the circumstances it was a guilty feeling as well. And now what does all this mean . . . . .what am I going to have to do???? "
And now here I am 1 year later. Since then we moved her to Charleston - so not only is she in an assisted living home in Charleston, I have to tend to her, help her at times. It started out with the guilt of her situation and of her being her being so huge that I was there every weekend. It is now to the point where I do what I can when I can and talk to myself constantly to not let guilt take over my abilities of what I should do versus what I can do.
It's been an eye opener - I realize now more than ever . . . . . What I Know is, we come into this world with nothing and have to be tended to in order to survive. We work and fight so hard for our independence and possessions when, in the end, we end up once again needing assistance in order to leave this world, with, nothing.
