Atalist's Dungeon

Cancer is triggering.  I have been seeing many of my friends and acquaintances struggling with cancer diagnoses and that terror wells up in my throat. I don't want to live in an echo chamber and I know that these individuals need love and support, but all I feel like doing is fleeing. I realize that given everything I have just gone through, facing my own mortality is normal, and yet, I am petrified. My friends of mine are young and have no business dealing with such hardships, but life is never fair and rarely makes sense. I want to be there for them, but I realize that my mother's illness has caused trauma. I feel pathetic to feel this way because their struggles are much more vast than mine and yet here I am, hearing about another friend who is fighting for their life and I cannot bring myself to snap out of this funk. I feel a visceral response to hearing it. It makes me ill to the point where I have no idea how to interact and feel cold. Sweat beads on my forehead and I re...

 Last night I had a small realization that turned into a big one.  I have been, like the rest of my family, busy avoiding the truth. My mom is gone. There are no more hugs left, no more smiles, her future is gone and with it the future the rest of us had with her. It seems so mundane to say it when we all know that is the case, but read it slowly and take each word in for the weight it carries.  My mom is gone.  There are no more hugs left from her.  No more smiles  Her future is gone.  And with it, the future the rest of us had with her.  It is one of those activities that you would see a 5-year-old just barrel through without a thought but this is something that needs attention, needs time, and needs patience. My mom's voice is gone, no longer to be heard. I have all of these recordings of her, all of these pictures and yet, there are no more. There is a finite amount of these things now.  I broke a necklace of my mother's. Rather than larg...

 If you have ever taken care of someone or been a caregiver, you know. But for those that don't ... I wanted to take the time to give it a go at explaining what it was like/ Every day is scheduled. Every moment there is a plan or a protocol in place to take care of the unknown. If you are a caregiver for someone who is terminal and under palliative care, there has to be a plan for the unknown. I remember calling every day when I wasn't up there to check in and see how my mother was doing. I was talking to my dad and giving him a plan for if "insert horrible thing here" were to happen. We had a system. I was "his" person that called and checked in and reported back to the doctors. I had to. I had made connections with mom's physicians and arranged all the logistical ends of things. I was also the contact for all of the caregivers and had to organize care and support. I was the contact for the hospital and also for LHIN and the equipment. God, I can't ...

 I don't think I have the capacity to cry anymore. It still hurts, but I just can't bring myself to do it. I am too exhausted. My weekend was lovely but filled with all the things I haven't had a chance to do for my dad. I know that he was singing mine and my sister's praises this weekend but wow... drunk dad says a lot more than sober dad. He told me how I was his number 1, his rock and that he understood why I was doing the things I was doing, and that he appreciated everything I have been doing, getting the paperwork done and the logistical stuff that would be hard... (canceling all of mom's cards, preparing documents, etc...) but that I am there with him every step of the way. My sister is there too but slogging it out in her way... building things in the house, cleaning, decluttering, and teaching him skills for when we are not there. Our focus is on him. It has to be. It has also built amazing relationships between us with our dad. We are a unit and much stron...

I may look happy but I am still grieving.  I am still burning in the fire, I am just getting used to the flames.  There are no tears left, they have burned out of me.  What is left is functional for the most part.  I am going to work, I am getting stuff done...  But in the quiet moments, I have nothing but grief.  This is what I worry about for my father.  I worry that it will envelop him like it does me.  We are so similar because we try to shield everyone from it.  We burn in silence.  I realize my silence is me saying that I am not okay.  Anyone who knows me knows that I am rarely silent.  I am over here quietly being engulfed. 

 It feels like I am living something that isn't real.  It is a weird sensation to have a mom that is gone? Blinked out of existence in an instance and yet there is all of this irrefutable proof that she did live, that she had an impact. There is this longing to call and talk to her and yet there is a constant reminder that I can't. That her voice lives on in recordings and home videos. It is almost sickening to think about it. All week people have been tiptoeing around me at work. Afraid to get caught talking about it, afraid of putting too much on me while piling on the work... just afraid of grief-stricken me, but I am living what I like to call Hysterical normalcy. Manic normality where I am so aggressively focused on the status quo I forget that I am depressed and not exactly okay. I get caught up in the minutia of the day-to-day and then all of a sudden things get quiet and I feel it all at once. The hurt, the pain, and the exhaustion. I am still not sleeping well and yet...

 I sit here with a constant reminder on my finger.  You are gone mom and I am wearing your wedding band as a way to keep you with me. I look down at it and remember all the times I looked at your hands... when you were painting, playing ball, or just general stuff around the house. I have seen this ring on your finger at least a thousand times and now it sits on my finger. I want to call the house just to hear you say hello. I know that is a tall order now that you are wandering the universe, but it is the simplest of things I want. It seems so simple and yet now it is too much. It is weird to have a mom but not have her within a distance. I used to joke that I never wanted to be within striking distance of my mom, but I would give anything for that now. I am as determined as you were... you hung on to the bitter end and chose the time you wanted to go. I couldn't ask anything more than that. There are wishes floating around that will go unanswered. I wish you could have staye...

 I am trying to find the words and I keep coming up short.  My mother, the brave, strong, and resilient person that she "was" is no longer here. She left us for the great beyond on Monday morning and we have been broken for several days. It all seems too much and yet we are still here, trying to figure out how to go on without her. Being a caregiver means that every moment is accounted for and we are now in a situation of painful freedom.  We gladly gave up our freedom, and the thought of peace is painful as we would rather torment to have another day with you. I wish I could kiss you goodnight again, or snuggle... Watching them wheel you out in a bag was the most painful thing I have experienced. I told Jeff that it was okay, I knew it had to be done... I held my sister while this happened after we had said our goodbyes...  Mommy, we love you.  I have no words. Just a shattered heart. 

 I know why you had to go. I know why, but it doesn't make it easier.  Mom, we haven't always had the easiest relationship, and yet I am feeling lost without you. You were always there, even when I was difficult, even when I had to do things my own way, you were there to watch it all happen and tell me I told you so when it didn't quite work out. You were there in the middle of the night when I needed someone to get me, and you were there to defend me and my kids when people were cruel. You were the shopper of inappropriate gifts for the kids and relished it when they opened them and watched my face in absolute horror when I realized the havoc the toy would reap on my household... you also loved it when I brought those toys to grandma's house and turned the tables. I was the child that you didn't always understand but loved anyway. I can't seem to find the words to say what I want right now and am finding even that difficult. I have always been able to find my w...