| Date | Grandma's Legacy: | View: | Attached to Forum: |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11/10/15 | 14: Grandma's Superstition | (Blog) (Forum) | .Chris Bishop. |
In Grandma's Daughters, on November 1st, I told you how we almost lost my aunt. Turns out it wasn't the cancer, as I had said. The radiation and chemo treatments worked- she was cancer free. It was the god da***d chemo that killed her. ...It shut down her digestive tract- she wasn't able to keep food down and something happened where she wasn't able to release any liquids from her system. She started aspirating stomach acids, developed pneumonia, and despite aggressive treatment, my mom had to make the decision to have her moved to hospice care. She was moved to hospice at a different hospital on the fifth.
Ironically, the power was out at the comic shop that day, so I had the day off until they could get it fixed. I didn't go to the hospital- I ran a couple of errands and went home. I went to the hospital about seven, when the shop would have closed anyway. I would tell you that I don't know why I delayed, but I do, and I've said so before- she's one of the strongest people I've ever known, and my mom is another, and I didn't want to see either one of them suffering.
The hospice room was practically a closet, and for some reason it outraged me. It felt like an afterthought from the hospital- somewhere to store people they know are going to die, with just enough room for a few visitors. Just down the hall, there was a Mexican-American family overflowed from a room out into the hall- probably ten to fifteen people, all sad, all waiting, talking quietly intermittently. Over the next couple of days, it seemed like most of them remained. I wondered if they had gone to and from the hospital like I had, or if they had stayed.
I've always envied the close knit feeling you get from Mexican-American families. Their commitment to each other is a conviction to me. I could tell they were grieving their family member and what was coming, but finding comfort in each other. I completely envied them that also. My mom and I are still grieving my grandma. With the seeming impending death of my aunt, we find comfort with each other's company, but honestly do not have the strength to hold each other up- only to cling to each other so we don't collapse in our grief... that's how it feels anyway.
On the seventh, I got up to get ready for work, and had a text and voicemail from mom, telling me to call her. On the voicemail, she was crying. I called, and by that time, she was only a little more together, but enough to tell me that the doctors were saying my aunt had taken a turn for the worse. They gave her no longer than twelve hours, but it could be less. Mom wanted me to come up there as soon as I could.
I struggled for a few moments, because the store operates on a shoestring, and we had been closed too much already. There was no point even considering that though- mom needed me, and in the end, family is more important than anything else. So I texted my boss, told him that I would not be in, but would stop by the store and put a sign up saying we were closed for the day. I did that, then went up to the hospital. All told, it took me about two hours to get there.
When I walked in, there were several people there, and mom was sitting in the chair closest to the head of the bed. When she saw me, she broke down immediately, and all I could do was sit down next to her and hug her while she cried. Her grief shook me to the center of my being, but I only sobbed a few seconds. To be real honest, I wanted to cry more, and I don't know why I didn't. It was kind of like trying to start a car- the tears started to turn over, but then stopped.
Also in the room was my aunt's boyfriend- a gold digging bast**d if ever there was one. He simply stood at the end of the bed, leaned against the wardrobe cabinet, looking at my aunt, hands in his pockets and head rested against the wardrobe. He said nothing, and maybe it's unfair, but he looked every bit the vulture, standing there waiting for her to die.
Her former partner was there. Mom said he had been really broken up about my aunt- may have had feelings for her that went beyond the badge at some point. Just then, he was a freakin' rock. I could tell he was hurting, but he was an anchor to that room.
My mom's friend was there- wife of an officer that worked with my dad before he retired from police work. She had been helping my mom for a couple or three days with various details- being my mom's personal anchor when mom was too angry, upset or drained to handle it.
There was also a close friend of my aunt's, and various officers that she had worked with over the years, in-and-out, all at various states of unravel over the impending death of their friend and Sister-in-Blue. Generations of officers, from rookies to retired veteran officers who were older than my aunt. So many came to pay their respects. My mom had laid out a guest book for people to write memories of my aunt in, and so many of them wrote memories of her, and notes to her, and every one of them was amazing.
While all of this was going on, my aunt was laying in bed, breathing slowly. Every few seconds or so, she'd take a breath like a person who was suffocating, then another, then a few seconds of pause, then repeat. Everyone in the room was watching her breathe like this- it's hard to explain, but it's like silent horror that this could be the final breath, but the slightest hope that maybe this little gasp will turn into some last words. For God's sake, if she would just say something in her sleep! Anything! She did at one point, and it was almost clear, but still unintelligible.
Her partner said he had to leave for a couple of hours, but would be back. We all said goodbye to him, and I think we were all glad that he would be back that day. When he left, we all made small talk for a few minutes. Then my mom got up suddenly, went to my aunt's side, and pushed the nurse call button. The nurse came in immediately, said something to my mom that I didn't hear, and my mom cried out loud. The nurse switched places with mom, explained that she was going to check my aunt to be sure, and at that point, another nurse came in to help. We stood back to let them work, and I put my hands on mom's shoulders, then put my arms around her.
The second nurse bent over my aunt with a stethoscope for a few seconds, then the first one asked very quietly, "Do you want to call it?"
She looked up at the clock on the other side of the bed, high up on the wall, and said, "1:21 P.M."
My aunt's partner hadn't been gone ten minutes... possibly less than five.
We all took a little bit to recover from the shock of her passing. Yes, we knew it was coming, but she was supposed to have twelve hours. Instead, I don't think I was there thirty or forty-five minutes before she passed. Seemed like less even. So probably three hours- four at the very most- from when I had spoken to my mom that morning.
My aunt had been passed away for less than an hour when her boyfriend asked my mom's friend- the anchor- a question about the will. Basically, he wanted to know if the will said he got everything, did he get all of the money too. He left soon after that. F***ing bast**d. I imagined at least three movie-scenario deaths for him in the first few seconds of processing that info when the anchor relayed that to me. God will judge him though, not me.
My mom spent awhile talking to the hospice chaplain- a woman I could swear I've met before, but couldn't figure it out. While mom was doing that, I wound up talking to a cousin my mom's age who had showed up after my aunt passed, and we spoke to a few officers who showed up after she passed too.
Finally, everyone had left except my mom, me, and my mom's anchor. We were about to go when my aunt's partner called back, anxious to know if my aunt was still there, or if they had taken her away. We waited for him. He came up, spoke to my mom for a bit, then stepped into the room for a minute to say a final goodbye to my aunt. He kind of took a deep breath when he entered the room, steeling himself, and when he came out- back to being the rock. He had had his moment to say what he needed to say, and that was it.
It really felt wrong, leaving her in that little closet of a room for the funeral home to come get her, but at that point, I just think we had reached the end of our strengths. It was time to go.
So my aunt passed at 1:21 P.M. on November 7th, 2015. Not with a bang, nor with a whimper, but simply with a breath, and was gone as easily.
I've thought about that moment of her passing intently, feeling a little guilty that I was paying attention to mom instead of her when she passed. Thinking about the fact that no one seemed to be paying attention to her at that moment. Shouldn't someone have witnessed her final moment? It seemed so sad... but then I was reminded of grandma's superstition.
Whenever I would go over to my grandma's to stay, I would stand at the screen door and watch my parents' car pull away and down the driveway, whether it was mom, dad, or both. My grandmother would always tell me, "Don't watch them leave... don't watch them until they get out of sight. It's bad luck." I never really understood that, and I don't think I ever really believed it, but I always did it- turned away before they were out of sight.
We all did. Me. Mom. And my aunt.
The more I think about it, the more I think that's what happened with my aunt's final moment- she waited for us all to be looking away, and then slipped out of the room quietly. "Don't watch me leave," I can imagine her saying from the ether. "Don't watch me until I'm out of sight," and in that moment that we looked away, she was gone.
The thought fills me with a little bit of peace. But I don't know...still feels like bad luck too.
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