LOSING MOM - Part 26

After the terrible night Mom had, Sal, Lib and I found ourselves swimming in an even deeper sea of angst and uncertainty than we’d been in before. And because we all had return flights scheduled over the next couple of days, we had the immediate concern of deciding who should stay and who should go.

Sitting in the sun room so as not to disturb Mom, the three of us tried to come up with a plan.

“So, do we all want to stay indefinitely?” I wondered aloud. “Or maybe one of us should stay and the other two go home for a few days? Or...” my mind was spinning with alternatives, ”maybe two of us should stay so we have some moral support, and one of us go home?”

“It’s just she could be really close to the end now after the past couple days,” Lib interjected. “Not sure I would want to be the one to leave right now.”

Sal was staring down at the floor pensively, as though deep in thought, but then with a quick nod of her head, as if agreeing with something she’d been discussing with herself, looked up at us and said, “I think it’s important that we each make our decisions about staying or going based on our own needs, and not worry about what anyone else decides to do.”

Although her words made sense to me, I have to admit I was kind of irritated by my older sister’s suggestion anyway. Oftentimes, and especially when decision-making was involved and Sal thought she had the answer, it was never what she actually said that would get my back up, but the tone she used to say it - an annoying combination, at least to my middle sister ears, of bossy big sister and dismissive know-it-all boss.

Obviously we have to make our own decisions, I grumbled inwardly, staring out the sunroom window to give myself a minute to wallow in my irritation. But shouldn’t we be thinking about each other, too? And what Mom would want? Maybe I could actually use some help deciding what to do, my inner-child whined, after all I’ve been here the longest.

To be honest, I don’t think it was Sal’s suggestion, tone or no tone, that caused my annoyance that particular day, as much as I’d like to say that it was. No, my annoyance sprang from my own indecision about what I should do because, frankly, I was feeling pretty sorry for myself.

Earlier that morning I’d woken up in the narrow, not the most comfortable, twin bed in Mom’s guest room, already exhausted by the prospect of the day ahead. Glancing over to see if Libby was awake to commiserate with, I was surprised to see her bed still neatly made, and it took my sleepy brain a minute to remember that it had been her turn to stay overnight with Mom. After the scary experience I’d had a couple of nights before, Sal, Lib and I had agreed to take turns sleeping at Hospice, just so one of us would always be there in case Mom took a final turn for the worse.

As I lay in bed trying to drum up the strength to start the day, I watched the grey March sky lighten through the semi-open blinds on the large picture window, and my mind wandered back to the day Mom had fallen, over two weeks before.

God I’ve been here a long time, I mused, thinking about everything that had happened since I’d been there. Images flashed through my mind like so many pages turning in a book; Mom in the hospital after she fell, her white hair tinged pink with blood, her head swathed in gauze; Mom writhing in pain on her recliner hours after we’d just gotten her home and my panicked 911 call; the enormous paramedics taking her back to the hospital; the kind ER nurse who so painstakingly cleaned the matted blood out of Mom’s hair; Sal and Lib walking into her hospital room for the first time, together; Mom on the ambulance gurney whispering ‘I love you' over and over and over as they transferred her to Hospice.

The images started to all look the same, though, as the ensuing days that followed melded into each other, so I let my mind flash forward in search of some relief from the enormity of all we’d been through. But the unknown void of what lay ahead that met me was so scary I felt like I’d entered a nightmarish time warp of some kind where, no matter which way I let my mind wander, backwards or forwards, there was no safe place for it to settle.

My heart actually began to race as I tried to find some solid mental footing, panic slowly building inside me when all I could see, whether I was looking forward or back, was an endless vacuum of time threatening to suck me in.

Even worse, when I started to think about home, and John, and all the day-to-day things that I normally took care of that he’d been doing without me for so long - feeding the dog, going to the grocery store, cooking dinner - the panic was compounded by enormous guilt for being gone for so long. For not doing my job. For being a bad wife.

Okay, Peg, hold everything! Sitting up in bed, I swung my legs over the side to get my feet on some solid ground, taking a few slow, deep breaths to try and calm my racing heart.

You don't have to look backward or forward, I reminded myself. You just have to be where you are. That’s all you can do. Try putting up the stop signs.

I had learned the stop sign trick a few years earlier after a tumor was discovered on one of my ovaries during a routine check-up. Not sure right away if it was malignant or benign, the two weeks that led up to the surgery were fraught with worry and fear, my mind taking me to such horrible places that I honestly died of ovarian cancer at least a hundred times a day.

Luckily I stumbled upon a self-help book that offered different ways, both practical and spiritual, to prepare for surgery. I’m sure there were all sorts of other good tips in its pages, but the one that stuck, the one that got me through those two terrifying weeks, was the one to suggest that whenever I caught myself heading down the path to the worst case scenario, I was to imagine a giant stop sign popping up and blocking my way.

It was hard at first to catch myself going down the wrong path, and often I was well on my way to the worst-case scenario of me bald and sick on my deathbed, when I remembered what I was supposed to do. But after a couple of days I became more adept at recognizing the dark, scary thoughts before they led me astray, and up the stop sign would go, reminding me to make a different choice. To go down a better path.

The virtual stop sign was especially helpful when I was talking to friends and family. I’d hear the worry in their voices, or see the pity in their eyes, and immediately imagine a stop sign popping up between us to shield me from their, albeit well-meaning, concern.

It was like having my own personal crossing guard in the middle of my brain, stopping the negative thoughts in their tracks so the positive thoughts could pass safely through.

It’s been said that we can control our reality by controlling our thoughts, and I swear the stop sign trick was what enabled me to consistently steer my thoughts away from a reality of sickness and toward a reality of health instead. The tumor was benign.

So sitting on my bed, breathing deeply, I tried to put up some stop signs and see if I could keep myself focused on where I was, rather than the scary vacuum of where I’d been or where I was going.

And surprisingly, despite my anger a couple nights before toward the self-help gurus who extol the benefits of the present moment, it turned out that maybe they were on to something. Because, at least in that particular moment, it seemed that keeping myself in the present helped to keep my panic at bay, and allowed me to get on with the day at hand.

Back in the sun room, I managed to get my whining, inner-child under control, and turned back from the window toward my sisters.

“Okay, well, I just can’t see myself leaving with Mom the way she is, so as long as John is okay with it, I’m going to stay,” I declared, somewhat tentatively, even to my own ears. It felt scary to commit to staying longer, but even scarier not to.

“Me too,” said Lib, without a moment’s hesitation. “I already talked to Kit and he wants me to stay as long as I need to.”

“Then it looks like we’re all staying!” Sal smiled as she grabbed her phone and headed out to the hall to call her airline. “We’re the K-team after all, right?”

Pulling out my own phone to call John, I smiled a little to myself as I watched her leave. Yes, my sisters could push my buttons like no one else could, irritating me faster than anyone else in the world.

But there was also no one else in the world I'd rather have on my team.

*Note to Reader: This is a story in progress, so I am sharing it as I write it, as a way to spur me on. If you're interested in following along, you'll find Parts 1-24 on my channel page. Thanks!