Five years

 

It’s a chilly July morning (FINALLY!) and I’m wrapped in my mom’s napping afghan. It feels like a hug. My last actual Mom-hug happened in June 2018. Five years ago.

On an unknown date in late July 2018, we talked for the last time. It was one or two days after my son had had a significant surgical procedure. “How’s our patient?” she wanted to know. I was happy to update her but quickly felt anxious to get back to him and ended the call.

Soon after that conversation, she was back in the hospital. She’d been there in April and—I had forgotten this until just now when I read through my old emails—earlier in July. COPD, pneumonia, UTIs, she was not well. Still, the sudden decline surprised us. She wasn’t with it enough to talk to me on the phone.

I left for Harrisburg early on Tuesday morning, July 31, after being informed on Sunday that this likely was the end. The 400-mile drive gave me (too much) time to imagine various bedside scenarios. I figured my sister and I would swap stories and share memories while Mom mostly slept, but she’d occasionally wake up and we’d bring her in on the conversation. We’d laugh, we’d cry. Heartwarming. I wondered how many days we’d sit by her bedside, waiting with her. I wondered what I would do if it stretched longer than the doctors thought—how do you decide when it’s time to go home to your own family?

Pointless speculation.

 

I met my sister at the hospital at 2:00 p.m. The ICU nurse handed us paper gowns, the kind you put on to accompany your child to the operating room. Mom was being tested for C. diff so we had to wear protective gear to go in her room.

I’m sorry, WHAT? I knew from years of dealing with IBS that C. diff is a serious GI bug with severe symptoms and possible long-term complications. It is nasty and persistent, sometimes recurring again and again. It is no joke, and this is what you’re hitting me with, really? When I’m about to visit my mom on her deathbed, you’re gonna throw “C. diff” out there. Fantastic.

 

Wrapped in paper, my sister and I entered the room. It was noisy. I began to understand that she was ready to go. They had kept her breathing, kept her alive, until I got there. The nurse turned off the machines and left us alone.

I kissed Mom on the forehead—then thought about the C. diff. Unbelievable. If you can’t tell, I resent the hell out of that being part of the story of my sweet mother’s passing.

 

I shoved that thought aside for later and sat down next to my sister, finally grasping that without the machinery’s help, Mom would only be with us for minutes more. Not days, not even hours.

 

It was a tremendous blessing that my sister and I were both there with Mom when she took her last breath. I’ll always be grateful for that. It had been the three of us since 1982 when Dad died.

 

OK, so … How long do you stay in the hospital room after your loved one dies? 👀 After several minutes, it seemed awkward/strange. We decided to head out to the lobby to make our phone calls. As we removed and discarded our PPE, the nurse informed us: “The C. diff test came back negative.”