Few Grievances....January 22, 2000

Few Grievances....January 22, 2000

...Even though my Mom has been "really" sick for only a short while now, it seems as though it has been forever. Perhaps this is because, for as long as I can remember, going back to the early days of my youth, she has always been sickly.

It is difficult to hide chronic depression from people, especially children. Despite the belief that they could not possibly understand, that they are blind to the high and lows, ups and downs, they are not. I always knew there was something not quite right with my Mom.

My friends' mothers did not spend nearly as much time in the hospital as mine, it seemed (excepting the fact that my Mom is a nurse). Nor did it seem as though they had to take as many pills as my Mom did.

To the observant child, even if he cannot put a language to what he is witnessing, this would not seem quite right.

As I grew, spending my weekends drinking with Lowlandz and my weekdays learning just how fucked up the world really is, I also became cognisant of terms like "manic", "nervous breakdown", and "osteoporosis".

While I was having the time of my life, my Mom was having a hell of a time. She always seemed to have a headache. She always seemed to be too tired to talk. She always seemed too weak to kiss my cheek. She always seemed to be in bed when I kissed her's.

There is a stong stubborness in my Mom, rest assured. Perhaps this was forged when she contracted polio as a child. Perhaps it was reinforced as she braved one miscarriage after another. Perhaps survival became a way of life after the forced hysterectomy, compressed vertebrae, and migraine.

That she was a nurse is ironic.

It was not a great surprise to me, therefore, when she developed a malignancy in her colon. Part of me had been expecting it, perhaps forever. It was removed, and despite contracting colitis after the surgery, it was hopeful that there would be no more cancer as long as she has regular exams.

There was a loud voice telling me those few months ago that this was the beginning of the end. I tried to mute that voice, or ignore it at the very least. It just would not go away.

I got the news just a couple days ago. My Mom now has a tumor behind her heart. Although it is not known whether it is malignant or not, I fear the worst. The bottom line is that a growth at the heart is never a good thing. It was not there just a few months ago.

I have been rather calm since receiving the news, in the midst of my sister's panic and my father's despair. It was cause for me to wonder whether I am the uncompassionate fuck some of my family believe me to be, or whether I am clinically numb. I came to the conclusion that neither is true.

All my life I have been told how frail my Mom is. When I was not witnessing illness after illness, I was made to believe that being a normal child and doing things normal children do would cause another one, bring on a migraine, or another bout of depression.

If anything, I became overly compassionate. It is my compassion for the ill and suffering that have made my career a successful one.

If this was the positive consequence for learning to cope, I came to the realization that there is a negative one as well.

I have been grieving for my mother for a very long time. I have been grieving little by little, bit by bit. I have shed tear after tear, starting when I was a preschooler and could not talk or see my Mom for days as she was in the hospital for some alien reason to a child that age.

And I have little grieving left.

But there is some.

I grieve that I may not have the chance to tell her I feel truly successful in life, or that she will see that for herself.

I grieve that she will not see just how happy The Goddess and I are, and how truly right for each other we are despite some of our recent difficulties.

I grieve for the Christmases that will feel so empty without her.

I grieve for her pup Shadow, who may never be able to understand why she never comes home anymore.

I grieve for my Dad, who never, ever thought he would be the one left.

I grieve for my unborn child, who will never feel Nanny's touch. Perhaps for this more than anything else. ...

....Blessed Be...