Five years ago this past May my much loved Mother lost a battle with Multiple Myeloma (in layman's terms "bone cancer"). This form of cancer she had sucked the life from her in a way compariable to how an undercurrent sucks an innocent swimmer under water. Her symptoms started in January of 2005 and by April she was a patient on the Oncology/Palliative Care Unit at Oshawa General Hospital. The cancer ravished her body making simple tasks very hard and uncomfortable. In her case death was a mercy because it was an escape from a body that had become a prison. During this time I became very philosophical pondering things such as "how could our bodies which sustain us on a day to day basis turn against us so suddenly?" and "what is death?" and "what is the next life after this like?". I tried to find answers anywhere and everywhere. I turned to the bible (copies are easy to find on a palliative care ward and throughout hospitals in general), I read books by Sylvia Brown (I believe in certain peoples abilities to commute with those who have crossed over into the next life) and I talked about what was happening to anybody who would listen. I wanted answers, I wanted hope, I wanted to know how do you say good bye (or as I preferred to call it...until we met again) to someone who you could not see your life without? As you can imagine those are not easy questions to answer and most of the time there are no right or wrong answers.
The theory I developed in regards to an afterlife during this time was that this Earth was hell (I mean I can make an arguement for that just by turning on both the local and international news...wars, famine, rape, shootings,fraud etc...) and that we worked our way out of that hell and that when God had seen that we had done this he allowed us to cross over into the next life. Spirtuality and the growth and development of one's soul is like any other development it changes over time. I am not sure my belief than is what I believe now but at the time it carried me through and that is what matters.
This past weekend I was informed that my Nana (my Mom's Mom) suffered a stroke; the good news from this is that she suffered it in a public place so help was recieved MUCH earlier than had she suffered it at home. Also it was a minor stroke on the grand scale of things so the long term effects were not as awful as they could have been. These two factors make me very thankful. I lived with my Nana for almost a year when I was 19-20 during my first year of college; she lived pretty close to the college I was attending. Her house also was a much quiet and calmer alternative to living at home. It was just her and I during the week and on weekends I would return home to Whitby to work as a cashier at Blockbuster video. I loved that time of my life. During the day I would attend my lectures and classes and in the evenings I would watch television with her. We enjoyed watching Law and Order, Medium and Dateline together. (When my Mom became really sick and her diagnosis was not a good one part of my philosphical thought process made me realize that the year I spent living with her helped form a relationship that would help carry me through the loss of my Mother. I only hope I was of a tiny bit of assistance to her in her grief). The plan was for me to return and live with her for my second year of college but my Mom passed away and things changed. I started renting an apartment in Whitby; it was better this way as we each had the space we needed to grieve the loss of someone who meant so very much to both of us. I still called her at least once a week sometimes twice a week and we would talk for usually an hour. When I graduated and took a job in Scarbrough that required me to work every third weekend she once again opened up her home for me on those weekends to make my battle with public transit and my commute less. I looked forward to those weekends as they mirrored my first year of college- I would attend work during the day and come home have dinner with her, help with the clean up and than we would watch television together. After almost a year of working at that job I took another job with a long term care home in Pickering this meant less of a commute but sadly brought an end to my every third weekend visit to my Nana. That year in her Christmas card she wrote "I miss our weekend visits but I am glad your new job makes you happy" (I missed our visits too Nana). When I decided to "move" to Australia she cried when I called her to tell her I bought my ticket. I know she like my Father worried about me when I was gone. I could not wait to call her when I returned...we had so much catching up to do and we did.Even though I have thanks that the stroke could have been a lot worse it saddens me to know that chances are she will never be the same but my love for her will always be.....I love you Nana xo
No comments:
Post a Comment