Zombie

This post is also written later than the published date. The date is accurate for the times events, but my mind was simple elsewhere. 




Gary, Tiffany, baby and I are staying with Jim, my step-dad. The house I grew up in. It is empty and without my mom there, it just feels eerily wrong. Dad isn't taking things well, as to be expected. Neither am I. Neither is anyone. Packed on with no sleep, coupled with an emotional train wreck, I was simply a zombie. 


The house, already decided, was going to be put up on the market as soon as possible. Dad didn't want to be there any longer than he had to be, but who would want to be. The house needed a huge overhaul clean. Dust and grime, dirt and who knows what was everywhere. The house wasn't maintained well and we spent all day cleaning and throwing things out, at the end of the day it didn't look like we did a thing. I scrubbed out the bathroom tub and I still couldn't bare to bathe Ariyana in it. 


I made dinner tonight for everyone, which was a very weird feeling as my mom was always the cook. Or was when I was living there ten years ago. 


After dinner, I sorted things up in my childhood bedroom. Random items that had been long left and forgotten of many years ago. Pictures, keepsakes, things of that sort. Christmas ornaments, decades old photo equipment, and boxes of who-knows-what were brought down from the attic to find a new home. 


I was on the verge of an emotional breakdown. I just wanted to wake up from this nightmare. 

She's Gone.

This post is a late entry. I wrote it well after the published date. Time to gather my thoughts and gather my will to even write, or even think. 


As the hours went on, my mom got worse. More confused, more sick, more difficulty breathing. More everything. I must have called the nurses stations thirty times between the middle of last night and arriving to the hospital. Ariyana and I got on the plane first thing this morning and arrived in Portland an hours and change after Gary and Tiffany. 


By the time we landed in Portland, mom was heavily sedated, with central lines, and a BIPAP machine, essentially forcing her to breathe. Loads of meds kept her blood pressure to a barely functioning level. The four of us, Gary, Tiffany, Ariyana and I, made record speed from Portland to Eugene in a rental. 


We got to the hospital Intensive Care Unit. I'm pretty sure she knew we were there. I'm pretty sure I was in some sort of state of shock. I'm pretty sure this shouldn't have been happening. We communicated slightly, without real conversation. And the doctors came in and gave a 'no hope' situation. She wasn't going to make it. After some time to let the news sink in, we spent some time talking to mom. Crying and trying not to wail, trying to keep Ariyana pleasant, trying to pretend this all was a nightmare. 


They took her off the BIPAP machine and onto a non-rebreather mask and oxygen. Disconnected the leads from her chest. Without the BIPAP mask in the way, I could see the harsh yellowing all over her face. Her eyes filled with a jaundice I'd only seen in our terminal patients at the hospital. And knew that this was it. This was the last time my mom would be alive. Her breathing was labored and each breathe was forced. A respiratory therapist came in and gave her a morphine breathing treatment. A few minutes later, after saying a goodbye that I never thought I would have to say within the next twenty-years - they stopped the medication drips that were keeping her hanging by a thread. 


Three minutes give-or-take later, she was gone. Her eyes fixed, staring blankly up at me. My brother next to me. And it was over. Her passing came mere minutes of our arrival, unable to have a real conversation. The lack of closure and reality was going to take years, I knew. It was a long and miserable walk out of the hospital to the car. With the bag of my mother's personal affects in one hand, and Ariyana clinging to me in my other arm. It stuck me like a knife that my mother never got to meet her for many reasons or other. Today, was a tragedy. 

Ugly Phone Call

I got an ugly phone call today. For several years, my mother hadn't been in the best of health. She hadn't been taking care of herself - the better part of twenty years. Increasingly, over the last several years, it continued to get worse. My mother and I have had some rocky moments here and there. Not seeing eye to eye - and specifics aren't really necessary for this blogs purpose. But I will say, hurt feelings were felt all around. 


So, the phone call. I had given my folks a cell phone on my plan so that they wouldn't be without one when they made trips into town and what not. My step-father, called me today. From the hospital wanting to know the number of their cell phone as he had never had cause to need to know it before. For several days my mom had been in the hospital with an infection of some sort. It wasn't all around clear why she was there. Her liver functions tests weren't the greatest with accompanying acitis,  and pneumonia was tossed around in discussion as well. With my background in nursing I spoke with the doctor and I wasn't told anything that gave me warm fuzzys. 


I got on the phone with my brother and told him that mom was in the hospital. Knowing that he was in Germany, there wasn't much he could do. But should things get worse, at least he had a heads up. 


They drained a lot of accumulating fluid out of my moms abdomen. Several liters at least. Pounds of fluid gone and my mom started to feel better as the day wore on. She was able to breathe better, but who wouldn't with all that fluid taken off and her lungs able to expand better. Or as best as they can with underlying COPD and what not. 


I can't help but to be worried though.