Death

My childhood grew up almost completely void of death. I had no pets that passed away besides a few fish. I had no teacher or pastor or adult figure in my day to day life pass away. It wasn’t until I was ten years old that my grandfather died of a sudden heart attack. And while I was sad and going to visit my mother’s family was different from that point forward, my grandfather was not a significant figure in my childhood. Visits to relatives were sporadic. In fact, since my grandfather’s death, I’ve only gone back to my mother’s home town twice. I think of my “Papaw” and while it is a little sad, there is no real sense of loss.

I think I was sixteen when one of my close friends told me her father had been diagnosed with cancer. I watched from a distance as she and her family went through the devastating journey of chemotherapy and radiation. While her father was cancer free for a short time, they soon found that his cancer had returned and spread. Less than six months after my friend had graduated from high school, her father passed away. I watched the hand of death unfold from a far, and by the time of her father’s death, my friend and I had gone our separate ways for post high school education. I was unable to attend his funeral or partake in my friend’s grieving other than to offer weak condolences.

Perhaps a year or so later, I remember wondering, “Why must we have such a hard time talking about death? Why can’t our culture be more open about the subject?” I look back at this thought and realize my own naivety on the topic as a whole.  I didn’t see a problem with the topic because I hadn’t really been touched by that particular piece of the life cycle. My own experiences with death had been peripheral, and I had handled them by simply not addressing them on an emotional level at all. An entire chapter of life experiences had not yet begun for me, not because of a gap in my childhood, but simply a beautiful innocence that life events had not yet spoiled.

This last week had been the second time I’ve seen my mother’s family since my grandfather’s death. In the seven years since my last visit, my grandmother’s health, both physical and mental, has deteriorated drastically. The polio she contracted in her twenties had left her with limited mobility, now worsened with age. The last time I saw her, my grandmother was still living in the house in which my mother grew up. However, the early stages of Alzheimer’s has progressed with no hesitation and age has caught up with my grandmother’s feeble body. She is now in a memory care home down the street from the house where she raised her children and grandchildren.

My mother, my brothers, and I visited her this last week at the home. Upon entering her dim, simply furnished room, we found her curled up on her bed, staring at the ceiling. With the decline her in mental function, my grandmother had been put on heavy antipsychotics to limit violent behavior affecting herself and those caring for her. Consequently, she exhibits very little response to her surroundings. I watched, trying and failing to keep tears at bay, as my own mother embraced my grandmother’s feeble body and smoothed her long, wild hair. Over and over through tears my mother said, “I love you, Mom. It’s so good to see you.” My mother talked about her own children, three of whom my grandmother had not yet met.

It was in that moment that I realized with a very selfish horror, someday, that would be me, holding my dying mother. I will be the one with my own life and projects and maybe family while my parents will be leaving me permanently. It is inevitable that I will have to watch their bodies and minds leave at varying distasteful rates, leaving me to care for what is left until it is gone. I hated the thought.

I think death is often uncomfortable because it awakens a selfishness in us. I don’t want to endure the pain of my parents die. I just don’t. I don’t want the responsibilities of caring for my parents, of planning their funerals, and of living life afterwards without them. They are hard and often overwhelming tasks that demand physical, emotional, and financial strength to give. That giving is hard and uncomfortable and is not rewarding for the giver in a material sense. As I watched my mother hold my grandmother for the short time that she could before having to return to her own children, I witnessed an incredible selflessness. Holding her hand, giving her sips of water, and talking to fill the silence and keep my grandmother engaged, I watched my mother give without an expectation of return.

As we gathered ourselves to leave for the last time, my mother took her mother’s face in her hands, and told her clearly, “I love you, Mom. I love you so much and I’m very glad I got to see you.” It was overwhelming to watch a few tears well in my grandmother’s eyes, a small token of her own awareness of the events around her. I can only hope that, when the time comes, I will be selfless enough to give past the point of where it hurts. 

Update:
My grandmother passed away on the morning of Sunday, October 18th.