Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Trip to Louisville and moms death

So its been a while since I posted. I took an unexpected early trip to Louisville. Got a call that mom was in the hospital, dad had found her unresponsive and she was on a breathing tube and being kept sedated. I hurried home as fast as I could...with Liam. Talk about stress. It took me 18 hours over 2 days what was only to take 12 hours to get to Kentucky. I prayed the whole way home just to be able to talk to mom and for her to see Liam. She wanted that so bad, and it had to happen. It must. I finally got there, and when I first saw her in the hospiatl with the breathing tube and her head tilted up toward the ceiling, she looked like death, horrible. I tried to stay positive and keep saying she would get out before I had to leave (whenever that was?) We all just wanted her to get well and get her butt home. But she hadn't took care of herself, she hardly ate, if she did, it was pretzels, chips...junk. If she drank anything, it was coffee or tea. She had given up really years ago, but recently it had taken it's toll on
her body. She had COPD, emphysema. Still smoked. She was dehydrated, malnurished. At the hospital they found she had a heart attack, congestive heart failure, from the dehyration tightening her lungs, thus making her heart work harder than it needed. Pneumonia, sepsis. All that together was
not good. We kept thinking she would get the tube out and go to a facility that would help her. They tried several times over the course of the week she was in the hospital to remove the tube, and she just could not breath on her own. Twice, it didnt work. Once it did. We clung to that one time.

She had a living will saying she didn't want to be kept alive artificially, and one night at mom and dads house all my brothers and sister got together and discussed what we should do because the dr told us her only option was to a tracheostomy(?) Of course, mom would never want that done. She had wanted out of her body for a long time. She was tired. She was done. Why would she want to be kept alive just so she could not talk, not eat or anything? That was hard for us to come to grips with. A lot of tears were shed that night. It didn't seems real. It still doesn't. I keep having reasons to call her and then realize.....and so my eyes tear up.

I had feared moms death ever since I was a little kid. I would cry myself to sleep a lot because all the kids in my class had parents that were in their 20's and my mom was 44. That seemed so old then. I used to pray, "God, please don't let my mom die" Kinda silly, but it scared me to death lol.

I am thankful I had her for 35 years. I know some people who have lost there moms when they were in their teens. That would have really sucked :(
I am so glad she got to see Liam and touch him. her family were right there by her. We got to say what we needed to say.

I dreaded to trip home. As long as I stayed in Louisville, her death just happened. But as soon as I went back to Texas, it became real and life had to resume. They say you can never go home again. Even though I have been in texas for a year. I never realized home was wherever mom was. Now. I feel so displaced. I am so lost. I really don't know how to go forward. I think she would want me to be strong for that baby. Liam. I feel like she knew I was okay now that I settled down, got married, had a kid. Maybe she was waiting for that. To know, all her children, the kids are okay.

This has been the hardest thing that I have evr had to deal with. And it is just the beginning. I pray for strength and peace everyday. I want Liam to know how cool and awesome his grandmas was even, in the end when she wasn't as positive as she used to be. She still was the "best mom ever".

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