Having a hard time. I need a safe space to vent anonymously, where i can be vulnerable. Found this website, looks legit. It's time for me to speak, so...
Here's my story:
Mom died on December 18th, 2017. I was with her the night of the 17th, when she was in the throes of death. It haunts me every day.
She was at home, under the care of myself and my two brothers. Our sister had taken care of her for months, but had to go home for a break. A well earned break. Little did we know that mom's battle would end very soon after she left.
Her condition had deteriorated very rapidly in the two weeks leading up to it. She'd been fighting metastatic breast cancer for years, and in March of 2016 it turned up in her brain very suddenly and very ruthlessly. Surgery to remove the tumor did not go well, and we struggled through months of rehabilitation, follow up surgeries, and finally when we got the OK to re-start oncology treatment, it was too late, It was back in her brain and that's the end of the line. That was July 2016.
It was a heartbreaking journey. Starting on March 2nd 2016, it only took 48 hours & she went from being my mother, to a brain damaged, helpless person. She had been fiercely independent in life up to that point. My father had left her 20 years earlier, and she was hell bent on surviving and thriving by herself. This made her new condition incredibly hard to observe. Unable to walk, feed herself, use the toilet, speak more than a few words at a time, and blind in one eye. She was in there, it's just the part of her brain which expressed her thoughts to the outside had been severely damaged.
Fast forward to December 17th, the night that keeps haunting me. She was emaciated, because she hadn't had much of an appetite for a couple weeks. According to my sister, it had been days since she had agreed to be taken out of bed to sit by the window. Her symptoms were exactly what we'd read about in the brochures. Labored breathing, mottling on the skin, and very unresponsive.
It really sunk in when my brother and I had to change her diaper the last time. Our sister had done most of that, and done a great job. We would occasionally give her reprieve but mostly the hired help was her backup. (We were quite clumsy at it, and had jobs and families that kept us from seeing mom more than once or twice a week). Despite trying to be gentle, it's tricky changing a diaper on a grown person. Just the act of rolling her on her side, caused her to let out a moan that's still replaying itself in my head every day. Sometimes multiple times a day. Which is what my problem is.
Here's where I'm struggling:
Everyone's tied to their parents (mom especially) by something very visceral. It's like a safety line made out of the very fabric of the universe. When they die, it's like a chunk of the universe itself gets cut away.
No matter whether you have time to see it coming like I did, or if it's sudden, it's still a shock to the system.
Images from those final months of her life keep jumping into my head during the day. Each one is like a punch in the gut. I am struggling to remain composed when it happens, and it's not getting easier. They don't happen during convenient moments. It's hardest during meetings at work, when I have to focus and keep my shit together. Also happens a lot when I'm driving, because it's easy for the mind to wander while you drive. And I don't know why, but it also tends to occur a lot when I'm eating meals, with my wife and kids.
Not really sure what it looks like to the outside observer when I'm having one of these episodes. I imagine it looks like I'm just having a momentary lapse in concentration, but nope. I'm experiencing & subsequently suppressing an emotional collapse of cosmic magnitude.
A cursory look at other posts on this website leads me to see that I'll still be struggling years down the road. I'm open to what anyone else suggests for coping mechanisms.
