One year ago on this date,
George was alive and miserable in his bedroom in our home.
Today, I am alive and miserable remembering each day last year, even though much of it has become a blur.
Anticipation, not filled with hope, but with dread.
Little did I know then, that in less than two weeks, our beloved son would be dead.
Oh, he had told us in no uncertain terms that he was NOT going to live in the state that MS had placed him. That he would not want to live to continue to deteriorate, become more dependent, lose more function, remain isolated from all that made him who he was; children, a loving woman, work, physical strength, friends......PURPOSE.
Now, he saw himself as an imposition on two aging parents, dependent on a caretaker to wash and assist him in his most intimate functions. He saw a man who would never have a woman hold him intimately, care for him as a husband, share all his life with him. He saw no future hope in all the drugs being touted by the pharmaceutical companies and the MS Society. He saw that he could not live with his four children, guide them, play with them, understand and participate with their changes and maturing.
He envisioned nothing but pain, deterioration and dependency.
"This is NOT who I am, Mom, and you know it". Yes, I knew it and understood his every word.
Now, I am a shell of who I was.
I walk, talk, smile, socialize.
I knew that I loved George.
I knew that we had a special bond.
I was willing to care for him for the rest of my life.
I never really knew how much I really loved him.
I never fully comprehended how much I would miss him.
The world expects that I move forward.
That I remember all the good times and find peace that George is no longer suffering.
It doesn't work that way. I have sat all this month remembering the terrible February last year when he suffered, realized his life would never get better and knew that the future held only more pain, suffering, loneliness and decline.
He worried about us caring for him. He didn't want any more ambulance rides, hospital visits, fighting for doctors to help him, sadness over his loss of love and friendships.
I can't explain how the light has gone out of my life. I try to be uplifted with love for my grandchildren, but then I am so sad that they are growing and becoming so wonderful and beautiful and George is not here to see them.
Nothing makes me really happy. I smile and participate, resemble the old me, but still feel like a ghost. I am the ghost, lost in this world and wanting my son to be with me.
I don't know if I will ever recover, find meaning in this life. Look forward to anything. I cry when I think of George's kids, their lives going on and he is not with them. Sadness prevails, and no matter how good my fake face is, I am not there.
Just like George is not here or there. I do not see him in the sky or feel him in the night or see him in my dreams. He is lost, gone. I do not want to believe that he is reborn to another life, as in reincarnation. I do not want someone else to have his love, his beauty, his humor. I am selfish.
I think he is just gone, belonging to the past, no longer any part of this world and not believing that there is another one in which he can exist. I hope I am wrong.
I just want him.
I just want him.........
(Photo taken early in George's diagnosis. Symtomatic, still functioning, but struggling with treatments and adjustments.)
