14 Days

My grandma is dying.  The doctors have said about 14 days, which means to me that she's almost out the door.  Here's the thing though.  I'm not sure how I feel about it.  Or even how I'm "supposed" to feel about her death.

My grandma is an amazing woman and has been planning on her own death for quite some time now.  Not in a suicidal way though. It almost seemed very matter of fact. I think she's been telling my husband and I that she's going to be "dead in a year" since Dan met her nine years ago.  She has survived two husbands and a daughter passing away before her.  Her own father died when she was quite young and her mother died when I was in middle or high school.  I remember my great grandma's funeral because it was the first one I had ever been to.  My grandma has always seemed anxious to go be with all of her loved ones.

The kink in her plan was that she was physically robust.  She went out to get her hair and nails done.  She drove a sports car.  She dug up her lawn to replace her own sprinklers. She was so lonely, but she still had so much life to live. She also had great joy in her loved ones here.  A story that will live in the memory of all of us is the time that she started a water fight in her back yard with my little Charlotte that dragged everyone in.  Water was everywhere and grandma was the one who started it. She liked to laugh.

I remember a series of one day excursions during my last year at college in Utah I spent with just her.  My memories of my grandma are usually filled to the brim with all sorts of family around.  We never lived in the same state so holidays were our chance to see her.  Our chance and everyone else in the family's too.  We are a loud and mostly crazy bunch of people so this one season of quiet sticks out in my mind.  Grandma and I spent that time talking.  Or rather she spent the time talking and I spent it listening and asking questions and being amazed that I was 20 and had no idea who my grandma was.  I learned about my grandma during those days-I discovered who she was beyond mom and grandma. I listened to stories about her childhood and how she met my grandpa, that I never knew. After a while she dug out this metal bread box that was dented and inside was a treasure trove of photos.  When I saw it I felt like she had shown me our family jewels. She showed me the photos and told me story after story about them.  Then we drove around the city and she showed me the physical places where the stories had happened.  The place she grew up, the place she got in a car accident.  It all looked different, even unrecognizable at that point, but it was there. I never knew any of it before.  I wonder where that bread box of photos is now? That's the family treasure I'd love to have.  Though of course I have no claim on any of it.

It isn't in her house anymore.  I know that, because she isn't there either.  She sold her house or gave it to one of her, oh what's the word for it, step grandsons? Anyway the house, the cozy, strange little house with an entire wall of mirrors isn't hers anymore.  She lives in an assisted living facility and all of her things were either sold or put into storage.

She has dementia. It seems strange to be able to use a single word to sum up the loss of who she is and what she remembers. Dementia.  Its like the lost box of photos from her house matches the lost bunch of memories in her head. She also isn't physically robust either. Hospice has been called for her. She forgets to eat. She's in pain and she doesn't get out of bed.  When she does get out of bed she falls.  At least she hasn't broken a hip.  Dan has told me enough about people with broken hips for me to know that if she did it would kill her in the most horribly painful way.

So I think maybe I should be glad for her. This is what she has been promising us is going to happen for so long.  She wants it and her body seems to finally be ready to give it to her.  So maybe glad?  But also very, very sad. In a way I realized last Christmas when I saw her that I had already lost her.  She recognized me maybe, but not Dan and certainly not my kids. It seems so strange to have had so much time to mentally prepare for this coming and to still, still not be ready for it. But I'm not.