On Loss, and Rememberance

On October 8th, 2005 my life changed forever.  On that day I lost two people very close to me.  My Step-Mom (Donna) and Paternal Grandmother (Grammy).  They passed form different causes, hundreds of miles away from one another, and from me.  I can't even imagine being my father.  He lost his wife and partner as well as his Mother within hours of each other.  By far and away the most important women in his life.  Loss of any loved one, pet, family member, friend, is hard.  And it never gets easier.  Having such sudden, unexpected, significant loss all at once can give you a little perspective. 

I'll talk about that later.  Right now I want to talk about my loved ones.

Grammy was, well, a grandmother.  She was soft and kind and loving.  She played Bingo, smoked like a chimney, and did plastic canvas.  She bought TONS of Avon Jewelry, not the good stuff, the cheap plastic kind. 

When I list things about her on paper, she sounds dreadful, but she wasn't.  She was just kind of old-lady-boring.  In the very best way. 

I had to watch a ton of old western movies (BARF), but I got to have my nails painted (usually hooker red) and wear her dangle-y earrings.  I also used to take her silk night gowns and wear them like princess dresses.  But I think I was a movie star, not a princess.  I mean it was the 80's, we weren't princess crazy back then. (Thanks Disney!) 

She taught me to do my very first crafts; I remember making a DREADFUL plastic canvas heart.  I couldn't decide what shade of red/pink to make it, so she chose a giant needle and strung up all 3 colors for me.  It was insanely difficult to make because pulling 3 strands of yarn through a tiny plastic hole at the age of 8 was so not easy, but I did it, kind of. 

As I got older I saw her less and less, I moved away and got married, she wasn't able to be there.  But on a visit shortly before my wedding I asked her if she had anything she wanted to send.  I had a necklace from my great grandmother who wouldn't be able to attend, and wanted to know if she had anything to send so that she too could be a part of my day.  She gave me a plastic purple flower.  I gave it to my florist and asked them to incorporate it into my bouquet.  I never saw it again.

I still miss her.  Every Day.  Every time something wonderful or awful happens to me I want to call her and tell her about it.  And I can't.  This particular instance is a good example of not knowing what you have until it's gone. 

She was in the hospital in Maryland when she passed.  She had been ill for a while but everyone had expected her to recover.  She had a bad heart, and I think the news of my step mothers passing, just hours before she passed herself, was just too much for her to bear. 

Donna was, wow, I don't really know where to begin.  She was wonderful.  She was young and vivacious, a mother, and wife.  She loved horror/mystery novels, particularly Stephen King.  She was into Angels and Reflexology.  She loved unconditionally and fully. 

She was honest, brutally so.  And thus often came across as a bitch, but she simply thought honesty was important enough that it didn't matter if it wasn't what you wanted to hear. (This was prior to the I just feel like being a bitch and cover it by saying I'm being honest BS that is all the rage right now)

She loved my father, and made him so happy.  She loved and was loved by her children, My Brother and Sister, as well as myself, her step daughter.  She taught me a lot about a lot of things.  Growing up I wasn't close with my mother, but I was close with Donna.  She was still an authority figure, but she was one I was much more comfortable approaching.  My mother and I are very different, but Donna and I were kindred spirits, making it easier to talk to her.  Whenever I need advice or to share a truly great novel with someone it hurts just a little because I would have been sharing them with her.  And though I love my friends and family no one will ever replace her in my life. 

Donna passed just a few hours before Grammy leaving behind my father who was just 42 at the time my sister who was 10 and my brother who was 13. 

She had been suffering from insomnia and depression, and was also a recreational drug user, she liked pain meds.  Her Doctor (idiot) prescribed both antidepressants and sleeping pills.  Which you are never ever supposed to mix.  She had a terrible headache and took some sort of crazy strong pain med that she had in the cabinet for her recreational use and her sleep aid, and her anti depressant before bed.  She never fell asleep, but she did get fucked up and forgot she had already taken her sleep aid, and took another and another and another.  She died of an accidental overdose, sleeping in bed with my little sister in the room.  (Thankfully she never really knew what was happening)

I had just started a new job.  It was teaching mommy and me classes and preschool readiness.  Still in training, I had just taught my first class on my own.  It was the last class of a sunny brisk Saturday morning, the kind of morning only autumn in the North East can bring.  Turning on my nearly dead phone I saw that there was a message in my voicemail.  Two actually.  The first had been left that morning by my frantic and obviously crying father.  The second was an eerily calm message from my grandmother.  The same one who I would learn had died before I ever got to call her back.  There wasn't enough battery life to call them back.  My job was locked up and I couldn't get into the building to use the phone there.  I went to a few other stores in the strip mall, but no one had a phone that would call long distance.  I was in a panic, terror stricken.  I don't remember getting in the car, or driving up the road to a friend’s house. I do remember ringing the doorbell a million times and banging on the door as hard as I could.  I just needed someone, anyone, to come and give me a fucking phone.  No one was home.

Hysterical crying at this point I am certain I should not have driven, but what else as I going to do?  I got back in my car and made the 45 minute long drive back to my house.  My husband met me at the door and told me to sit down.  I wouldn't, I kept screaming, "just tell me what happened!" 

At this point all I could think about was my siblings.  That my brother had had a bad dirt bike accident, or my sister had a broken leg, maybe someone was in the hospital.  These were all things I expected, and though I would be upset, I could handle it.  I was not expecting what I next heard from his mouth.

In the calmest voice he could effect and with a bounty of sorrow in his eyes, "Donna died."

I didn't recognize the noise that came from my throat as human, let alone coming from me.  My knees gave way, he managed to catch me and keep me from hitting the floor too hard.  And then he just let me cry.  I sobbed longer and louder and harder than have ever cried in my life.  I could hardly breathe and my vision got a little blurry at times from the lack of oxygen.  It was slobbery and snotty and ugly.  I was shaking, and heaving my chest to try and get air.  It was physically painful, and mentally excruciating.

It was all so surreal; I kept hoping that it was just a horrible dream and that I would wake up soon.  Each time I would slow in my crying, I would hiccup "Is this real?" my husband would have to tell me that yes, it was, and my sobbing would begin again.  This was so sudden and such a senseless tragedy that my brain couldn't process it. 

Smack in the middle of my melt down his grandmother came in.  I didn't look up until she spoke, and then it was a good thing that I was unable to move in my grief stricken stupor, because I would have slapped her.  She said "These things happen, now get up off the floor."  The shock of what she said still gets me each time I recall it.  Of all the things that have been said to me, hurtful, hateful, mean things, this sticks out more than most.  Like she was making this huge thing, insignificant in a way that it clearly was not. 

I called my father once I could speak and he sounded like I felt.  Raw and open and hurting in a way we had never hurt before and we would hopefully never have to again.

I don't really remember the words, so much as the mutual feeling of devastation.  We cried and said I love you, a lot.  I remember being worried about my siblings staying in the house where their mom died just hours before.  Daddy had sent them to a friend’s house.  They weren't going to school for a few days.  My Dad wasn't alone either, friend and family were everywhere.  You really learn a lot about your friends, family, and community in general when tragedy strikes.  There was more crying, and my assurances that I would be there ASAP and I would help him with everything. 

I remember him telling me he felt responsible for her death.  For not realizing something was wrong until it was too late.  He had performed CPR on her, praying that it would work until the paramedics arrived. Not only had he "failed" to notice something was very wrong, he also hadn't been able to save her, so a double dose of failure in his eyes. 

I reassured him that it wasn't his fault, (it wasn't) that he had done everything he could (He did), that it was just her time and all the other things you are supposed to tell someone.  Some of them I believed others not so much, but I would have said anything to try and take the hurt away. 

Once I could stand again I started to pack, because we were leaving for Maine right fucking now.  I never really stopped crying, but it would let up a little, and I could go through the motions, without really knowing what I was doing.  Then I would break down again.

I was later convinced that in order to not cause another tragedy via fast driving and bad weather and grief, we should wait to calm down and get some sleep before the seven hour drive.  My keys had to be physically removed from my hands.  I was allowed to finish packing.  Then I was forced out of the house, and chauffeured to get some (free) food at the restaurant where my brother in law worked.  My husband’s phone rang while I was attempting to compose myself in the car, still in the parking lot. 

My father had called my husbands grandmothers house, we were staying there having just moved back to NY from FL, and told her that Grammy had also died.  She told my husband over the phone so he would be prepared when I lost it again, I wasn't supposed to hear, (but I did) I was just supposed to call my Dad.  I screeched and my hard won, barely there composure was gone.  People stared as they walked past the car, unwilling witnesses to my worst day ever. 

I called my Daddy again.  I remember him not really being able to talk, and I told him that I knew.  He was mad, he was supposed to tell me, but I think he was secretly glad not to have to say it again. He expressed more grief and feelings of being responsible.  My Grammy was sick, she had a heart condition, and hearing about Donna's sudden death was just too much for her.  Since Daddy had called and told her, this too must be his fault. 

Clearly this was not the case; his other option was to just not tell her, which in reality was not an option at all.  She loved Donna too, and she had a right to know.  It would have been so much worse for him to not tell her.

After I got off the phone with my Dad, I called my voicemail; Grammy had left me a message just that morning!  I could hear her voice again!  It would be calm and comforting, and I could hear her tell me she loved me just one more time.  What a precious gift!  Except when I got to my mailbox it said I had no messages. 

In an attempt to ensure that I got home safe, my husband had dialed into my voicemail and deleted the messages, hoping I had not yet heard them.  Instead of being thankful that he cared enough o try and ensure my safety, I was incensed, beyond angry.  How could he have taken that from me?  Looking back, how could he have known that she would die that same day?  He couldn’t have, and he was actually trying to do something nice.  But at the time I was outraged.  In my already hyper-charged emotional state I was unable to understand the logic.

Eventually, when I was out of tears to cry I was led in a fog into the restaurant and as much junk food as I wanted was set out on the table.  I'm sure I ate, but I don't really remember.  I was exhausted when we returned to the house and slept like a rock until we left at 3 in the morning to beat the traffic.  I slept the entire way there.  By the time I got to my Dad's I was numb.  Thus began the absolute worst day(s) of my life.  The next few days were spent at wakes and funerals, making sure that my brother and sister and father were fed and clean and ready to go face the music.  I don't really remember much of the days leading up to the funerals, which were, of course, on the same day. 

Donna's was first.  And two things stand out to me from that event.  One was amazing, and one was awful.  I will tell you the awful part first.  I sat alone.  Like, all alone.  It was horrid.  There was no spot for me at the front with my Dad, and Brother and Sister and Donna’s parents and step parents, and brother.  I wasn’t even in the second row, close to my family.  I was 4 rows back sitting next to Donnas Step-brother and his girlfriend.  My husband went and sat at the back of the room with my best friend, who had taken the day off from work to be there for me.  I sat alone, and cried the ugly cry through the whole thing, without tissues, or a hand to hold, or shoulder to cry on.  They played Free Bird and to this day I can't hear that song without getting emotional.

The second thing that happened, which actually happened first chronologically, was that one of my best friends from High School showed up at the funeral.  I hadn't seen him since we left for college, and it meant so much to me to know that he saw that this awful thing had happened to me, and my family and wanted to be there to support me.  You really learn who cares when your world crashes down around you.

Earlier I mentioned perspective.  And I never ever thought I would use that word in respect to this particular topic.  But let me tell you, losing two people who you love dearly on the same day within a few hours of one another gives you some effing perspective. 

In the late winter/early spring of 2009 my now ex-husband came home and said "I want a divorce."  It was heart wrenching.  We had been together for TEN years, I was attached to his family, they were my family, I was going to miss so many milestones of people I now loved.  He had been there to catch me when I literally fell over getting the news of my loved ones passing so many years ago.  It was hard, living in the same house as him for the two weeks it took me to pack up my life and my dog and move away.  And I cried, but not every day, and only two or three times after I left our house.  I cried as I left, but was done before I got to the highway, and I never really looked back. 

You know why? 

Because compared to that day in October 2005, it wasn't that bad.  Yes, it sucked.  No, it wasn't easy.  But everyone came out of it alive, and in the long run we are both happier people.  I have been able to remain close to the family I left behind, and I love my life now.  We were miserable; he was just the one brave enough to admit it. 

In March 2010 I lost my Great Grandmother, Memere.  She was 92 years old and she had lived a long happy life.  She had gotten to see her daughter grow up, and her grandchildren, and ever her great grandchildren.  She even got to meet her great-great granddaughter.  She was the last of her siblings and in laws left and she was ready to go.  She spent her last few weeks in hospice care, and we never left her alone.  Family and friends came out to ensure that she always had a companion with her who loved her.

I had spend the entire day with her, singing to her and holding her hand, and as much as it hurt, telling her it was okay if she couldn't hold on anymore.  She hadn't been awake since the second or third day there.  I got the call while I was making dinner.  I was strangely accepting of the news, and just a few stray tears escaped until dinner was finished. 

It all boils down to perspective.  As humans we naturally compare ourselves to others.  I call it "Joneses Syndrome", you know, keeping up with the Joneses. But we also compare our current circumstances with those of our own past. 

For me losing two people on the same day, one very young, she was only in her 30's, has made other traumatic experiences pale in comparison.  My divorce really wasn't that bad, Memere passing was heart wrenching, but she had lived a full life and was ready to go.  She made peace with us and herself.  With her demons and God. 

These were also major life changes, total uprooting of my life and the loss of another family member, but I was able to see the positive, the silver lining if you will. 

I mean, I had my Great Grandmother until I was nearly 30.  I was so lucky!  I still have one complete set of Grandparents now, just past my 30th Birthday.  My parents are so young, especially to have a child who is 30, my mother is 47 and my father is 49.  I have many, many years left with them.  My ex and I were miserable, now we are both happy.  He is re-married and I am engaged.  And I am as happy as all get out!

My point is that this one truly horrific day, has made me so much stronger.  I am able to see the silver lining on nearly every cloud.  I am able to be calm and reassuring to those around me who aren't able to be as strong, and I know, that even when it hurts, and ever when we are at our most devastated and desperate, life does indeed, go on.