It's been a long 8 months...

Eight months ago, at about the time that I am writing this, I started to say my final goodbyes to my Mom.  She had been in the hospital for weeks and we went to visit her the first weekend she was at Abbott.  Thinking that it would be like all those other times....in for a week or so, have a few extra dialysis cycles, get cleaned out and then sent home.  But this one wasn't the same.  A late Thursday afternoon phone call forever changed my life.  The phone call that I had dreaded for years and years whenever my Mom was in the hospital but the phone call that I never thought would actually come.  We didn't do what-ifs.  We couldn't do what-ifs.  Dad called to tell me that Mom wasn't going home this time. 

We spent 2 days at the hospital; spending as much time as possible with her.  Most of it runs together now.  The kids were troopers.  It was heartbreaking to see them look at my Mom, their Grandma, and know that she was going to die soon.  She looked just a little different (much more tired and all those tubes, wires. I know it scared them a little), didn't have her normal energy and slept a lot, but at the same time it was still Grandma Kathy.  Her face full of love every time she looked at them.  Just like always.

I felt a kind of peace with her that I have never felt before.  Holding her hand, watching her sleep, talking for just a few minutes when she would wake up.  I couldn't cry, I wasn't sad, I was at peace because she was at peace.  I sometimes felt like I was draining all her strength from her because I needed it and that is the final gift I got from my Mom.  Her love and strength.  I long for that peace, I haven't felt it since.  I hope to feel it again someday.   

Finally, on Labor Day, it was time.  After fighting it in my head and heart, I knew we had to go home.  It was time to go back to Ankeny.  I couldn't leave my kids.  I couldn't leave my Mom.  I had to leave my Mom and be a Mom to my own kids.  So off to the hospital we went.  So many people came to spend the day with my Mom.  So much love filled her room that day. 

Telling my Mom I loved her, she was the best Mom ever, giving her that last hug & kiss was hard.  For a few minutes, I thought that it was the hardest thing I had ever done.  But I quickly realized that walking down the hallway even harder.  I had walked that hallway so many other times.  But that was the final time.  Once I left that hospital, I wasn't going to see my Mom in this lifetime again.  It was gut wrenching, nauseating, heartbreaking, and the single hardest thing I've done.  It took all of my power to take those steps.  My husband and kids helping me every step of the way. 

I shouldn't have been surprised when my Dad called that night to tell me that Mom had passed.  She saw everyone that she needed to see that day.  She said all of her goodbyes.  She was at peace. 

Its been eight long months.  Some days I am strong.  Some days I am weak.  Some days I am numb.  Some days I am happy.  Some days I am sad.  But everyday no matter what I am I miss her and I love her.