Passage Into Paradise - A Caregiver's Journey - PART TWO - Page 7

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Page 7

Jun 1, 2000

July 20, 1994

This has been a season in hell! Two days ago, Mom started running a high fever that wouldn't go down, and she'd have drenching night sweats from 6 PM to 6 AM. I thought she might be getting the flu, but it turned out she had seen lights flashing across the room and then the room started spinning. Her arms started shaking, then her legs. She felt horrible, but was conscious. The next day, she hardly had any urine, but the bed was completely soaked from her own BODY FLUIDS! It took 6 diapers to clean all of it up, and we had to throw away the eggshell mattress too. Mom's bowels had eliminated all the way up to her belly button and down to her knees - It had run through her diaper and all over the sheets. It was the worst mess I had ever seen!

Mom suddenly went into a coma which lasted 5 hours, with death rattles twice. I tried repeatedly to revive her, to no avail. She looked D-E-A-D. Then without warning, she called for me to bring her food! I nearly passed out in the kitchen! After she ate, about an hour later, she went right back into the coma and death rattles - No responses, sunken features, clammy, ashen skin. I cried all day long - I did pretty good until she came back the first time. Then the calmness I had felt left, the anger and bitterness, grief, fear and tears hit me.

We were making burial plans and Mom came out of the coma again! She was hungry, so we fed her - she was actually alert! I thought I really was losing my sanity. She had absolutely no memory of what had happened to her and she has lost over two days in time! She never heard my voice or felt my touch. I crawled in her bed and begged God not to take her away from me. I am just not ready to let go! People tell me I'm overreacting and should adapt, but it's not THEIR mother! No one can help me with my pain because I have pain as a CHILD, and no one has those memories or loyalties but me. I seem irrational, but I am still HER child, and part of me fears losing the security, albeit FALSE, that a parent provides. Rationally I know she cannot help me or protect me - but emotionally, in my heart, she is still my "safety net". I guess I never grew up emotionally - that is quite obvious.

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