It's not unreasonable that my thoughts would return to this situation, given that this situation has dominated my attention for over six months. Since that evening's phone call from her sister in late February, my primary daily focus has revolved around our kids, her surgery, her treatments, and her downward progression to the point that she's at today.
Even though I moved out over eight years ago, and we've been divorced for the last two and a half years, our lives have remained connected through our children. We have maintained contact and communications on a routine basis throughout those transitions, and as many of my prior writings reveal, these were not always harmonious or tempered exchanges. They were often contentious and conflicted, peppered with resentment, bitterness, and blame. Although I am inclined to say that was one-sided, it wasn't.
So why am I so invested in this situation now? Why am I immersed up to my neck in the thick of her suffering and impending death? I left the marriage and have spent the past eight years at odds with her. I have remarried and established a separate home and dynamic with my kids. Why have I made this the priority I have? Several people have asked me this multiple times. Hell, I've asked myself this too—numerous times.
I am fond of a comment Bud Hill once made – "Everybody has a first wife." As I suspect many are at unspoken levels, my marriage was something of a compromise and something of a concession. Even at 37, I wasn't entirely confident of my decision. Trepidation and doubt consumed me. My writings over these past years are comprehensive representations of my ongoing efforts, guilt, anger, and frustrations with situations in which I could find common ground or resolution.
None of that has changed.
What changed was the timeline for some possible closure or resolution. What changed was the "near miss" of a sudden passing that would have left me facing the rest of my life feeling like my best intentions were never recognized. In late January, what changed was an exchange while the tumor was unknowingly affecting her behavior and comprehension, unbeknownst to any of us. An opening appeared wherein we were able to have a sincere and caring conversation finally. I walked away from it, anticipating my long-sought resolution might occur. The baby might get retrieved from the discarded bathwater.
As I go through this process, being with her almost daily for as much time as I can, alone or with our children, watching her slipping away, I struggle with many conflicted feelings.
I am angry that she left a hoarding nightmare for me to manage. She insisted that if anything happens to her, I could not let anybody see the hoarding in our bedroom and closets. It's stunning to this day to imagine that everybody else's opinion and perception about her mattered more than that of her husband, the one who had to live in disorder daily. The OCD one. The clean freak. The minimalist.
I recognize what I believe so many others see in her: needing help, comfort, and reassurance. I see a little girl sitting in a tree across the street from her childhood home, waiting and waiting for somebody to notice her absence and rally the family in an all-hands effort to find her. To express how much she meant to them. While in reality, a few hours later, she climbed down from the tree and returned to a home where nobody noticed she was gone. I see her in her early teens returning home from school to find her siblings all gone, having been moved out with her mother, while she was left to care for her alcoholic father, who was sobbing in the middle of their living room. I see the person who could never saw the glass as half empty or half full but as about to shatter in her hand.
I am heartbroken as I watch my kids struggling to find closure with a mother who has adamantly denied them of it, resisting and refusing to confront her mortality. When pressed by her sister and myself to broach her prognosis, she declined to discuss it. I resent that on their behalf and my own. They and I have had to say goodbye to somebody who's no longer capable of engaging.
The few times I have looked back at things one month ago and compared them to the current circumstances have taken my breath away with shock and sadness. She can't talk to us any longer. She mumbles and mutters and repeats those utterances over and over. We don't even know if she hears and comprehends us any longer, although I believe she does still.
She's here, but she's gone.
The mediations used to calm her and relieve her pain would not explain the nature of her descent; it's the tumor doing further damage and taking her down a path that will only end with her passing away. And sadly, at this point, the sooner, the better. There is no quality of life here. There is only prolonged suffering. The longer she's kept alive, the more likely she will suffer more significant pain, trauma, and debilitation. As both my son and I expressed to her doctor, we would prefer she peacefully pass away next week in her sleep than go through two months of seizures, blindness, strokes, and paralysis.
We show more compassion to our pets than to our people.
I remain fully engaged in this for three simple reasons.
"There's no comfort in the waiting roomEven though I moved out over eight years ago, and we've been divorced for the last two and a half years, our lives have remained connected through our children. We have maintained contact and communications on a routine basis throughout those transitions, and as many of my prior writings reveal, these were not always harmonious or tempered exchanges. They were often contentious and conflicted, peppered with resentment, bitterness, and blame. Although I am inclined to say that was one-sided, it wasn't.
So why am I so invested in this situation now? Why am I immersed up to my neck in the thick of her suffering and impending death? I left the marriage and have spent the past eight years at odds with her. I have remarried and established a separate home and dynamic with my kids. Why have I made this the priority I have? Several people have asked me this multiple times. Hell, I've asked myself this too—numerous times.
I am fond of a comment Bud Hill once made – "Everybody has a first wife." As I suspect many are at unspoken levels, my marriage was something of a compromise and something of a concession. Even at 37, I wasn't entirely confident of my decision. Trepidation and doubt consumed me. My writings over these past years are comprehensive representations of my ongoing efforts, guilt, anger, and frustrations with situations in which I could find common ground or resolution.
None of that has changed.
What changed was the timeline for some possible closure or resolution. What changed was the "near miss" of a sudden passing that would have left me facing the rest of my life feeling like my best intentions were never recognized. In late January, what changed was an exchange while the tumor was unknowingly affecting her behavior and comprehension, unbeknownst to any of us. An opening appeared wherein we were able to have a sincere and caring conversation finally. I walked away from it, anticipating my long-sought resolution might occur. The baby might get retrieved from the discarded bathwater.
As I go through this process, being with her almost daily for as much time as I can, alone or with our children, watching her slipping away, I struggle with many conflicted feelings.
I am angry that she left a hoarding nightmare for me to manage. She insisted that if anything happens to her, I could not let anybody see the hoarding in our bedroom and closets. It's stunning to this day to imagine that everybody else's opinion and perception about her mattered more than that of her husband, the one who had to live in disorder daily. The OCD one. The clean freak. The minimalist.
I recognize what I believe so many others see in her: needing help, comfort, and reassurance. I see a little girl sitting in a tree across the street from her childhood home, waiting and waiting for somebody to notice her absence and rally the family in an all-hands effort to find her. To express how much she meant to them. While in reality, a few hours later, she climbed down from the tree and returned to a home where nobody noticed she was gone. I see her in her early teens returning home from school to find her siblings all gone, having been moved out with her mother, while she was left to care for her alcoholic father, who was sobbing in the middle of their living room. I see the person who could never saw the glass as half empty or half full but as about to shatter in her hand.
I am heartbroken as I watch my kids struggling to find closure with a mother who has adamantly denied them of it, resisting and refusing to confront her mortality. When pressed by her sister and myself to broach her prognosis, she declined to discuss it. I resent that on their behalf and my own. They and I have had to say goodbye to somebody who's no longer capable of engaging.
The few times I have looked back at things one month ago and compared them to the current circumstances have taken my breath away with shock and sadness. She can't talk to us any longer. She mumbles and mutters and repeats those utterances over and over. We don't even know if she hears and comprehends us any longer, although I believe she does still.
She's here, but she's gone.
The mediations used to calm her and relieve her pain would not explain the nature of her descent; it's the tumor doing further damage and taking her down a path that will only end with her passing away. And sadly, at this point, the sooner, the better. There is no quality of life here. There is only prolonged suffering. The longer she's kept alive, the more likely she will suffer more significant pain, trauma, and debilitation. As both my son and I expressed to her doctor, we would prefer she peacefully pass away next week in her sleep than go through two months of seizures, blindness, strokes, and paralysis.
We show more compassion to our pets than to our people.
I remain fully engaged in this for three simple reasons.
- I lived with, cared about, and still do care about this person. Our differences aside, I can't discount and discard knowing her well enough to be aware of how scared and alone she must feel, and I can't consciously turn my back on her and let this play out from a distance. I want to see her through this with grace and respect.
- My kids warrant the example of compassion and my support of their mother and themselves through this painful process. How I engage and what I model will set a framework for the rest of their lives. I want to help my children get through this by going through it with them.
- It is the most life-affirming experience I have ever encountered, as tragic and awful as this has been. It is a lesson I want to learn in every possible way, much like I wanted to know from Guilamme Barre, but I quickly forgot. This time, I won't, and I will apply a higher level of perspective to all I do. It makes everything from losing a job to being stuck in traffic a lot less significant.
Just nervous paces bracing for bad news
And then the nurse comes round
And everyone lifts their heads
But I'm thinking of what Sarah said
That love is watching someone die."
- Death Cab For Cutie