I Miss My Grandma

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I took care of my grandmother,solely for 18 months. She became my grandma, my mother, and eventually my child. In February of 2004 she was diagnosed with colon cancer. They reassured me they got it all out and that she would live well into her 90's. (She was 87). After 3 months of chronic, explosive 15-20 bowel movements a day, hospitalization after hospitalization, and a weight of 72 pounds, our primary told me there was nothing more they could do. She kept getting one infection after another. I had to spoon feed her, change her diapers, and steam clean my rugs every day............yet I didn't mind. When the hospital she was in deemed her as "non hospice" for that hospital, I decided to take her home. Untied Home Hospice came every day. Each day she dramatically downslided. Each day was scarier than the one prior. I carried her to her commode (sounds crazy, but that was her wish, some dignity). She arrived home on Monday, by Friday her respirations were 90 a minute......with the palliative med's. She SHOULD have died Friday, but lingered until Monday, June 21st. I am empty, sad, lonely, misunderstood, and alone in my grief. I am sickened at the phrases of "get over it". "Let it go". "What would she be doing in heaven watching you". These are all questions asked by people who did not truly understand the type of angel she was. The more they stab me with these words, the more I want to crawl into a hole. She was my world, as a child, and an adult. I am sick of justifying or apologizing for my feelings. The thought of the holidays nauseates me, but I am trying, as darned hard as I can. It's just so darned lonely. Can anyone relate? I looked death right in it's face in all of it's ugliness and it is a thought that haunts me every day.

[JCL]

Yes, I can relate. I lost my 76 year old mother on Oct. 17, 2004. I was at the hospital everyday for three and a half months. They gave her Demerol at one point which made her hallucinate and relive everything in her life she had ever worried about. I had to hand feed her for those three days until they got the Dialysis machine and washed the drug out of her system by cleaning her bood. My mother went through a bypass on her leg and two subsequent amputations on the same leg all of which weakened her. The doctor's should have been honest with us in the beginning about her circulation in that leg. If they had been honest and had done an above the knee amputation the first time around, my mother would still be here. The progressive operations and a temporary dialysis catheter in her chest, that started an infection in her lungs, was what took her from us. I went to that hospital everyday to help her excercise, blow dry her hair and put lotion on her. We started giving her a high protein shake with frozen blueberries and omega 3 oil and some black figs to get her off of the awful stuff they give you in the hospital for constipation. I constantly warmed up the hospital food and got her ice and watched Ellen with her in the afternoon. I saw her weaken and become more childlike as she got less and less sleep or any real rest in those hospital rooms where they seem to wake you up constantly. She wanted to go home to her own bed so badly and just get some uninterrupted rest. I was there at the end when the infection in her lungs caused respiratory failure. I saw the blood pressure monitor go down. It was surreal because she was really gone but they were still breathing for her with the respirator. The picture of her face after she was gone has haunted me and I had to take sleeping pills the first few weeks just to get to sleep. Everytime I closed my eyes to go to sleep all these images would be there. I cry and cry because I feel so alone without her. I would have given anything to have a few more years with her. My mother was an angel too and I know she is watching me. I will never get over this. I have already thought things like- it will be another thirty years before I really get to see her again. Such a long time to be without her. .....

[truckgirl]

my best friend's brother died 17 years ago and she is still not "over it". she has learned to deal with her emotions but she told me that you never "get over it". how can you just forget someone and move on. I was a caregiver for my grandmother for 7 years and I gave her my heart and soul and then some more! I will never "get over" her death and I will always be heartbroken. One day I know I will learn to manage the pain I am feeling but until then it hurts like hell...sometimes i feel like I am going to have a heart attack it hurts so badly!