My Thoughts Always: A New Perspective

I have been to so many funerals it isn't even funny.  Each funeral has given me a different view on life.  The first one I attended was at the age of six.  My great uncle had passed away.  I didn't know uncle Joe.  I never met the guy but I heard that he was just like my dad.  Simply put he was not a nice guy at the time I didn't understand that.

I stood as others cried.  I felt nothing for this man I didn't know him.  Outside of a bug he was the first living thing that I saw that wasn't living.  It's barely a memory and I didn't understand what it all meant.

Then, my step great grandpa passed away.  This event I remember so clearly.  My grandpa loved children and was such a good man.  He treated me like I was his own flesh and blood and it didn't occur to me that he wasn't.  I got into the backseat of my mom's car when she broke the news.

I almost had a grasp on what it was at that point and I knew I would never see grandpa Holly again.

I was 12 or 13 when I attended the funeral of a child my age.  His parents purchased a motorcycle for him, he was in an accident and didn't make it through.  I was not close to him but I went to the funeral because he was a kid my age and I did know him.  I cried as the mother screamed "No! Not my baby!"  I knew then, that death isn't just for old people, it's for children too.

When my grandmother passed away was one of the worst moments of my life.  A piece of me was now missing and to this day, life truly isn't the same.  I loved her so very much.  I never knew the amount of pain she was in.  That was kept as a secret on her request which to this day I still resent. 

Knowing my husband's mother has given me a whole new perspective on this whole thing called death.  She had hernias, diabetes and probably a bunch of other issues.  She has been ill ever since I have known her.  I can only imagine someone with holes, in which you can see the insides, as being in pain.

Last week my husband, children and I made a trip to Ohio to visit my mother-in-law.  She was having kidney failure and she was placed on dialysis.  I looked at her and she was gasping for air.   She recognized me, I could see it in her eyes, and she said my husband's name.  My husband talked to the nurse he was more tuned in to his mom I was tuned in to the staff at the hospital.  She shiffted her eyes like she wanted to say something but couldn't.  I think she knew I saw the tears she was trying so hard to hold back.  I could tell she didn't think my mother-in-law would make it.

We went back to my sister-in-law's house and in the middle of the night my mother-in-law was on life support.  Now, I knew we should prepare ourselves for the worst.  Two days she was to be on the machines and then we would see if she would make it.  It wasn't even two days when she passed blood in her stool and then we all knew it was time.

Fourteen hours waiting for a phone call saying she passed away.  I spent hours crying because I knew she had to be in pain.  When she finally passed away I was relieved because she wasn't in pain any longer. 

We went to the funeral and I had already cried so much that I had kind of accepted it.  I could now only cry for my children who had yet to accept that grandma is in a better place.  Tears poured down the face of my oldest child and I could do nothing but hold him.  My youngest waved goodbye and said "I miss you grandma." and I knew the image of him waving goodbye will be etched in memory forever.

The amount of pain she was in made me understand my own grandmother's pain.  The fact that we experienced a haunting after she passed made me realize that I can call on any of my loved ones and they will be there.  It gave me a new perspective on this life and death thing.  My mother-in-law loved me and I loved her and I will miss hearing her stories about flatulence and other odd bodily functions.