Here’s the last day of what has been, well not the actual worst month of my and my family members’ lives, but pretty far up there. I’d say it probably makes the top five just by the shear amount of crap that happened. Now, most of the stuff that’s monetary is technically just inconvenient for the moment, I can handle with the help of a great support system (thank-you, thank-you my support system 🙂 and a year from now it will be a bitter memory. It’s just stressful. (Money stuff is stressful!)
But there are the other things, the things we can’t undo, the things we can’t fix. My grandma died, grandpa had a stroke (they got him to the hospital and he’s out now and seems fine, but that was hella scary), and a few days ago, our sugar glider Chia died from pneumonia.
Chia’s the bigger one on the left. The little one was Ivy. She died from pneumonia last winter. My mom was devastated. Now with Chia gone the same month her mom died and her dad had a stroke, my poor mother’s reached the end of what she can deal with. And she still has to deal with the will and cleaning out grandma’s storage and such. She wants to go visit her dad but can’t afford to because of all the stuff hitting at once right after the holiday spending.
So, I’m wallowing in my own sorrows, but then I call my mom and brother and suddenly my problems are on the back burner. You realize that while your stuff is stressful, you can deal with it, you have a plan and you’re moving forward. There’s a solution and you just have to implement it.
I lost my grandma and I still cry over her loss, but my mom lost her mom. She’s terrified she’s going to lose her dad soon because of all his health problems, and she just lost her pet of 10 years. I don’t know what to say to her. I don’t have anything besides what people are telling me. That this too shall pass, there are always good things in life to focus on. Stuff from the religious like God doesn’t give us more than we can handle, to the crude and practical like shit falls sometimes, get a raincoat.
I hang onto my family even though they’re far away, my friends, and my writing. My family needs me now, I’m trying to be there for them to hang onto even if it’s just over the phone.
So my dear readers, I have a question for you. How have you dealt with people dying? What did you do to make yourself feel better, what did people say that actually helped? I’m a fixer, I want to help fix my mom (as in, help her start to feel better and hang on through all this), and I’m not sure how. Any advice or just words of encouragement I can parrot would be greatly appreciated.
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