Things to remember

I keep thinking about things I should hold on to, you know, trinkets 'to remember' her by. We're not really an heirloom type of family. I don't think there's anything really old or special that's been passed down amongst us. At first, when I thought about that it made me a bit sad. When I considered it more I started to ask myself what kind of thing I would want to have passed down to me and I came up with nothing. I got to thinking about how shallow an heirloom is and how many things, tangible things, I have already in my possession that were passed to me from my mother.

I will never mix a cake batter or pull a sheet of cookies from the oven without thinking of her. I hear her telling me how to measure flour (with a spoon and butter knife) every time I bake anything. Baking is one of my favorite things to do, and that joy is directly related to hours spent helping my mom in the kitchen.

I wish I'd learned sooner, but mom taught me to sew last year and I've loved it ever since. I know I'll never thread a bobbin or cut a pattern without her in my head.

These hobbies are shallow things too compared to the multitude of other lessons I learned from my mom. How to love. How to be compassionate. How to be selfless for the good of the people you love most. Good humor in the face of sorrow and adversity. If my mom wasn't who she is I know that I wouldn't have the skills or strength to get through this grief. And I know that I will pass those same gifts to the people I love. So I guess that's our family's heirloom... the lessons we learn from each other. Pass that down.

Unreal

I sleep too much. It's really a problem. I've slept 12-15 hours at a stretch pretty much every night this week... and last. Yes, I'm unemployed and that allows me to catch as many z's as I want to, but who wants to sleep 15 hours straight? It's causing me some serious physical discomfort. My jaw hurts more than usual and my ribs always feel bruised. I'm pretty sure those things are both caused by spending too many hours laying down in bed. When I say "at a stretch" I mean all at once, but I do wake up during those hours. The last 3-5 of those hours aren't great sleep and are interrupted with many opportunities to wake up... but I don't... I keep sleeping. As bad as the sleep may be, and as ready as my body might be to wake up, my head just isn't in it. My brain isn't ready for another day of this unreal heap of bullshit.. so I sleep, and sleep and sleep until I am so phsically uncomfortable that I absolutely can't fall asleep again. I feel like this is the first crack in the wall. My big toe dipped into the downward spiral of... well... losing my mind.
I miss my mom. I miss her how she was. I miss the assumption that she'd pretty much always be there. I miss her being the strong one. I miss her giving me crap all the time. I feel like she lost so much while we weren't looking. Gone are the days of picking up and just going shopping with her, or spending an long afternoon at Cory and Kerrie's house. Not just gone, but gone forever. No more Christmas cookies or Thanksgiving meals prepared with my mom in the kitchen. Last December, a mere 9 months ago, my mom helped me finish a queen sized quilt for Grandma. This involved hours of sitting and squatting and crawling around on the hard floor tacking the quilt pieces together by hand. This will be the last craft my mom will ever help me with. And less than a year later she can hardly get to the bathroom on her own.
Honestly though, the worst part of my day is when I'm reminded that she's in there still. The same fiesty, energetic, amazing woman is still in her wreck of a body. Would it be worse if she were also losing her mind? Maybe not. Ignorance is bliss right? But she's just got to sit there in her ever weakening body and... live. I don't want my mom to die, but I especially don't want my mom to suffer. I sleep 15 hours because when I'm awake I'm contemplating what it's like inside her head. She's lost pretty much EVERYTHING to this disease and when I put aside my own grief and consider hers it squeezes the breath out of me. She acts strong and she says she's more worried about everyone but herself, but it's got to be so terrifying and so.... fucking SAD.

I don't want my mom to die.