So, so tired

The doctors have been telling me everyday for the past three days "could be any minute now". The nurses keep telling me "could be any minute now, you wanted to know baby, go hold her hand" and I would sit at her bedside for hours on end, 10 hours straight Monday night, 6 hours straight Tuesday night, all day long yesterday and when I'm not in a chair at her bedside, I'm on the couch less than 3 feet away, listening, trying to catch a moments rest before I fall over. Her stats go up, her stats bottom out, her stats go up, her stats bottom out. I'm grateful for every moment with her, but, I'm not sure how much longer I can hold out on this roller coaster ride. I feel like she's died 10 times over already.

She didn't want to be on life support because she didn't want to linger like this. Hell she's only 62, still so relatively young. But I feel everyday, the both of us growing weaker. I had to talk to a grief counselor yesterday because I began to feel guilty because some part of me selfishly began to wish her on because I'm just so physically and emotionally exhausted. The grief counselor told me that was pretty textbook, but if it was the other way around and I lost her suddenly, I'd be wishing for more time, and she was right. Nurses, doctors and counselors have asked me if I'm getting out of the hospital at all, I told them no, she made me promise to be here holding her hand when her time came and I'm determined to keep that promise, erego, I'm paranoid to leave her for even the shortest amount of time. In hospice or Palliative care they tell you to tell your loved one that it's ok to let go, I've told her it's ok to let go...the entire family has expressed their love and told her her it's ok to let go, we know she's tired, we know she's been in pain for a long time. But she keeps fighting. I wish she had this much fight in her months ago when I was trying to get her to go to the hospital, or at least up out of bed and moving around some, right up to the moment she told me I was "picking on her".

When someone is in the process of dying they develop what is called Cheyne Stokes respiration, which is an abnormal breathing pattern that is categorized by a series of sometimes deeper and faster breathing, and then a long pause, lasting anywhere from 10 seconds to as long as a minute. She's stopped breathing so many times, I've had to train myself not to jump up immediately and run to her if I'm not already at her bedside, but each one of these episodes makes my own heart stop a little.

Monday night (I think it was Monday, my days have all run together, my mind is barely working at this point...I stood on an elevator with only 2 buttons yesterday for 5 minutes, before it dawned on me which floor I needed to get to) anyway, Monday night she had an old GI bleed begin to express itself. My mothers biggest fear was suffocating (mine was losing my mother), that night she started bleeding, expressing old blood from her bowels and from her stomach up her throat, she was choking on her own blood. Unconscious, on her back, aspirating in her own fluids, suffocating. I kept telling her over and over "I'm so sorry Mama, I did everything I could so you wouldn't have to go through this", because I've made it clear to the doctors from the onset, that suffocation was her biggest fear, and they've been damn good about making sure she could breathe comfortably. Thank god the nurse was able to suction enough of it out of her mouth that she didn't go that night, like that, I was begging God to show her mercy, and though I didn't feel it at the time, I guess he did, because that would have been a horrible way to go. Again, that was one of the nights the nurse told me "I think she's done baby" so I sat there, I lay my head on the side of her bed, sobbing, and put her hand on my face, so I could feel like she was comforting me until the doctors came the next morning to explain to me what had happened, because they seemed to have left the massive internal bleeding part out when they were explaining to me the possible series of events associated with her death.

I'm just, so so tired and I feel selfish for wanting the hardest thing I've ever had to face to be over. But I feel in my heart, she's got something so much better waiting for her. I just want her to be at peace. I don't want her to struggle and hurt and be in discomfort. So all I can do is pray for her peace while simultaneously wanting every second I can have with her, and a long undisturbed nap.