I almost cried out of pure emotion
Driving onto an on-ramp with my grandmas in the backseat after dropping my Mom off to the bus station, I think. I think about my grandma’s health and how she’s been getting worse every weekend I see her. Not too many years ago she could still cook, and man could she cook the best empanadas. One year later and she can barely walk around the house. She would always walk around the house to make sure everyone was home. Another year later and she becomes a couch, laying down watching t.v. all day. What is there to do when you can’t do much?
Fast forward to about three months ago. My grandma’s Alzheimer’s is pretty bad but at least she still remembers me. My Mom will ask her who I am and she’ll say Joseph. She remembered most names but she couldn’t remember my baby cousin Andre’s name because he is too young. She would also mix up names with my mom and my aunts but she always knew my name. That made me happy.
Last week, my grandma can’t speak anymore. She can’t call my grandpa every five minutes like she always does anymore. She can’t say my name anymore. She will look at me but when I talk to her she won’t say anything back. She is a vegetable now.
Present day after my drive home, I help her and my other grandma to get inside the house. She falls out of her wheelchair on the lawn and I hold her up. She is okay but in that moment I felt she was already gone. The body I was holding up, so frail and whithered by age, was my grandma’s soul but without any life in it. She didn’t pass away, but I know she left long ago.
Watching someone die for so long has been really hard. I’ve been trying to just keep expecting it will happen soon so I won’t be wrecked by it but the more I think about it the more tears fill my eyes. So I’m sitting here bawling like a baby, writing non-stop at this point and I still haven’t clicked cancel. I guess it’s going up.
