The Longest Goodbye

This is what I said it felt like when describing what we have gone through with my grandmother. For four years, we've watched her slip away. First, it was crippling anxiety and panic attacks. Second, it was her losing the ability to drive. Third was bedsores that became open wounds. Next, it was her getting up out of bed and falling and breaking a few vertebrae in her back. After that, it was her becoming bedridden. Now, it's hard for her to communicate clearly. She also has some trouble swallowing.

We've felt all of the emotions of grief. When my Papa finally decided to let Hospice come in and help, the nurses thought several times she was going to pass away in a matter of days. All of the family came in to say goodbye.

She didn't pass away like they thought she would. She's been on Hospice for almost nine months. I miss my Granny coming to visit me. Even though we live within walking distance, I still miss her coming to check on me. Now, the tables have turned and I get on my electric scooter to go check on her and my Papa.

I miss her smile. This sickness has taken away her ability to smile. I miss her being healthy. She always said she wanted to lose some weight, but she never wanted it to go like this.

I miss her funny jokes. One time she wore some black glasses with a big fake nose. I kept them because they remind me of her.

I miss seeing her work in the garden. Every year, my Papa plants tomatoes, sweet potatoes, okra green beans, and corn. Granny would always help him pick the food and then spend all day in the kitchen canning it so they could have fresh vegetables for winter. She made the BEST green beans and corn! Now, my Papa still does a garden, it's just smaller.

When my Memaw died, it was a shock. I felt like I didn't get to say all the things I wanted to. She was ripped from our lives due to COVID. No one was prepared for her death because she was healthy. It was a short goodbye, and I am still grieving her loss.

With my Granny, I've gotten more time. I said when she got sick, "I wish I had come down here more when the kids were little and she cooked all kinds of surprises for them." So, since I have the gift of time, I make time to go down there once every few weeks, even when I am in excruciating back pain because I don't want to have any regrets. I don't remember if I told my Memaw I loved her before she passed, so I made sure to tell my Granny.

I wish I could hug her, but clasping her hands will have to do because I can't reach over the bed while I'm in my scooter without falling over. The main concern I have is not hurting my Granny. She's so fragile now. 

This morning, my Granny met Jesus. I will love her forever.

Love People Anyway

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

If the last few months have taught me anything, it's love people anyway. Go out of your way to make people feel loved and appreciated. Listen to their silly stories. Be inconvenienced. Take the trip. Make memories because you really don't know when it will be your last opportunity.

Life can change in an instant. And you may have done nothing to deserve the hand that you were dealt, but remember, the people around you didn't deserve it either. They were merely caught in the crossfire of someone else's pain.

I finally realize the depth of what Martina McBride sang in her song when she said, 

"You can spend your whole life building
Something from nothin'
One storm can come and blow it all away
Build it anyway

You can love someone with all your heart
For all the right reasons
In a moment they can choose to walk away
Love 'em anyway."

I heard that from a place deep inside of me the other week when I was confronted with unimaginable pain. I even asked someone, "How did we get here?"

I know through it all, I will NEVER regret choosing to love. I will never regret being a safe place for others. I will never regret choosing the right way over the easy way.

An Empty Celebration

Today is my niece's 7th birthday, and we didn't get to celebrate with her today. My mom made a cake just in case she came.

From the time I woke up, I was confronted with the reality that she wasn't there. The empty house that was so still the silence was deafening.

When we finally did decide to get out of the house, there was a little girl at the restaurant with us who was celebrating her birthday. She had a cute little pink headband that proudly showed everyone she was the birthday girl.

I had to choke back tears at the table as I remembered we SHOULD have been celebrating my niece. As the little girls laughed and smiled, I couldn't help but see my precious niece's face. I hurt in a way I didn't think I could today.

Then something else happened that was another slap in the face. I said, "God, you see this! I know you say forgive seventy times seven, but I don't know how much more I can take."

Forever Forward

FOREVER FORWARD

I heard this phrase in a song last week, and it stuck with me. It's easy to choose to go forward for a day, a week, a month, maybe even a year.

But choosing to forever go forward takes a deep level of commitment. Forever forward means looking adversity in the eye and saying, "You will not win." Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. Because people who choose forever forward are not bound by circumstances, attitudes, or people.

They choose to continually go forward because to stop means you die. To quit growing means you are stagnant, stuck in one place. Like a female veteran friend of mine recently said, "Stagnant waters don't heal or nourish."

Get up out of the pain of yesterday and go forward! Whatever that may look like for you. Make better decisions. I can't guarantee hardship won't be there when you wake up, but choosing forever forward means awakening the lion within you. And staying committed to doing that as long as it takes.

Forever forward means looking at pain and saying, "You may have held me down for a season, but I will summon the strength and grace needed to press past this. Soon, that obstacle that once seemed insurmountable will now be a stepping stone to help others.

Swimming in Emotions

Joining the weekly prompt over at Mama Kat's Writing Workshop.

Swimming against the current. Utterly exhausted from trying to keep myself afloat. Grief and chaos are all around. When will peace break through these waters? How do I keep going? Putting one arm in front of the other, I feel the water. Something so fluid and free, but my mind is heavy, like an anchor trying to pull me down. Willing me to stay rooted in the pain of yesterday and all the days before. 

I can't give in. I won't give in. The minute I stop trying is the minute I am consumed. This is not how the story ends.  It's just a chapter. Like Dory in the movie "Nemo," I'll just keep swimming. I plunge myself into living. Feeling. Breathing. Moving. 

I will reach the other side of the bank by turning my pain into purpose. 

An Empty Seat at the Table

Sorry I haven't written much. Life has been crazy. My grandmother passed away from covid pneumonia on September 9, 2021.

Today I feel like I can finally write something that has been on my heart since that week.

An empty seat at the table

I look around and you're not there

Bustling about making sure everyone is taken care of

We are all gathered around the table that we've shared so many meals at, so many laughs

But there's an empty seat at the table

It's the seat you should be in

You should be here

But you're not and it's not fair

My heart aches at the thought of all the things you'll miss

The emptiness I feel is too big for words

Sometimes all I have are tears

But tears won't fill that empty chair

Tears won't bring you back

I just pray that every day we have left we continue to make you proud

By loving a little deeper

And speaking a little sweeter to those around us

Like the preacher so beautifully said at your funeral, you embodied Galatians 5:22...the fruits of the Spirit

You gave until you couldn't give anymore

All to see smiles on our faces

So the torch has been passed to us

Now we have to do the same and more

To leave this world and the people in it and little better than we found it

I love you beyond words, Memaw!

I Will Not Be Moved

I'm tired. Tired of the struggle day after day. I feel like I'm in the in between space of growth and everything that led me to this point.

I wish I was never in the wheelchair. Getting out of it for good is one of the hardest things I've ever done, but I am determined to do it. Even if that means crying while doing my exercises. 
I haven't given up, but I am tired. I need God's breath to breathe on me again. 

This isn't meant to be a depressing post, but just an honest account of where I'm at.
To win the mental battle, I have to constantly celebrate the small victories. Just the other day, I walked 7 times instead of 6 in my hallway at home.

I'm challenging myself to do more and go further. I told my mom, "It seems like I have such a long way to go to get to where I want to be." She always reminds me, "Look at how long you were down for." I was bedridden 2-3 years, but I've been in the wheelchair for almost 14 years.

I just have to steel my shoulders and plant my feet firmly on the ground. I refuse to be moved by how I feel. I refuse to be moved by what I see.