dear 2019

..the best and worst year of my life. I would find myself getting closer to my mom than I had been since the moment I was born. Herbert Wall said to my mother back then, you will love this one the most. I’m not sure if I deserved to be loved more, or that Herbert was just able to see into the future and knew I would need more love.. My mom lavished an unconditional love on me that would get me through my darkest times and I am determined to rely on that to get me through her passing. My greatest legacy will always be that I was Martha Ann’s son. God gave her to me and knew how important she would be to my life. We had a bond that others could see and feel and it was right and good that I was here and able to care for her and be here to pass her from my arms into the arms of God and through the gates of heaven.

When 2018 came and went I was unaware that the new year would include the pain and the anguish of losing my best friend, my base and foundation. Looking back has always been my preferred method of feeling and that may have to change in 2020 if I am to survive the loss I am unable to put into words.

When I could help her to the couch to sit for a while we held hands and talked about a lot of important things till we would both fall asleep still holding hands. I studied her hands and her swollen arthritic fingers and paper-thin skin. All of the life and love those hands had given were there to see and they remain one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life. Her soft pretty eyes and the smooth skin on her face that all the nurses talked about being so beautiful, all of those memories are still with me as I sit here. 2019 tried to break me and may still yet, but this year will always be the one I witnessed the greatest love and dignity I have ever known. The dignity and strength of a woman so full of life and love for everyone she met were right here with me and nothing can ever take that away.

2020 has yet to begin and already it has a get out of jail free card at least for my life in that nothing can ever hurt me like 2019 did. But then nothing can ever be as sweet and loving as those times during the worst of my mom’s illness near the end where she reached out not for comfort for herself, but to comfort those around her who were worried and hurting. She took my hands and told me what she knew I needed to do to get to the place where she was going and where she would be waiting to see me again. I promised her I would and I am doing just that.

Many good friends have tried to push me in this direction or that, get me here or there and added their advice for how I need to handle the emotional struggles I’m going through, but I know me better than anyone else and I will go through all of this at my own pace and in my own way just as I have always done even though this is a very different thing and much deeper than I could have imagined.

I appreciate those who offer care and concern the only way they know how and I even appreciate the ones who have done and said absolutely nothing. I know everyone’s names and although I may forget where I put my keys, I will never forget the names of those who were here and the names of those who were not.

So long 2019.

2020, go ahead and take your best shot-

the man I used to be

Working (for news) was always my go-to on New Years eve and one of the best revenue nights of the year being that idiots seem to be out in force on this night. While others say so-long to a year gone by and ring in the new one, I spent my time getting to and shooting video of those who thought they were invincible. Happy that those days are over for me and I will be spending my NYE right where God intendeds me to spend the rest of my time here on earth, alone, hopefully safe, and with peace of mind.

The past two nights I’ve managed to sleep some and had dreams instead of nightmares indicating the deepest rem sleep had been reached. An improvement I’d say, I’ll take it. Nothing about 2019 to celebrate and 2020 looks terrifying so there’s that. The best I can hope for is an acceptance that this is how life is going to be now and then finding a way to live it in peace and by myself. Caregivers will know about this transition going from all your energy and efforts twenty-four seven going to another life and then overnight your focus is turned completely off of those efforts and doesn’t know where to go. Do I take care of me now is the obvious first question and that feels selfish and uncomfortable. It’s taken me six now going on seven weeks to decide to find a Dr and deal with my own health and even now I have a tough time caring a lot about the outcome.

Older people have always captured my attention but never the way they do now since taking care of my mom. The elderly devise all sorts of ways to manage to get bottle caps open, stirring things well enough, seeing the right oven temps, walking, getting in and out of the shower, reaching for things the list is long and it is entirely heartbreaking. My mom was having trouble swallowing her food and little did I know this was the beginning of what would eventually take her from me. I would cut up her food in tiny little bites and she would try but… Anyway, the list of things one can do to help older people get by on their own is a long one and I feel deeply sad for those who have no one to help them do these things and then just have to give up trying.

The physical downturn leads to a mental downturn and I did my best to help my mom avoid all of that by keeping things she used at eye level, pre-opening all bottle caps and clearing pathways for her to get around with her walker in the house. Probably the best thing I did was to install grip bars in her bathroom and vanity area. She loved them and they enabled her to safely do things she was struggling to do before. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND those for anyone elderly you may know who doesn’t have them. They are worth their weight in solid gold for those who need them.

Mom’s walker. When mom began having some trouble walking she hesitated using the walker that was right here ready to go. Ours is the one with four wheels and a seat (please don’t get the ones with no wheels or only 2 wheels) she could sit down on if she got tired. Once she agreed with my insisting that she try it, she was hooked and it was a godsend. It’s sitting in her third bedroom back there with the fuzzy socks I wrapped around the handles because they made her hands hurt. I want to donate it to someone in need of one and haven’t found that person yet but I’m looking.

Don’t feel much like writing today and it kind of feels like it might not be the greatest day. I’m not bothered by people celebrating a new year coming but it does remind me that mine will always be remembered as the greatest loss of my entire life. There is nothing left to lose but my own life from here on out and in an odd way that is somewhat comforting knowing nothing will ever be as devastating to my time here on earth. The hardest thing for me to do now is to learn how to live with a shattered heart.

My sweet precious mom, I love and miss you so terribly much-

five in the morning

A gentle cool breeze and light rain and it's six weeks now today since I saw you look at me with your soft sweet eyes. A month and a half since I talked to you and held your face and hands. The days go by like massive heavy anvils on my shoulders. "So how are you doing," I still get asked which suggests to me that some think I should be further along in the grief process while the fear in me that I may never get beyond this looms and grows. My precious mom, can you hear me when I cry out your name and is it you who wipes away my tears when I can no longer see? I am truly broken.

My health is suffering now and my mind wanders aimlessly over scenarios of a future where loneliness and sadness share the majority of every breath that I take. I am certain this way of life is not sustainable and I question how much longer God will allow it to continue. My mom probably worried for me much the same way while I spent my time trying to keep her alive and as well as I could, her anguish over what she knew it would do to me must have been excruciating and deeply painful to her heart but God needed her with him and she had done all a human being could do to prepare me to live a life without her here. So why then do I wander through the house room to room and then the other house with no purpose? What is my plan for the new me who looks back from the mirror and doesn't recognize the person he sees? The me I am afraid of, the me I do not know. So I am to map out a plan and a future for someone who seems to be on a collision course with a future consumed with sadness? What does that kind of future look like I ask myself as I lay awake in the silence and darkness.

In the first few weeks, I stayed wrapped up in getting things done that had to be done. In stark contrast the past couple of weeks as a lot of those things have been put in the hands of others more qualified and are being taken care of, I'm not so much in a hurry anymore. It's becoming clear to me that when it's all done there will be nothing left for me to do but to live this life I'm not ready for. A life full of mindnumbing silence when I need to talk with my best friend. Unending days when things I want to share only with her go unshared forced deep inside and are then forgotten and meaningless over time. Her laughter, her soft gentle voice, brushing her hair, it's killing me just thinking I will never experience those again. I have recordings of her sweet voice I cannot listen to. Photos that have me at the point of breaking apart.

The rumbling and piercing silence is brutal. I started her car today and forgot about it so it stayed running a long time. Went outside to watch the soft rain and began to get emotional. It begins with this mass inside my stomach and it moves up towards my throat and into my eyes. It's inescapable and cannot be stopped. Will this be my every day now? Why would I want this and how will I avoid it? I'm at a point in my life where I can have just about anyTHING I want, go anyPLACE I can dream of. I'm able to work or not work and not worry about it. I've reached the place I always thought I wanted to be but without my mom its a cold and lonely unlivable place. Nothing like I thought it would be and I would trade it all for one more minute with my mom to hold her and talk to her and hear her voice again.

Things and places are to be shared with those who make your heart warm enough to beat. If you are reading any of this and wonder why it is I go on and on about this loss that is "just like the one you had and got through," think of it this way for just one minute. Tomorrow morning you will wake up and get out of bed and there will be no one there. It will be dark and silent and there will be no one to call and no one to talk to. If you eat you will eat by yourself at a table with chairs for others but it's just going to be you now and you alone. Every single person you have ever known who made you feel alive and your soul sing, your husband or wife, your kids, grandkids, parents, friends, grandparents, EVERYONE who made you happy who supported you and fed you and made you proud of yourself and feel love and affection, tomorrow morning you will wake up and all of those people are gone and they are never coming back. Think about those faces, those eyes, their smiles and laughter, talks, and sharing your life and theirs, gone and gone forever. Your life as you know it today with all of those loved ones involved in everything you do and are, think that tomorrow morning you will wake up and every single one of those people is gone. Gone forever and never coming back.


That is what has happened to me. The difference perhaps in my circumstance and most other people is that all of those important people who kept me alive and wanting to do well and keep going were all inside just one person. That is how I have lived my life. I have some great friends who have stepped up and some family who check-in and would do anything for me if there was something they could do but there isn't. No one and nothing can fill the void that has been left by my mom's passing. No amount of time is going to lessen the silence and despair that I feel. God and only God can help me now and I'm reaching out to be sure..

Meantime, I will write..   

Mother's Day #3 - Sunday December 08, 2019

https://medium.com/@mwzuke/mothers-day-3-sunday-december-8-2019-7am-978f1dc208ca?