Growing Pains

When I loved myself enough, I began leaving whatever wasn’t healthy. This meant people, jobs, my own beliefs and habits anything that kept me small. My judgement called it disloyal. Now I see it as self-loving.

– Kim McMillen

Staying Present

Someone wrote about their response to grief "I have to stay in the present time or I can't hold it together"
That about sums it up. Tonight makes it 6 weeks since Mom died. Right about this hour I was asked if I wanted to maintain DNR for her? And after learning all the facts and seeing her rapid decline within that hour and a half after I arrived at 8pm, I said yes maintain DNR.
They turned off all the machines and monitors 2 hrs from now at 11:30pm, at 11:40pm, she died.
Every Tuesday since then has been the worst day of every week. 
I miss her so much

Deconstructing Mom's Place

It's been hard slowly deconstructing my Mother's home. On the one hand every time a family or friend takes one of Mom's things I feel good they're taking a little of Mom home with them. However, it's bittersweet to see my Mom's home becoming less and less hers. With each picture I take off the wall or small piece of furniture is out of place, it hurts. I do it in small weekly dosages. Every Saturday afternoon I'm here. I have 2 to 3 weekends left to finish with it all. It will be hard to say goodbye to a home I've been coming to for almost 14 years! Just 1 year longer than I in NYC.
Oh well as Mom would say "J....  it is what it is"

Grief update

I managed to get back to sleep this morning for a few hours...
This coming Tuesday will be 4 weeks since Mom died.  I have been extremely antisocial at work last week and know I'll be so again this week. I don't want to be bothered by anything beyond my job.  I don't want to deal with the co workers and all the extra stuff that I do.
I find my mind to be like a broken record especially when I'm alone or sleeping my mind plays endless loops of Mom. I try to think of other things but to no avail. The crying spells comes and goes. I don't mind,  I'm not going to try to bury my grief, only live thru it.
My Mom's cat Callie is now mine. It makes me happy that Mom knows her cat is with me and will be taken care of for the rest of her kitty life.
I also feel tired and achy all the time. With the dark winter months ahead, I'm worried I'll fall into a major depressive episode.
I'm not sure why I wrote all this but I needed to vent.

The Logistics of Death

I have this month of October to go through Mom's things and what to put into storage etc etc..

I got a lot done at Mom's place yesterday with her kitchen and bathroom. Plus my childhood best friend Paula along with Uncle David made the afternoon bearable. It's so hard to be in her home and she's not there. And painful to slowly deconstruct her home. She lived there for almost 14 years! This was one of my homes and I know with each passing weekend,  I will have to say goodbye to my Mom's place.

Sitting on my Mom's couch yesterday made me ache for her presence so much. We spent many moments in her living room talking, eating, watching tv or movies.  I miss her so much.

Woke up at 5:15am with thoughts of Mom.. Hope to get back to sleep some in a while.

I am also ashamed that I never knew the depth of my love for my Mom until she was gone.