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Blogs by Elizabeth Proske
No Regrets 2/14/2014 7:47:46 PM
. Mom is gone now.
After six weeks of watching her suffer, six weeks of being strong and cheerful for her in the hospital room while sobbing in the hallway because it hurt me so bad to see her in pain, when she finally passed, I felt...nothing.
I'd already rejoiced when she gave her life to Christ about a month before her death, I'd already grieved when I realized that she wasn't going to pull through this time, and I'd already said everything that needed to be said before she died. So what was left to feel?
Like King David after his son died, I cleaned myself up and calmly started handling all the things that needed to be taken care of, like filing paperwork, making arrangements, etc. I'm still sad that my mother suffered so much before leaving this life, but otherwise, I'm okay.
Most of my peace comes from the knowledge that she is truly in a better place, where there is no pain, no weakness, no fear. (Thank you, fellow author Connie Faust, for your encouragement in that regard) So the little pang I get when I drive past her favorite restaurant goes away quickly – no, she's not missing her double bacon cheeseburger, she has something so much better. No, she's not missing out on cuddling her kitties, she's surrounded by infinite love. No, she didn't miss the traditional flowers on Valentine's Day, because where she is must be indescribably more beautiful than anything on this earth. So, why should I weep for her now?
The other thing that keeps me from being tormented by the “if only”s is that as I go through her things, organizing her belongings to give them away, I keep finding little reminders that, even though I was far from a perfect daughter, I did okay by my mother.
Things like the grab bars I installed in random spots because she was too stubborn to use her walker. The labels with big lettering that I placed over the buttons on her TV, so she could easily turn it on to watch her favorite soap even when I wasn't there. The package of tamales in the refrigerator that I had regularly gone across town to buy because no local stores carried that particular brand, and it was the only kind she liked. The countless rumpled receipts from Starbucks, where I would go several times a week to get her caffeine fix, even though I never ordered anything for myself. And the neatly folded stack of towels that we had washed and put away together the day before her stroke, since she was unable to make her own way to the washroom but she didn't like the way I did her laundry.
Just stupid little things that don't even amount to much, but they make me feel like she knew I loved her.
It wasn't always easy, because she resented that she needed my help. She told me many times to leave and not come back. I would get angry and snap at her when she said that, but every time I walked out her door, I would say to her, “I'll see you tomorrow.” And I did, even knowing that sometimes she would still spewing out her anger the next day. God gets all the credit for my persistence, because I wanted to give up so many times, to just walk away and not look back, but God wouldn't let me do it.
And I'm so grateful now that God gave me the strength to hang on, to keep loving her no matter what, because it is a wonderful, freeing thing to have no regrets.
