So when I was a very little girl I lost my biological grandmother and eventually my grandfather remarried a wonderful woman. She always loved to tell the story of the day I looked up and asked, "can I call you grandma?" and she was as much my grandma as anyone could be! But I grew up and my grandfather died and I moved away and had a baby of my own. I kept in touch with cards and letters and visited whenever I came "home". Eventually I moved back to this area, within an hour of where she was. I visited, I took my mom to visit (who would never have gone on her own), I took my new baby girl. As time went on, she moved to a nursing home. I still went to visit, I took my kids, by then two little ones. About three years ago when I was pg with number four, she fell. My mom, the kids and I went to the hospital to see her. She was so out of it and loopy on the drugs, she didnt know who we were or even that we were there. The time before that at the nursing home she was starting to lose her memory, she knew who I was in person, but when I called on the phone, she had no idea. she showed my pictures of myself as a child but didnt recall who it was etc. Anyway, her daughter was at the hospital and they didnt know if she would be going back tothe same place or not so we gave her all our contact infor to let us know. She didnt. For three years I have not seen my grandmother. I have called the nursing home but they wont give out her forwarding address. We (me, my mom, aunt and uncle, cousins) have all sent lettets and cards to the last address we had, but they came back. We had lost all contact. We didnt know where she was.
My grandmother had a biological great granddaughter who was about my age. Growing up we were pretty close because she, I and my brother all spend just about every weekend togather at our grandparents home. We went to church togather (to my grandparents church) though we lived in diffrent towns and went to diffretn schools. In the summers, we would visit each other even when we werent at grandma and granddaddys. But during highschool she fought with her dad and stepmom and moved in with her mother, in new hampshire! We still wrote letters all the way through the births of our first children (who are now 17 both my ds and her dd) but somewhere as both of us had problems with our respective marriages and moved around a lot, we lost touch. I hadnt heard from her in years. Last I knew she had three girls and she and her husband had seperated.
Last month she found me on facebook!!! I was so happy! She and her husband actually worked out all thier issues and they were celebrated like thier 20th anniversery or something! Her three girls are teenagers. My son is a teen, Ive since divorced, remarried and have three much younger children.
I of course asked her about Grandma and she put me in touch with her stepmother who still lives near here. She contacted me via facebook and email to say that she is so glad they found us (I passed on contact info for my mom and aunt) becuase grandma is not expected to make it through the month (may)! I asked where she was and if it would be ok for me to go, she said it was ok but said she thinks she is a little girl again, she wont know me and most of the time stares into space and if you try and make her focus on you gets very agitated and upset. But I made plans to go with my mom and the day before my mom threw a holy fit about me taking my kids with me.
Now, I woh and on my days off, even if I have someone who could watch my kids, I dont. Becuase I dont see them as much as I want to as it is. Besides, I feel we are a family, she would want to see them. At any rate, if she didnt even they know they were in the room, how could they possible upset her? Besides, she LOVED children and even if she didnt know WHO they were I stil lthought she'd like the company. But at this same time I had a cousin and a sister with medical crisis whos lives were inthe balance as well. Plus work and home stuff, I just could.not.deal.with.my.mother. so I canceled the trip planning to go another time without her. I almost went that very day but figured if I canceled with her then went that same day anyway she'd be very very upset. But somehow with this and that going on, I never went. Saturday I got a message that her kidneys had shut down and her heart was failing, they said three hours to three days......
We were so busy all weekend and had puppies that were dying (momma had 12 pups and only 10 nipples and the little ones werent getting to eat) we tried dropper feeding but by sunday night had lost three anyway. Monday I had a training at work in which I was a presentor so I didnt feel I could take off. I made up my mind last night to take today off work and go see her. Of course I woke to an email saying she passed away late last night.
But I feel like, I HAD time, I HAD notice, I KNEW at the begining of May that she wasnt suppose to make it to June. I knew saturday that three days was the max she had left. Why didnt I jsut GO? What else was important? I will of course take off work for the funeral, but wouldnt it have been better to take off and go see her while she was alive??
My cousins stepmother says she glad I didnt go, that she was horribly bad off at the end and totally wouldnt have known me anyway and that my kids didnt need to see her like that etc etc.
But I still feel a tremendous amount of guilt. I know that her grandson and his family were there with her last night so thats good. I know she knows I love her and while I will miss her terribly, Im glad her suffering is over, becuase her granddaughter in law (my cousins stepmom) really painted a bad picture. And Im not sure my visiting would have even registered with her. When my dad was at the end like that, he wasnt aware of us or at least he didnt seem to be.
Last night I closed my eyes and saw a redish light getting smaller and smaller and thought what an odd last thing to see, must be somekind of illusion then I thought of my grandmother very strongly and felt that she was free and trying to talk to me, I told her how much I love her then I kind of starting crying thinking she is gone and sure enough this morning found out that she was.
I guess Im not really looking for replies as much as I just needed to get this out. Also, a weird thing is, I dont want to tell work for some reason. I know they will get my a card and everyone will offer sympythy but I almsot feel ike its too private and I dont want to answer anyones questions or something. I dont know.
I also have class on saturday, and in the program Im in, there are only three face to face meetings for each class (9 to 5 all day) and to miss one is to lose a letter grade! So now Im worried that the funeral will be on saturday and that makes me feel selfish and guilty all over again!
My grandmother had a biological great granddaughter who was about my age. Growing up we were pretty close because she, I and my brother all spend just about every weekend togather at our grandparents home. We went to church togather (to my grandparents church) though we lived in diffrent towns and went to diffretn schools. In the summers, we would visit each other even when we werent at grandma and granddaddys. But during highschool she fought with her dad and stepmom and moved in with her mother, in new hampshire! We still wrote letters all the way through the births of our first children (who are now 17 both my ds and her dd) but somewhere as both of us had problems with our respective marriages and moved around a lot, we lost touch. I hadnt heard from her in years. Last I knew she had three girls and she and her husband had seperated.
Last month she found me on facebook!!! I was so happy! She and her husband actually worked out all thier issues and they were celebrated like thier 20th anniversery or something! Her three girls are teenagers. My son is a teen, Ive since divorced, remarried and have three much younger children.
I of course asked her about Grandma and she put me in touch with her stepmother who still lives near here. She contacted me via facebook and email to say that she is so glad they found us (I passed on contact info for my mom and aunt) becuase grandma is not expected to make it through the month (may)! I asked where she was and if it would be ok for me to go, she said it was ok but said she thinks she is a little girl again, she wont know me and most of the time stares into space and if you try and make her focus on you gets very agitated and upset. But I made plans to go with my mom and the day before my mom threw a holy fit about me taking my kids with me.
Now, I woh and on my days off, even if I have someone who could watch my kids, I dont. Becuase I dont see them as much as I want to as it is. Besides, I feel we are a family, she would want to see them. At any rate, if she didnt even they know they were in the room, how could they possible upset her? Besides, she LOVED children and even if she didnt know WHO they were I stil lthought she'd like the company. But at this same time I had a cousin and a sister with medical crisis whos lives were inthe balance as well. Plus work and home stuff, I just could.not.deal.with.my.mother. so I canceled the trip planning to go another time without her. I almost went that very day but figured if I canceled with her then went that same day anyway she'd be very very upset. But somehow with this and that going on, I never went. Saturday I got a message that her kidneys had shut down and her heart was failing, they said three hours to three days......
We were so busy all weekend and had puppies that were dying (momma had 12 pups and only 10 nipples and the little ones werent getting to eat) we tried dropper feeding but by sunday night had lost three anyway. Monday I had a training at work in which I was a presentor so I didnt feel I could take off. I made up my mind last night to take today off work and go see her. Of course I woke to an email saying she passed away late last night.
But I feel like, I HAD time, I HAD notice, I KNEW at the begining of May that she wasnt suppose to make it to June. I knew saturday that three days was the max she had left. Why didnt I jsut GO? What else was important? I will of course take off work for the funeral, but wouldnt it have been better to take off and go see her while she was alive??
My cousins stepmother says she glad I didnt go, that she was horribly bad off at the end and totally wouldnt have known me anyway and that my kids didnt need to see her like that etc etc.
But I still feel a tremendous amount of guilt. I know that her grandson and his family were there with her last night so thats good. I know she knows I love her and while I will miss her terribly, Im glad her suffering is over, becuase her granddaughter in law (my cousins stepmom) really painted a bad picture. And Im not sure my visiting would have even registered with her. When my dad was at the end like that, he wasnt aware of us or at least he didnt seem to be.
Last night I closed my eyes and saw a redish light getting smaller and smaller and thought what an odd last thing to see, must be somekind of illusion then I thought of my grandmother very strongly and felt that she was free and trying to talk to me, I told her how much I love her then I kind of starting crying thinking she is gone and sure enough this morning found out that she was.
I guess Im not really looking for replies as much as I just needed to get this out. Also, a weird thing is, I dont want to tell work for some reason. I know they will get my a card and everyone will offer sympythy but I almsot feel ike its too private and I dont want to answer anyones questions or something. I dont know.
I also have class on saturday, and in the program Im in, there are only three face to face meetings for each class (9 to 5 all day) and to miss one is to lose a letter grade! So now Im worried that the funeral will be on saturday and that makes me feel selfish and guilty all over again!
