One day in January about 20 years ago, my mom and my aunt and I went to a yarn store. My mom felt too ill to get out of the car. We all thought it was the flu. At the time, my mom was 60 years old, a very attractive, healthy and vibrant woman.
My step-dad had died about 15 years previously from unknown causes after having been in Vietnam (at age 43) after that, my mom always said she didn't think she would live too long.)
My mom went from bad to worse. She started experiencing tingling in her hands and feet, and numbness. Then she lost control of her hands and feet. She was in a wheelchair. I took her to every damn neurologist in Northern CA. No one could figure out what was wrong with her. She finally ended up coming to live with me and my husband. I hired a nurse to take care of her while we were at work. I remember one Sunday when I had to walk her to the bathroom and dropping her on the way back to her room. I'm only 5'2". I couldn't carry her. I finally got her back in bed, and I walked down the hall and started pounding on the wall and screaming, "I hate her, I hate her." Of course I did not hate my mother; I hated what had happened to her.
After a few nursing homes, I finally hired a private nurse to care for her in her home. Because while my mom was very physically disabled, mentally she was just fine.
Finally, about 14 months from the onset of her illness, she died from lung cancer, which was never diagnosed until three weeks before her death. I tried so hard to save her. I drug her to every neurologist in Northern California.
I will never forget the last time I saw her alive. It was a Saturday. I was all over my mother and her nurse about my mom getting more exercise. I just was not giving up!
My husband told me later that on that last visit that my mom had said to him "Will Elveta be okay." He apparently replied that I would be. I got a call at 4:00 a.m. the next morning that she had died. I strongly suspect that my mom died from an overdose of morphine, but that was her choice, and I am glad that she had the ability to make that choice. I am so glad that my mom did not have to linger, trapped in a body that no longer worked for her.
Her death was really painful for me, being an only child and all. I immediately left my husband a week later. I didn't want to do that prior to her death and worry my mother. Of course, I wondered around in a fog for about three months after that; having anxiety attacks, being unable to stand in lines at the grocery store; I lived on orange juice and bananas that I could buy at a convenience store.