Thursday, January 31, 2013

She's gone

I guess this entry won't be as funny as some of the others.  It's a shame, because my uncle was over here tonight telling all sorts of tales of time-travel, teleportation, and aliens on earth, but at around 8:23 Mountain Standard Time, my mother died.  Now I don't feel so much like musing over my uncle's beliefs.

She was doing the whole death rattle thing.  All day.  She managed to swallow a few times and stop it, so I thought she didn't have long, but that she might have another day or two.  I guess not.  She gurgled a bit, but I think it just slowly reduced the oxygen in her body until she stopped breathing regularly and then stopped completely.

My brother and I were both with her and holding onto her when it happened.  I guess you couldn't ask for much more than that.  I was going to make an Arkansas joke about being able to combine dying during sex and holding onto your family members to really get the ideal death scenario, but I'll just tell you about the joke instead of making it.  The first writerly thing they tell you is "Show; Don't Tell," so I don't know how much writer I've really got in me.

Now she's lying on the bed next to me.  I sat here most all day and it just seems natural to keep doing it.  I guess we should call the hospice people soon.  We'll do it, but first we're going to let her doggies say goodbye.

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