Nothing more, nothing less

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Mum is visibly weaker than I have ever seen her before, and we have together gone through so many sessions of chemo and radiotherapy over the past few years. Everyday, she lies there so tired and so frail in her bed, unable and somewhat unwilling to get up. She often whispers, for she is so weak her voice is but a weak whisper now, "I've never experienced anything like this in my whole life..."

When I massage her, I feel just bone and skin. Just bone and skin! I try to hide my feelings seeing her so frail and so thin by smiling as I touch her body, as I massage her sore bones and strike her aching shoulders and hips. It's a very haunting to feel the sharp bones of mum's shoulder blades and pelvis so 'visible' to the touch. It's very haunting to grab mum's arms and legs and feel how terribly fragile and thin they have become, making me wonder whether she will gain her muscle strength back again... Again, the haunting image of prisoners confined in a concentration camp comes to mind...

Today my cousin, who is a trained nurse, came to visit. She told me afterwards when we were alone that she was so shocked to see how thin mum has gotten.

"It's the look of an ill person," she said, telling me how she's seen that look on the bodies and faces of cancer patients. "The tumour will absorb all the nutrients and feed on her body. You can see it in the way how her cheeks have sunk so much. It's the sick look."

I thought for a while that her dramatic weight loss was because she's not been able to eat much (if at all!) for the past three weeks. But now I realise, not only that, but the cancer is eating her from the inside, getting bigger and stronger by draining her own body's reserves.

Later in the afternoon, the monk in the mountains called. It's been a while since I last spoke to him, partly because I know he is going through some emotional trouble himself. And literally nowadays, " no news is good news"...

He was very convened how I've been and thought my break in communisation was because I'd gone off to do my round-the-island bike tour. I wanted to when I last spoke to him about three weeks ago (time passes so gruellingly slow, yet weeks go by so miraculously quick...), but because of mum's ever deteriorating condition, the furthest I cycled to was over the city boundaries some 20 km away.

"I've not been well..." I admitted. A rare admission, as I normally don't like to complain (that's perhaps ironic as this blog is perhaps blighted with rants and complaints!!). But really, the circumstances are such that my mental and physical energies are at their lowest I have ever felt, ever.

I describes mum's condition, and how she's lost so much weight, including the latest diagnosis of cancer growing in her intestines. "It's testing..." I said. And throughout our conversation I must have used the word "testing" a dozen times. But that is perhaps the best word I can think of. Testing of my patience, testing of my sanity, testing of my forbearance, testing of my health, testing of my faith in the teachings and ways of the Dhamma...

I narrated how frustrated and angry i feel at times, and how i feel guilty for feeling that way, and he assured me it is the most normal reaction (even a self-help guide to caregiving my ex kindly sent me said so...). For such a long time, almost three months now, I've had to deal with mum's deteriorating health almost completely alone, and there does not seem to be any signs of improvement, only deterioration.

The monk said frankly, even for him when he was (and in some ways still is) dealing with the decline and eventual death of his disciple, he knew all about letting go, all about attachments and suffering, but when it comes to you, when you are faced with real, hard emotions and feelings you cannot but feel overwhelmed and helpless.

Death is hard, that cannot be forgotten, but perhaps harder still for the loved one to process is the process of seeing someone you love dearly slowly, painfully, excruciatingly, uncontrollably dying. The sense of helplessness, the despair, the frustration and fears that are coupled with someone in my circumstances are impossible to imagine, and harder even to bear. "It's like watching someone trapped in a burn house and you're unable to save him..."

I described my tiredness, my utter exhaustion and sense of deep, deep despair. "I'm doing what I can, but feel it's far too little. But really what else can I do?"

"Keep on doing what you do, and I'm sure it gives your mother great comfort..." I struggled to listen to those words, because they are so true. I know what I do, the massages, preparing heat packs, making her liquid foods and juices, rubbing her numb feet and hands, they mean so precious little, but I know, and I can see, they give mum such great comfort and reassurance. "Your way is enough, it's what you can do and nothing more or less."