The morning after

I sudden woke up, barely three hours after I lay down to sleep. I did not dream, I don't think, but just slept all the way through. I am still very tired, but my mind refuses to rest anymore.

Almost twelve hours after mum passed away. Memories are still fresh in my head. Memories of those final moments, and of the whole day yesterday. It seemed like such a long time ago, maybe because of the lack of sleep, and I am afraid if I don't sit down and write things down, they will escape me...

It's strange to open my inbox and see emails from two friends who wrote to check up on me and wish my luck, little knowing that in the time that they wrote and I read their emails, so much has already taken place... I have already begun the process of writing to friends. Friends in so many places, to whom I am forever indebted for their support and encouragements over the past few years...

Slowly, we have to start picking up the pieces and plan the funeral. Local traditions and customs play a large part in the mourning process, and very soon the priest mum wanted to organise the funeral will come and start making an altar dedicated to mum('s spirit).

A busy time of organising and taking care of mum's affairs is about to begin...

I wish I had a fresh body and mind to face it all.

Finally home

Three in the morning. Finally home. In mum's room, where I'll be spending my first night since my return here seventeen days ago. I'll be sleeping on her bed, on the bedsheets and using the blanket she used prior to entering the hospital three weeks ago. It's bizarre to think she went in and never came out again, at least not physically.

It's been a long seventeen days, and long evening. Almost two hours of chanting followed after we accompanied mum to the morgue. It was long, and brother got stung a lot by mosquitoes. But the chanting according to Taiwanese traditions will make it easier for mum to leave this realm and enter the other world.

Not sad. Strangely stoic, and haven't shed a tear yet. Maybe I'm just too tired now to feel. Too tired because last night was so rough for mum, and I slept only at three, and only for a few hours. Now to think of it, the memo the doctor gave us yesterday did say the last twenty four hours is the greatest struggle. Too tired also because since her passing at eight in the evening, there's been so much to take care of. So much paper work involved in checking out of the hospital, and then following traditions by accompanying mum to the resting place of her body until the actual funeral. It's not even sure when that will take place, within two weeks or so, but it all depends on which day is a "good" day for a funeral. And we've got the priest figuring that out.

I called my "little" uncle, mum's youngest brother, the one sibling mum is closest to. He happens to be in Vancouver. He said he will arrange to come back for the funeral, even though he just arrived there yesterday to be with his family. On Skype, I could see he was so saddened, his face in a deep frown. It even looked like he was close to tears. But his voice was calm, and he told me not to be too sad. I felt very apologetic ruining his holiday and reunion with his family. But he needs to know, for he cared and loved his sister so much...

And I called my ex, who happens to be on holiday with his parents, also in Vancouver. I hesitated a lot before contacting him. I don't know why I was most shaken when I was talking to my ex. Even more so than when mum breathed out her last breath before everything ended. I didn't know how to break the news. I didn't want to ruin his holiday with his parents, but he has a right to know, because he cares so much, and has been ever so supportive. He said before he'd (try to) be there with me at the funeral, but it's a lot to ask, because he's so busy at work. I guess I was shaken because of the uncertainties surrounding us.

Finally home. Surrounded by mum's things. I don't even know if I should be sleeping on her bed, for maybe she'll come back tonight. I did say to her before she passed away if there's anything to come back an visit. I also told her if there's something she wants to tell me, she can come back in a dream. "I won't be afraid..."

Because she's my mother. My mother I love so much, my mother whose hand I held and whose body I hugged as she left this world...

Pain and morphine

"Doctor, the pain in the stomach...?"

"I just felt her abdomen, and it's bloated from the retention of liquids. We haven't done any scans yet, but most likely the cancer has progressed in the intestines, causing the swelling and occasional pain," he explained, "We can give her some morphine. Small doses to start with. It'll make her feel better." I thanked him, and he bowed his head gently before walking away.

I walked back into the room, and mum was languishing in bed. Today, more than ever, she has been very restless and asked to have her body shifted several times due to sores. Mum has become so weak that she cannot even shift her own legs, let alone turn her body so that she's not lying on just one side. These are signs, I fear... (but then again, I am not a trained medical expert...)

As the carer took half a day off, it was just my brother and me taking care of her. For much of the afternoon, mum lay there in bed with a lot of discomfort. At one point the nurse did come with a syringe containing the painkillers (3mg of morphine) which she injected into mum's IV. Mum felt a bit better, and within an hour or so fell asleep.

Mum spent most of the day in a state of waking moments of daze or sleep with her mouth open. At one point, she opened her eyes and saw me sitting by her side. She whispered (maybe not intentionally, but what sound she manages to muster these days is no more than a whisper): "I know it's been hard on you seeing me like this..." Mum's voice is almost inaudible now, and every-time I really have to strain close to her ears to hear her. I reassured her I would have it no other way. "I know, I'm very lucky. Even the monk said so..."

"Isn't this the best you could wish for? So many people who care about you, so many people coming to see you. You're with your children and grandchild. What more would you like? Would you like the president to come see you?" I joked. (It really was a joke, for the current president is an incompetent fool who's policies are jeopardising the survival of my homeland. He is not welcome here. I'd lynch him and shout abuse at him if I had the chance...)

"Would you like to go home?" I asked her. I told her about the dream I had the other day, the dream in which I was by her side at that final moment and when i said "Let's go home..." Mum weakly shook her head. I asked again whether she would like to be at the hospice or be at home "when that moment comes". 

"Here... I don't want to scare any of you..." mum said weakly.

"You won't scare us!" I said. By "scare" she means that she doesn't want to appear in her spirit form and frighten us after she passes, for according to local beliefs the spirit of the deceased will remain in the place of death for some time, often "haunting" the place until  the spirit can find a final resting place. "It is your home, you can go back to if you want to, if you feel most comfortable..." Mum dozed off before she said anything else. I held her hand for a little longer before I let go.

While talking to a nurse, I learned that fluids collecting in the stomach ( the medical term is ascites) may be caused by the thinning of blood vessels which cause whatever fluids in the circulatory system to escape into the body (whereas normally the fluids are contained in the blood). Another possible cause may be due to liver disease, and failure of the liver to process and reabsorb the waste fluids of the body. Both possibilities may explain mum's bloated stomach, for since last week the nurses have been unable to draw any blood from her veins, for they have become too dehydrated. It is also likely that mum is suffering from liver disease, as the bile fluids are unable to completely come out of the body, and the build of bile is not only causing jaundice, but also affecting the normal functioning of the liver...

Does it matter what the real reason is behind mum's latest complication? The reason we are at the hospice is not to treat, but to alleviate pain and suffering. And the first administering of morphine is a step in that direction. A worrying step, because I have seen before what morphine can do to her mind.

For most of the afternoon, I was pensive, a little shaken and saddened.  Mum ate next to nothing today. The bloatedness of her stomach and perhaps the morphine made her have even less of an appetite. The few moments when mum woke up, she is lost and confused, more than ever before.
At one point, just a little after six in the evening, and after sleeping for two hours or so, she woke up and murmured: "Why are you here? Go to sleep! It's still so early..." She thought she had slept all the way through till the morning. An hour later, she woke up, opened my eyes and saw me sitting by her side. She said: "It's so late already! Go to bed. Don't sit there..." Is it the morphine, or is it her malnourished body and brain that is causing her to have difficulty comprehending time and what is happening?

I do not know. But this is the way mum is now, and her condition seems to be deteriorating rapidly.
I sense a new stage of illness and difficulty has come.