Question by erinjl123456: What would you tell your children if you were to face death?
‘Mommy’s going away’

On Thursday, the hospice nurse said Carolynne would likely die within 48 hours. Her respirations had fallen to six per minute. It was nearly impossible to rouse her from sleep. The nurse said she probably wouldn’t regain consciousness. Carolynne’s family hurried back to New Hampshire.

That night, Brian sat by his mother’s bed as visitors gathered around her. He often had asked questions about her condition – whether she felt pain, whether something could be done to help her breathe easier, who they would call when she died. Tonight he asked Rich why her muscles were twitching.

“Mom’s dying, Brian,” he said.

“Oh, yeah, yeah,” Brian said and turned away.

When Rich tried to tell him again, Brian plugged his ears.

“Brian, take your fingers out of your ears, you’re embarrassing yourself,” Rich said.

After a long pause, Carolynne’s sister Laura Cummins, 36, said, “It’s okay Brian. I don’t want to hear it either.”

Even before Carolynne’s illness, Rich’s relationship with Brian was strained. Lately, Brian had been getting in trouble at school, where he’s in the sixth grade. In recent weeks, Rich received daily calls from his principal.

Brian and Melissa have limited contact with their biological father. Rich said he knows that Brian feels as though he has lost both parents. “He’s got a bum deal,” he said.

Carolynne’s sisters and cousin Anna had already assured her that they would help care for Brian. Rich said he is unsure how to move the family forward when he and Brian are battling each other.

One night last week, Rich told Brian that if he didn’t change his behavior toward adults, he could be sent to boarding school. Brian protested. He said he didn’t want to leave home.

Rich told him he didn’t know what else to do. “I’m doing everything that people tell me I should do to help you,” he said.

Later on Thursday, Rich placed Elijah down in the bed next to his mom. Elijah draped his arm across her chest. “Mom? Mommy? Mom’s not waking up,” he said to Rich. “Mom doesn’t hear me.”

Rich reminded him of the books they had read about people’s bodies breaking.

“Mommy’s going away,” Rich said, starting to cry. “Mommy’s dying.”

When Elijah said she would never wake up “because she doesn’t like me,” Rich showed him the surgical scars on Carolynne’s stomach and tried to explain what was happening to her body.

The normally boisterous boy would later tiptoe quietly down the stairs at about 6 a.m. on the day Carolynne died to listen at the doorway of the room where his dad dozed next to his mom. Then he walked slowly back to the stairs in the blue darkness of near-dawn and kneeled, peering between the rungs of the railing at people sprawled sleeping on the couches.

On Friday, Carolynne’s pulse was weaker, her temples caved in from dehydration. In the afternoon, she opened her eyes for a few moments. Melissa sat at the computer in the kitchen. Rich asked her to join him beside her mom.

“Your mother’s eyes are open, and I want her to see you,” he said.

At first, Melissa refused. When Carolynne was in the hospital, Melissa had said she sometimes felt as if her mom was already gone. Since Carolynne had come home, she had kept her distance. After Rich prodded her again, she conceded.

“Melissa’s here,” Rich said to Carolynne. “She’s watching you.”

The next morning, Melissa stood at the end of her mother’s bed quietly, her hair in two braids, and dressed for the state gymnastics meet. The adults in her family had explained to her that her mother would likely die that day. She chose to go to the meet anyway, and they let her. This was her own way of coping, they said.

Through the morning, Carolynne’s hands turned blue and her breath became fast and shallow. At about 1:30 p.m., Ellie Duhaime and Melody Cooper-Mishkit, longtime friends from The Family Place, turned Carolynne on her side to give her some medicine. When they returned her to her back, her breathing changed immediately. They called for Rich. The family ran to Carolynne’s bedside.

They held on to Carolynne and to each other until she died.

Brian hugged Rich tight around the waist.

“I love you,” he said.

“I love you, too,” Rich said.

Rich sobbed as he removed her wedding ring and his own and placed them on her chest. He fetched Elijah and sat with him next to Carolynne’s body.

“Mom’s gone,” he said. He touched his son’s chest. “She stays in here, with you now.”

When Melissa came home hours later, she walked immediately upstairs to her room. She came down after prodding from the family’s longtime baby sitter to go see her mom’s body.

Later, Carolynne’s cousin Anna said she thinks that Melissa and Brian will be proud to have shown such courage in watching their mother’s long fight and in experiencing her eventual death.

“It will give them tremendous strength and take away – or at least diminish – the fear that they might have . . . of what happened,” she said.

In the days immediately following Carolynne’s death, they were already showing strength: Melissa went to another gymnastics meet on Sunday. Brian has talked to his mom, if only in spirit, each night and each morning before he and Anna fall asleep on the couch together. Both kids were back at school yesterday.

But Saturday night, when people from the funeral home came to take Carolynne’s body, Brian sat with Ellie in the basement while Elijah ran around throwing toys.

“Where do they have her sleep? Are they going to put her in a bed?” Brian asked, as the stretcher that carried his mom’s body was wheeled across the floor above his head. “She’s going to be lonely.”

Ellie told him that his mom’s spirit is in heaven now, not in her body.

Rich called down to say they could come up. Carolynne’s body was gone. Elijah ran up the stairs, calling for his mom.
For those of you who read this… this is a real artical from this week. Just wondering how people would deal or think they would deal with this situation. Elijah is 4, Brian is 12, and their sister is 14.

Best answer:

Answer by All hat
Gee thanks

Add your own answer in the comments!

 

 

Young Girl Losing Her Mother Poems Death Life Adolescence – Call Me Sonya Grey A Young Girl’s Poems About Death, Life & Adolescence SONYA TUPONE LLOYD This personal collection of poetic verse is at once inspiring and challenging. Beginnng with the loss of her mother at age nine, Sonya began collecting her thoughts in 40 poems in a diary from early childhood through her twenties. She describes the daily battles of self-image and self-expression she experienced growing up after the passing of one parent and the estrangement of another. With the death of her mother, Sonya lost a part of everything she had known. Two states away, she finds herself with a different family, school, friends, home and a new name. The verses written during this time are one woman s exploration of her raw, emotional responses to dramatic life changes. This is Sonya’s story. Purchase your copy at: tribute-books.com

 

'Death panels' save money, suffering

Filed under: dealing with the death of a parent

My mother, widowed when I was three years old, had to work as seamstress in a factory for 45 years until she retired. My grandmother was intelligent, witty, affectionate and attentive, shopping, cooking tasty meals and baking cookies that were a treat …
Read more on The Island Now

 

Give grief a thought

Filed under: dealing with the death of a parent

“In the past, I have worked with adult men who come to the realisation at age 50 that the depression they have suffered most of their lives is connected to the death of their father, who died when they were 9 years old. … the non-profit centre …
Read more on gulfnews.com