I'm giving him a lot of my energy. I spend countless hours mulling over the things I used to do for him and how I am reminded that I am not doing those things anymore. I used to keep two baskets in our linen closet in the bathroom each one containing our underwear. It's silly to discuss on here, but I'd see his underwear basket everyday and as the pairs dwindled down and only his least favorite pairs remained, I started up the washer to make sure his favorite ones were clean. I find myself wondering if his favorite ones are clean today.
I very much enjoyed being a wife and mother. Those two things were the things I set out to do in life. Ask my friends when we were younger and it was a no brainer that I was going to be the first of us to get married and have children. And sure enough I was. I spent eight years at home raising my Marble's and taking care of the house. I took care of him too. I thought I did at least. I guess I didn't hold up my end of the bargain.
I started dealing with some major issues after my grandpa passed away in 2008. The loss of him changed me deeply and changed how I viewed death in general. As my grandpa was entering the last stage of Alzheimer's I flew up to Michigan to visit him in the hospital and stayed for three weeks. I was told that he wouldn't know who I was so I prepared myself for that and upon entering his hospital room he was calling out to the nurses, "Rita. Rita??" Rita was my grandma. He thought the nurses were her taking care of him. I sat down at this bedside and he had no clue who I was. I talked to him like I would have talked to him any other time before the Alzheimer's took over and as we spoke he was wadding up the blanket on his bed into a very tightly wound square. After a while, when the blanket was wrapped tight and neatly he turned to me, handed me the blanket and said, "Here Bug, go put this in the shed." I was his Bug. I worked with him in his shed. He knew it was me sitting there.
The last time I saw my grandpa was about a week later and I was again sitting in his hospital room this time with my mom and he was talking to me about helping him change a tire on a car that was out in the hallway of the hospital. The Alzheimer's took over his amazing mind and left him disorientated and confused. I told him I'd help him change the tire. I asked him if he wanted me to go into his shed and get his tools. It was easier for me to go along with his delusions then try to tell him that there was no car in the hallway of the hospital and that all his tools were no longer available to him. I knew that day that I was going to be returning to Florida and that it was going to be the last time I saw him alive. I cried in my moms arms in the hallway of the hospital after my emotional goodbye to my grandpa and I never laid eyes on him again.
About two weeks later I got a call at my work that he had passed away. When I returned home from work, I feel into the arms of my husband and cried. His warm embrace was just what I needed at that moment when I had lost the most wonderful man in my life. He stayed up almost the entire night with me and I laid with my head on my chest, my tears wetting the skin on his chest. He stroked my head and comforted me. That was the last time that I felt sadness until this situation with the divorce. Only now when I cry, he isn't here to hold me. I don't even think he cares that I am crying daily about all of this. He tells me hurting me was never his intention, but what did he think this was going to do to me? Once my grandpa died, my husband was the only man left in my life to play the role of protector, caregiver, companion. But, how he's gone too.
I have cried so much lately that my eyes are constantly red and puffy. I look and feel like shit. All I want to do is take my medication and sleep in hopes that the next day I wake up something will be different. I know my reality is that I will end up going through tomorrow just as lost as I have gone through the last several months. It is complete and total bewilderment. Life now is sadness. Moving on feels like an insurmountable task.
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