62

My mother would have been 62 years old on Friday.

If I had known 10 years ago that my mother would be gone, I might have played things a little differently. I know, I know.. playing the "if only" game is stupid, non-productive, and only adds to your misery. But I play it just the same.

I wish I had let my mother be at my son's birth. I didn't let her, and now that she is gone, I regret that. She never really bonded with my son, and maybe she would have if I had let her come to the birth.

My mom was so fucked up. I honestly think she wanted to be a good mom but she just didn't know how. She spent so much time trying not to be her mom, even when it would have benefited my sister and I to have that kind of mother, that she kind of failed to be any kind of mom at all. She tried to be my friend. I remember her being very lonely. I was her social outlet for the most part, I think, through my teen years.

I was there for her at the end.
She was wheezing with every breathe but her body was on autopilot. Her respirations just kept coming. We'd had her semi-upright to help with the breathing, which ironically kept her alive even when she was brain-dead. I lowered the bed. I knew it would speed things along. She died a few hours later. She opened her eyes at the end and gasped. It made me wonder if I had done the right thing.

Could she have survived and come back? I don't think so. Everything I read about stroke and brain death indicated that she, the she we knew as my mom, was no longer there.

But here I am. The weekend of her birthday. Tomorrow would be her 38th wedding anniversary.

Playing the "if only" game.