Saying Goodbye to Mamma

Have I ever told you about when my mamma died? I tweeted it last night, and I feel like I need to write it down to share with others.

I'm going to tweek it just a bit, because tweets are never edited. They're raw.
And short. :)

Mamma died on September 16th, 2001. On September 11, I was waiting on my sister Jeanie. We were going to ride together, home, to be at her side. I was packed and ready to go when I turned on TV and saw the first tower on fire.

Wasn't she gorgeous? This is Mamma when she was in Nurse's Training during WWII.

When Jeanie arrived, she had been listening to the radio, and we were both in tears. It was tragic and frightening. All those people! We decided Jeanie needed to go back to her house for the night to be with her husband. School had been dismissed, and my children were home and needed me, too.

So we delayed the trip for a day, but knew we didn't have long to be with Mamma, so we left the next day. When we arrived, my other two sisters had been there at least a week. They were exhausted from keeping a bedside vigil with Mamma. They talked about what a stinker Mamma was being. She was in pain and the bed was so uncomfortable. My sisters had not managed to sleep in office-style chairs, and had cricks in every bone of their bodies.

I have to tell you again, Mamma was such a stinker sometimes. She was the little girl in that children's poem, "...with a curl in the middle of her forehead". When she was good she was very very good, but when she was bad, she was horrid.  Anyway, Mamma had been a "pill" and so the first night after we arrived, Jeanie stayed with her. All of my dear sisters are a bit protective of me. I'm so frickin' fragile.

All the next day, sister Nancy stood guard beside a comfortable bed with a circulating air mattress that had finally become available. She was determined to aquire it for Mamma, and after practically wrestling it from an orderly, she did. Once settled into the new bed, Mamma was instantly more comfortable. That was the night I stayed with her. Thank God for that bed. Mamma was so much more pleasant to be with.

That night, she was...well, she was Mamma. She was so beautiful, and yet, full of herself at the same time. I had prayed that if God wanted me to talk to her about anything in particular, that it would happen naturally and I would know what to say. So as the night went on, we talked about a lot of things that people need to talk about when they are dying. We talked about the uncle she couldn't forgive. We talked about something so secret she had never told anyone. I'd rather not know, myself. But it doesn't matter. I told her that no matter what, God loves her. All she had to do is ask and he would forgive. I vaguely remember praying, but I'm not sure if we did. Probably.

God is so good.

That night, the nurses asked if I needed a bed-chair, and of course I said yes. So once all the talking was done we both slept soundly, some time after midnight.

The next day Daddy and we kids talked with Mamma's doctors and decided it was time to move her to hospice. Two young, cute orderlies moved her in and out of the ambulance, and she flirted with them shamelessly. She loved men. Especially cute ones.

It was Saturday. Mamma was in so much pain; at the hospital the nurses had been giving her something for pain. Now they couldn't get ahold of her doctor to get the prescription transferred to the hospice until afternoon. After that she relaxed and was able to enjoy all the attention she was getting from her four daughters, one son and especially, her beloved husband of 55 years.

She was so precious that day. I can't tell you.

She kept smiling at the ceiling at the foot of the bed. One of my sisters said, "I think she is confused. She's seeing those huge oxygen tanks and thinks they're angels." But she had such a sweet smile. Like a little child. She'd been asking about the beautiful people for two or three days now, and there were no oxygen tanks in her hospital room.

I was sitting close to her, when she said again, "Who are these beautiful people." Her face was bright and her smile innocent, like she must have looked when she was three years old, and her daddy came home after a hard day's work.

I said, "Mamma, there are oxygen tanks down there. Do you think you might be seeing them?"

Mamma turned her head in my direction and looked at me with a disapproving frown that was o-so-familiar.

"No!" she said firmly. "Those are beautiful people, Deborah. Not oxygen tanks!"

I straightened up immediately. I said, "Well, Mamma, do you think you are seeing angels?" She gave a single nod and her gaze returned to the angels who were patiently waiting for her at the foot of the bed.
I thought, there are angels in this room, and I can't feel their presence at all. It was an amazing realization to me.

Then it occurred to me that among those present at the foot of the bed could be one of my grandparents, or Uncle Carl who had died of an accident when he was just 28 years old. She loved Uncle Carl so.

So I had to ask, "Mamma, do you recognize anyone?" and she nodded once. Still smiling like a little child, she slowly lifted up her frail hand and pointed a finger at the host whom I could not see, but knew were there. "Well," she said. "There's God."

Well, that was quite a surprise to me. Not only a heavenly host, but God himself, was in the room, and we couldn't feel them at all. How do you act when you know God is in the room and Heaven has opened its doors for someone to enter?

For me, I thought this would be a good time to find out what God looks like. I knew I shouldn't ask, but I couldn't help myself. "What does God look like, Mamma?"

Once again, she looked at me with that frown I'd seen so many times growing up. "Well, I can't see his face!" Sort of like, "isn't that obvious to you?".

I had to laugh. I said, "Mamma, that makes sense. The Bible says you can't see the face of God until you die."

Mamma looked back at God, smiling. Satisfied with herself. And with God.

The next morning was Sunday. We got a call from hospice. Mamma was in the final stage, and didn't have long. All five of us were at her side, along with Daddy. We sang hymns and prayed.

Mamma was no longer conscious.  Looking at Daddy, I could see that he was so scared. They'd been married for so long. He didn't know what he should do.

After a little while, Mamma stopped breathing. Daddy panicked, and reached over and tried to wake her. She started breathing again. This happened twice more. Poor, sweet Daddy.

When she quit breathing again, I realized that Daddy just didn't know if it was okay to let her go. I said, "It's okay, Daddy. It's okay to let her go."

He looked at me and said, "It's okay?"

"Yes, Daddy. It's okay."

He sat down, bewildered and relieved, and Mamma went on to be with the angels. And with God.

Daddy lived for several more years, and joined Mamma in heaven with the angels. And with God.

You know, God is good. Life is hard, and it always ends in dying. But you know , with God, life doesn't really end at all. It is just another beginning.