It is hard to come to terms with loss, especially when it so closely follows that very same gain.

My Great Aunt was just moved to a nursing home, not 5 minutes from where I'm at, after spending her whole life in Florida.  She was moved to be closer to family.  She arrived on the 11th, and I visited her every day.  She got sick last week.  It started with her being 'out of it' on Wednesday.  She was not herself.  I thought perhaps she was on some medicine that made her tired, or that perhaps she wasn't as sharp witted as I thought when she claimed she was always up early.  (She could've just been tired.)  The next morning, I got the call she was moved to Emergency at the hospital.  She had a blood infection and a UTI.

NBD, right? You would think...

She had a heart attack yesterday and they sent her up to the ICU.  Now there's talk of her dying in the next 12-24 hours (less, since I'm up at almost 2am - YOU try getting sleep with this kind of news!).

I don't want her to go!  She just flippin' got here!  It's not fair! I didn't get enough time with her!  She turned 88 today (yep, today, not yesterday which was a couple hours ago, it's her birthday right now).  Of all days, I don't want her dying on her birthday!  That's just not funny.  I wanted to hear more of her stories, more of her life.  She lived through Hitler's Germany as a German, she had wonderful stories to tell.  I never got the stories out of her, because our visiting times were so far apart. 

You would think we'd have written - nope.  Her hands have been arthritic since I was like 5.  She hasn't written legibly in decades.

Calling her?  With the terrible reception in FL, it wasn't worth it.  That and she's needed a hearing aid since before I could afford a phone of my own!

Okay, I could've called her more while she was in FL, but by the time I got my free minutes after 9, she was usually already in bed.  I'm poor, we've established that in other blog entries, so we know I can't afford the long distance charges or premium minutes.

Anyhow, I really feel ripped off.  I feel cheated by God, and she's not even gone yet.  I really hope she pulls through because if she doesn't, I am going to have a crisis of faith like I haven't had in decades.  (as in, "What kind of sick God gives you a chance to make an old lady smile, a child blossom in her artwork, and a baby start giving out kisses, then rips the old lady out of the picture, crushes the sensitive artist, and never lets the old lady get a sloppy toddler kiss in her golden years?!?"  Not to mention the whole "I really wanted to spend time with her, I thought that's why You allowed her to move back to us.  Couldn't You have given us more time with her?!?  You're going to be that mean?" and, "Don't take her from us!")

Grieving sucks.  I hope I don't have to do more of it.  I pray I wake up in the morning and hear that she's breathing on her own again, talking, and aching to go home where she's not poked and prodded every 10 minutes.  I hope she can eat some birthday cake and read her cards.  I hope she can watch us enjoy being with her for hopefully another year or more... I hope she lives so long she's sick of me visiting her every day! (I promised her 'I'd visit so often she'd be sick of me' the first day she got here.  Don't let me leave that unfulfilled!!)