Bless My Friends

I am pretty certain you got from my last blog that I was crumbling around the edges a titch! Sorry!

However, it did feel okay to share that because I am certain most if not all of you reading this have had a day or two at the very least of feeling pretty much like I described. I certainly felt alive. But it was a pretty painful and difficult alive place to be.

I have put that pain and sorrow to rest. At least for this time. Dear, dear friends from Michigan spent a few days here in our home. Clo and I both felt so very loved, seen, understood, valued and affirmed. What an incredible gift to have someone who has known you for years and followed your life journey throughout those years, join your current life with no judgement, simply love and support you! The angels continue to look after us.

I have again deepened my understanding of the need to hold steady, see the moment through, and trust that on the other side there is hope, love and joy. It is easy to panic in the centre of pain and sorrow and loose perspective. There is a tendency to fear this may not end, or I can't see the end, or I won't make it to the end. But we ALWAYS  make it IF we trust there is love in the universe waiting for us to notice. Seeee... the love all around you. Gently slip past the mud and darkness. Notice the tiny chip of blueberry sky. Listen carefully: the birds are singing. Can you hear the water in our garden fountain joining in the chorus?

Remember, you are loved. Let your skin feel that. Let you eyes see love. Let your heart sing songs of love. Even when you feel as lousy as I did at my last blogging, even then, I was being love. I just forgot.

Breathe.

Remember.

Hugs, Nancy

I Am Pooped

Why am I such a poop???!!!

 Today we learned good news all around for Clo.

 I am exhausted.

Couldn't sleep, then did for a bit. Rest and reading all day. Gone down to the kitchen for wine. Left empty handed. Unexpected guest for dinner that L. and M. are preparing. Good smells. French words and laughter. I want to run away. I want to hide. I want to evaporate. I do not know how to face death and come out laughing. I do not know how to be in public frivolity when what I feel is private grief. If Clo isn't dying, she will some day. If I am not dying, I will some day. Not now. Laugh now. Die later. How do I do that??

Dinner is ready. I join. I smile. I hurt. I long. I am alive. We are all alive. Now.

I don't think I hurt. I don't think hurt is what this is. I think it is profound sorrow. I am grieving for the pain of the planet. The planet screams. I long to cry. My tears will soften the hard ground beneath me. My tears will eventually lead me to my laughter. It hides inside me. Ashamed to show itself for fear laughter will betray the relief.

 Relief.

I can't find it yet. I am not afraid. I am tired. I long to sleep for a long winter. We enter the brilliance of summer. And I long for the solitude and quiet of winter. That will come.

I share this because I have the words. I believe others have the feelings and can't find the words. I will try to do it for us/you/me. My words help ground me. Help me find the softer ground my tears could prepare for me if I would let them. Not time yet. I stand on hard dry earth and wait. Some time I will laugh again. And pray again. And love myself again.

Almost.

Soon.

Now?

Not quite.

Love, Nancy

Home Again!

Clo is home again! Man! What a whirl wind week this has been. Truly believing she had only weeks to live, to today when she showered, dressed beautifully, watered the garden, went shopping with her sisters....she is tired tonight. Go figure.

I am enormously grateful to Marie and Louise for being here and helping with some of the responsibility, to say nothing of all of the cooking. How marvelous it is to have family, hers and mine. Again, we are so fortunate.

I am learning huge lessons in being in relationship with the ups and down, huge swings, uncertainty, kindness of everyone, with a partner who has cancer. I think she is dying. She says not yet. I am glad!!!  I get scared. I feel relieved. I carry tired and not knowing as a constant friend. I have learned to know the feeling of the sacred moments of honouring being allowed to walk beside my beloved as she transitions into whatever it is she has in mind for next. I have leaned to forgive myself when I feel overwhelmed and tired of it all. Did I REALLY sign up for this???? Maybe. Probably. I am pretty sure I did.

There is so much more to share. But I am being all to dinner!  (: Lucky me. Three French women to cook for me. How much better could it get.....Hugs, Nancy

Palliative care inpatient unit at Princess Margaret Hospital

Clo is in the hospital. I have no idea for how long. She isn't eating, drinks little, is exhausted, very head achy, nauseous, terrible metallic taste, pain in liver, legs, knees and shoulders. Generally speaking, totally miserable. I learned about ambulances: hire a private one unless you want to go to the nearest emergency room. We sure didn't want to do that. We had a bed waiting for us at PMH on the 16th. floor and no stops between here and there were going to delay us! It worked wonderfully well.

I am learning about the precious gift of being able to love and support a dying friend and family member. Clo so trusts me. And I am so pleased that she does. I want to give her the gift of knowing she is loved, feeling she is safe, being free of pain, and feeling fearless. I am praying she will die in my arms. I want her to feel my love, my presence, my hope and the safety of my holding her close as she leaves for something I don't know much about and she will explore sooner than I will.

My experience is that we really don't know how we want to die until we are in the middle of the journey. Because it is pretty difficult to talk about when we know so little, it is imperative we talk about it when we are living in the middle of one partner dying. What are we each feeling? fearing? hoping, dreaming, wanting........

Nancy, I am afraid. My dearest Clo, you do not need to be afraid. I am right here always.

Love to all, Nancy