Since I’ve started the MAT, it has been all I can think about. My life began to revolve around it some 2 weeks ago. I’m constantly looking for research, doing homework and readings for class, formulating my own opinions about topics we discuss, getting to know my cohort, and even grocery shopping for foods that I think would be great to take to class. In all that I’ve done, its been about the MAT. Well, I forgot that when I usually get absorbed in one part of my life and forget about the rest, something happens to ground me. An event, a person, anything usually comes along just when I think nothing would to make me realize there is more to life then just me and what I’m doing. You see, I have a large family, and with large families comes problems. I’ve had sibling fights, disagreements with my father, and I’ve wanted to lock my sister’s kids in a closet, but in the end we all love one another and have to realize that this life is short and it shouldn’t be wasted on the material, the menial, or the trivial. So we’ve all put our differences and lives aside because my grandfather is dying.
A few years ago my maternal grandfather was diagnosed with prostate cancer. All but 2 of his 8 siblings have died from cancer or will die from cancer. He is currently the last of three and the oldest remaining sibling. Recently grandpa started some pretty intense radiation treatments that have burned his stomach so badly, he hasn’t eaten in weeks and has lost almost 50 pounds. He is skin and bones. I like to describe his personality as an old cowboy. He loves watching westerns. He used to train horses, hunt, fish, and snowmobile throughout Idaho’s forests. Now he is bedridden, too weak to get out of bed from lack of proper nourishment. His 64th wedding anniversary is next month, July 29th, with my grandmother Margaret. They were married the day after she turned 18 against her mother’s advice and discouragement.
So last week, the family came together. It seemed like it had been ages since I’ve seen everyone in the same household. Great grandkids were running around hollaring, us grandkids were visiting with grandpa and helping grandma, and my father was contacting hospice because we realize his final days are approaching. He doesn’t want to go to the hospital anymore because that is not how he wants to live. Our duty as family is to keep him comfortable, painfree, and happy.
I’m worrying about my grandmother. I went and stayed the night at their house Thursday night since we did not have class Friday. Having someone at the house helps grandma to keep up with the hectic medication schedule as well as maintaining her sanity and health. I took over food from Orphan Annies and if I hadn’t, she said all she was going to have for dinner was cottage cheese….I don’t care what anyone else says about cottage cheese and fruit because I know they are nutritional. You can’t live off of it. I grocery shopped for her and I promised to take her out for some new clothes next week. (She claimed all of her clothes were ancient and she needed some sprucing up) We watched some western movies on the TV and I dusted her surfaces and fine things.
SO, I have a lot of homework this weekend and coming week with the literature review coming up. I’m not stressed though because I was with my grandmother when the social worker came by and discussed options for my grandpa’s living will. I have so much reading to do tomorrow before the week starts, but I will get it done without becoming anxious about any quiz because I gave my grandfather a sponge bath. I have to find a way to pay for summer school, but I will do so with grace, because there are more important things to worry about.
I’m writing about this not to make anyone sad or feel sorry for me, my grandfather, or my family. I’m writing this for myself, so that I can look back later and read this and recognize that during times of stress in the classroom, or when I am completely oblivious to anything but me, there are more important things in life. We just have to recognize what they are before its too late.
p.s. please don’t respond to this blog
