Yet another loss

As one of my relatives in Canada texted me today, “So sorry, Tony, for yet another loss.” Yet another loss. 

My favorite aunt on my father’s side passed away this week. She was (is?) my father’s sister. She was 87. I am not sure what, specifically, she died of, but in recent years she has had dementia and that is what ultimately killed her. She was no longer able to live in the home she had owned for as long as I can remember. She had (has?) three sons. One lives in Florida and the other two live about twenty miles apart, not too far from me and their family home.

In recent years, the middle son took on the responsibility of taking care of his mother. He lives on a lake in the countryside. It was a beautiful “retirement” spot, if you will, for her. I visited her there a few times.

One time my cousin took advantage of the situation by having me watch her for a little while (wound up being five hours) while he ran some errands. I didn’t mind. She spent a better part of the last hour worrying that the dog ran away. My cousin had taken the dog with him. She even went so far as calling him to confirm, but she still didn’t believe him. It was the last quantitative time I spent with her and I will treasure it. I could still feel her love when she looked at me as we talked.

The lake wasn’t picturesque. It was more like a big pond and it had spots of algae floating around. There were no other homes close by. In fact, there was even a stable on the grounds. When my cousin first bought the home about ten years back, he had a couple of horses out there. I don’t think they were his. I think he charged someone to rent out the stable for the horses. Nonetheless, it was pretty cool to go visit him and be able to pet the horses.

But the horses were long gone before my aunt moved in with him. You could say the horses were let out of the barn – never to return. They didn’t run away, but they were no longer there. There was still some hay, the trough, the barn, the obstacles they jumped over, and a saddle among other things left behind. They served as a reminder as to what was once there.

Dementia is much the same thing. The horse is let out of the barn. The mind and memory have left – never to return. There are always things left behind, however, to remind us of what was once there. Maybe it is a smile. Maybe it is a twinkle in the eye. Maybe it is a giggle or a laugh. Maybe they surprise you by mentioning a long ago event.

My aunt had been in and out of the hospital a few times in recent months. When you have dementia, you tend to go to the hospital a lot. Accidents happen more frequently. They might fall down stairs. They might burn themselves. They might fall in the yard while chasing their pet and break their wrist (as happened to my mother). Any number of things can happen when you forget how to protect yourself or you forget what is dangerous.

Most of the times when my aunt was in the hospital, I was unaware. The reason being that it wasn’t that serious. Maybe it was a bruised knee, or a sprained ankle. Two weeks ago, however, we got word (via social media, of course – more on that later) that she was in the hospital and it didn’t look good. The insinuation was that if you wanted to say your last goodbyes, you better do it now.

So I took my dad and we went to visit her in the hospital. Only two visitors were allowed at a time so we had to wait in the lobby for about a half hour. When we got to see her, her son was there. He gave us the rundown of her condition – something about she wasn’t eating and something about cirrhosis of the liver. I mentioned to him that I had never known her to drink even a glass of wine at dinner (which was very rare in the Portuguese culture). My cousin has always been a bit pretentious and a bit of a know-it-all. He started to explain that you didn't need to be an alcoholic to have cirrhosis, blah, blah, blah. I didn’t really care.

All I cared about was what I saw. My aunt was a shell of herself. She looked like she was down to less than 80 pounds. She was always a tiny woman so any sort of weight loss was devastating. She was laying there much like you would imagine a dying person to look like. She was being fed liquids via a sponge on the end of a stick. It brought back bad memories of me doing the same with my mother. I can still see my mother, desperately, trying to squeeze her lips around the sponge just to get a little drop of water in her mouth.

I knew I couldn’t stay long. I had nowhere else to be, but I couldn’t stay. I could faintly hear my cousin still explaining to me how someone could have cirrhosis without ever having sipped alcohol, but I was no longer present in the room. I had been transported to a time four years ago when I spent my last night with my mother.

Eventually, my cousin said he would go to the cafeteria to grab something to eat and give my father and me some alone time with my aunt.. My father sat across from her on the other bed in the room. I sat in a chair by her bedside and held her hand. The hand was just skin and bones. It felt just like holding my mother’s hand that last night.

I looked at her arms, her face, her hair. The barn was still there, so was the trough, the hay, and the saddle, but the horses had left the barn no longer to return. I am sure she didn’t know who I was when I talked to her. 

Auntie, it is Tonito (little Tony – it is what she always called me), your nephew. I love you. 

No response.

I bent over and kissed her forehead. Surprisingly, I heard her whisper, “Thank you.”  It was another beautiful memory I will cherish forever. Something was still there.

I kissed her hand and she whispered it again, “Thank you.” My cousin had said she hadn’t spoken all day so I felt special.

And I know I was special to her. Despite being my father’s sister, my aunt was extremely close to my mother. When my mother died, my aunt said to me that she had once made a pact with my mother that if anything ever happened to my mother that she would look after me as if I were her own son.

After my mother died, I would go to the cemetery and sit there every day for hours on end. This one time my aunt showed up with her granddaughter and her boyfriend. My aunt was there to visit her husband’s grave.

I walked over to say hi. My tiny aunt greeted me by banging on my chest with her two tiny fists and saying, frustratingly, “Why don’t you snap out of it, Tony? You need to be the happy Tony I remember. Your mom wouldn’t want to see you like this. Please, Tony, please!!”

Her granddaughter stood behind her giving me the universal twirling finger on the temple gesture to indicate that she was crazy. But my aunt knew what she was saying, and her desperation was real. I felt she was feeling she let my mother down and it pained me even worse.

My dad told me this week that she was the hardest working one of the four siblings. Maybe that is why she and my mother were so close. They had the same work ethic. But I also think they were bonded by their extreme sense of kindness and unconditional love.

About ten years ago, her middle son – the one who took her in in her final months – came out as gay. I always suspected it all my life. Many of us did. He was too good looking, too funny, too social, and too much of a good dancer to be heterosexual. I mean that in the best possible way. At weddings, all the girls wanted to take their turn with him on the dance floor. I can picture my mother Portuguese dancing/quick-stepping with him.

He waited until he was almost 50 to come out. How long had he been gay? I don’t know, don’t care. He was the first, and only one to this day, to come out as gay in my family. Still being a traditional conservative Portuguese family, his father didn’t take it well. He felt ashamed. My aunt, however, said who cares and only chastised him for not coming out sooner.

That was the type of person my aunt was.

Before my mother even died, I saw the early signs of dementia in my aunt – and I think she did, too. The first sign I got was one time when I got home from somewhere and pulled into the driveway. It was a nice summer day and I looked in the yard and saw my aunt sitting with my mother and father under a tree where they liked to congregate.

I stepped out of my car and noticed her car in the driveway next to mine. It was still running.

I shut off the car and handed the keys to my aunt. “You left your car running, Auntie.” 

“I did? Oh, my head. I am getting so forgetful lately.”

It is one thing to forget where you left your keys at home or where you leave the remote control for the TV. That does not, necessarily, mean you are getting Alzheimer's or dementia. It is another thing to forget to shut off your car. I also started to notice she would park her car sometimes with one wheel up on the curb when she would park on the street. She never did that.

To digress for a second – her being able to drive and speak decent English was one thing that set her apart from the other older generation females in my family. It proved her work ethic that she was the only one who made the effort to learn to speak the language and to learn how to drive. She took the time to go to night classes to learn English. It is yet another thing that set her apart in my family and why I admired her so much.

Despite her deteriorating mental state, she always took a special liking to me. Again, maybe she saw my kind heart as comparable to hers. Until a few years ago I would be the only one of the cousins to visit her from time to time. I wouldn’t go to visit my cousins (her kids). I would go to visit her… and have her feed me, of course! She was an awesome cook. She made lasagna just the way I liked it – with olives. She also made the best apple pies.

And she knew I loved her cooking, probably because I told her that every time. Every time I would say something like, “You know, Auntie, I miss your lasagnas.” Guaranteed, the next day she would show up at my house with not just a plate of a lasagna, but an entire platter just for me.

“Just make sure you return the dish when you are done,” she would always say. She had special labels printed out with her name on it that she stuck to the dishes so we knew they were hers.

And it wasn’t just when I, subliminally, suggested I wanted her lasagna. At least a handful of times per year she would surprise me by bringing over a lasagna, some doughboys, or an apple pie. Oh, how I miss that.

Memories like that raced through my mind as I held her hand. I had forgotten my father was even in the room. I realized I had hogged up enough time with her. I again bent over and kissed her forehead. Again, she whispered, “Thank you.” I told her I loved her and she whispered, “I love you too.”

I then hesitated before I said the next thing, but I really felt like I needed to say it. I told her to please give my mother a big hug and a kiss for me when she sees her in heaven. I felt bad that I was reminding my aunt that she was dying, but she had to have known. It would have been easier to say what I said if I knew that she wasn’t listening, but it was obvious she was aware of her surroundings. But I felt I had to say it.

And, in a way, I was envious of my aunt. I wanted to give my mom a hug and a kiss myself. If I knew for sure there was an afterlife, I wouldn’t be here. I would sprint to be with my mother. I would meet everyone else that I left here on earth later when it was their time.

My aunt would make a little bit of a recovery and get discharged. God forbid hospitals keep any patients any longer than they had to. They, obviously, made a mistake. After a few days at home with my cousin, she was put into hospice this past weekend. 

She didn’t last more than a few days. My father spent a lot of time with her those last couple of days in hospice. It kind of pissed me off that he spent hours on end with his sister, but told me after only a half hour on his final day with his wife/my mother that he was bored and wanted to go home.

I feel bad saying that just like I am going to feel bad writing this next thing. It also pissed me off that when my aunt died, I had to hear it from my partner, Erin, after she saw it posted on Facebook. I waited a bit and went downstairs to see if my dad had heard the news. I sensed right away he hadn’t. He was doing dishes. It still took some getting used to seeing him do dishes.

I snuck up behind him and said hi. He said, “Hi, son.” He kept on washing the dishes. I could tell that he thought that it was odd I came down to visit at 8 o’clock at night. I knew for a certainty that he didn’t know about his sister..

I gave him a side hug and told him, “Aunt Maria passed away.”

He dried his hands on a dishrag and went over to sit on his recliner. I sat next to him.

“So she is gone. My younger sister is gone. My sweet Maria.” This was as much emotion as I had ever seen out of him. He just stared straight forward as I held his hand. He kept repeating, “My Maria is gone.”

It then began pissing me off more and more that none of my aunt’s kids had called my dad to tell him the news  first. He (I) shouldn’t have found out like this. I understand the situation and all, but they only needed to make two phone calls – one to my father, and one to the other sibling, my other aunt.

It is the day and age we live in, though. People have forgotten how to communicate the right way. Everything is via social media or text.

You want to know how I found out my sister-in-law died? My brother texted me, “Hey, don’t tell anyone yet, but Ana died last night.” What????? Imagine sitting on your couch and hearing your phone go off. You pick up the phone and tap the screen thinking it is going to be some random text from a friend and you read that!

Some things merit phone calls. I can’t believe I even have to say that. It is just common courtesy.

So now I have to prepare myself for yet another wake and funeral. I know everybody tells me everyone has to deal with death, but they do have a cumulative effect. Not everyone reacts the same. As an empath, I feel others’ pain. When someone dies, I die.

Give my mother a big hug and a kiss for me.