Coping. Or not.

by Liz Deacle | Grief, Personal

Please note: This post was originally an email to my Front Row newsletter community. Written from the depths of grief. My mother had been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer four months earlier. I want you to know you are not alone. 

My mum is my number one fan. She was the first one to sign up for this newsletter.

At first, I thought it was because she was nosey and wanted to know if me and Brian were having kinky sex so she could phone her sister and tell her, but I soon came to realise that she was reading my words because she loved them.

They made her laugh.

They gave her an insight into the other me. The me that rarely shows up in real life. 

Before I press publish on this email, the hardest thing I will do is go into the filter and exclude my mum from the list.

She will not get this email. I can’t let her see it. I want her to think I am strong and am coping.

She will never see these words.

My Mum is Dying

I recently spent the weekend with a friend.

I didn’t want to go. She asked me, and I said, “Oh, that sounds nice,” but really I was thinking, ‘No way. Stuff that. I can’t think of anything worse. I’d rather crawl under a rock and die than leave Brian and my pillow and pretend that I’m normal and coping’.

“I can’t go.” I cried to my husband, Brian. “What if she asks about my mum? What if I have to make a decision? I can’t go. I won’t go. No, Brian. No.”

I went.

The weekend was lovely, hard, but lovely. 

The woman is a GP.

She lost her mum to cancer five years ago. This woman was exactly who I needed to spend time with. The universe knows. It always knows.

My brave friend spoke of her mum. She shared words I believed only took place in my head. Guilt-laden, chest-heaving thoughts that have taken to entering my head in the middle of the night. 

Thoughts that permeate any feeble attempts at positivity. 

‘I know what you are going through’, she soothed. ‘It’s shit and Cruel. There were days when all I wanted to do was hold a pillow over my mum’s face and put an end to it all.’ 

Shit and cruel. Two words that depict this perfectly.

It was as though she could read my mind. Taken a sneak peek into my life. Heard the words that I scream regularly into the switched-off stereo whenever I drive away from a mum who is fading away and who I am struggling to recognise. 

Coping. Or Not.

Today is not a pillow on the face day.

It’s a sad day. It’s a your-mum-wouldn’t-want-you-to-write-this-email day. It’s a don’t-you-dare-press-send-and-exclude-me kind of day. 

It’s a wracked with guilt day.

A day where I can’t suppress the secret longing for that phone call. The phone call from my father-in-law who will tell me that my darling mum has passed away peacefully in her sleep.

But I know the phone call won’t come.

Not today, at least.

She has too much fight inside of her. Too much bloody-mindedness.

She is my mother, after all.

As I do my best to protect all bases and navigate how to show up for my mum, Kev’s wife, Sonny and Tessa’s grandma, I realise that when one is battling an illness as monstrous as Cancer, all reason leaves the room.

My mum knows she is not eating or drinking, yet still, she says, ‘Don’t worry, Lizzie. I’ll still be here in eight years. Just you wait and see.’

I’m not sure where the eight years came from.

Probably from one of her well-meaning Facebook friends. “Oh, my next-door neighbour had stage four lung cancer, and she’s still here eight years later”.

Ping. Like. Share. Next.

My mum has clung to that eight-year ticket for dear life. Told everyone and anyone who’ll listen. And who knows? Maybe she will still be here in eight years. I sincerely hope so.

At least, I think I do.

There are days when I walk up the gravel drive to find her sitting in the garden under the big Sycamore tree with filtered sunlight dancing across her beautifully shaped bare head. 

“Hello, darling!” she says, smiling at me. “Do you want a blanket?” (No thanks, Mum, it’s eighty degrees outside. My knickers are sodden in so much sweat I’m squelching). 

On those days? Yes. I believe her eight-year promise to be true.

She is my mum, after all. She knows best. If anyone can ward off death for eight years, my mum can.

But then there are the other days.

Days like yesterday. Days when I watch her being carried out of the house and into my car by her husband. Cradled like a child. Unable to walk or muster the energy to even try.

And on those days, as I grip the steering wheel so hard the blood leaves my knuckles, I see no eight years.

Nor eight months.

Not even eight hours.

My Mum is Dying

I am in two minds about whether or not to share this email.

I know that my unsubscribe rate will triple once I send it.

No one wants to read a post such as this. Learn that the woman they thought was quite nice and rather funny is, in fact, a closet murderer and a big fat liar. A sweaty fake friend.  

But I am not writing these words for those people.

I am writing them for you. Because you might need to hear them.

Just as I did that weekend with my friend.

I am pressing send because I want you to remember this:

Whatever you are thinking, whichever way you’re feeling, in how you are dealing with, coping through or reeling from … know this: me too, my friend. Me too.

Exactly the same thoughts. Exactly the same feelings. You. Are. Not. Alone.

Quote that says it so much better than me:

“If I exist, then surely there must be someone else out there like me.” – Joyce Rachelle

Thank you for listening.

Always authentically yours,

Liz x

Liz’s 5-Day Letters

Would you like to be friends?

I have five letters. Five letters from my personal journals.

I wrote these letters in the days and weeks after my Mum’s passing. During the darkest and hardest of times, when I needed hope instead of gloom. Light in place of dark. Laughter instead of snot.

When I needed my mum.

I would love to share these letters with you in the hope they bring you the comfort, love and inspiration they brought me.
It would be an honour to share them with you.

Sign up for Liz’s Five Letters here or fill the box in below. I look forward to helping you.

If this post was helpful, please share it with others who need to know they are not alone. Thank you. Liz x