The Longest Two Days

On Monday a week ago the hospice nurse told my family that my grandmother had one to two days left. That was a week ago. The nurse has been scheduled to come twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays. Last Thursday she said she was surprised to be visiting my grandmother again, having believed that she would have passed away already. Imagine her surprise at visiting her again this morning.

You can not imagine how long these "two days" have been.

When someone in the medical field has told you that a loved one has two to three months to live, you sort of believe them, but you know that some people die sooner and some live longer. Everyone has heard those stories of people living months, even years, longer than expected and you know that no one knows for sure when it's someone's time to go. The days and weeks go by and you see good days and bad and the illness progresses. When someone says your loved one is down to the last couple of weeks, you understand that the time is short, but you remember that no one knows these things for certain. When someone starts saying it's a day or two, you know they really mean it could happen at any moment, so everyone should be prepared, right? You certainly don't think they're off by a week or more!!

Last week was the longest "day or two" any of us have ever had. It was the weeklong vigil for the coming end that didn't come. By the end of the week we were all running out of words. We've said our "I love yous," our goodbyes, and our plans for how we will make it when she does leave us. Even her pastor came over on Thursday to sort of, well, send her off. Friday morning we thought we were entering the final stage of her borrowed time when SHE told my Aunt to call "the boys" (my dad and uncle) because it was time for her to go. -- her words!! We gathered. We laughed. We cried. We sat in silence watching her breathing for an interminable amount of time, and then, well, nothing. She didn't die. Someone broke the vigil and got up. Someone else went to the bathroom. Eventually my grandmother asked to be moved from the hospital bed to her own bed. OK! Here we go. We all have notions about dying in our own beds, maybe that was what was holding her back. So, we moved her. We cried some more. We prayed. We hugged each other. We waited for her to sleep, to rest, to drift away. She finally fell asleep with my dad reading the Bible to her.

But it still isn't over. She awoke on Saturday. She talked with her daughter about the new shopping district in town. She wanted some coffee. My cousins took her outside onto her patio in her wheel chair. Still not the end yet.

Sunday and Monday brought more sleeping and more painful unrest, but still death waits.

It's been the longest two days.