[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BlogPosting","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/a-mother-daughter-connection-outlives-death\/#BlogPosting","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/a-mother-daughter-connection-outlives-death\/","headline":"A Mother\/Daughter Connection Outlives Death","name":"A Mother\/Daughter Connection Outlives Death","description":"I so wanted to be there holding my mother\u2019s hand at the end. But my mother had other ideas. ","datePublished":"2015-12-18","dateModified":"2021-07-20","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/author\/leslea\/#Person","name":"Lesl\u00e9a Newman","url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/author\/leslea\/","identifier":2656,"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f55545346c97e419475a849dd882d616c01e28e44002aa76b13150518ca40e25?s=96&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f55545346c97e419475a849dd882d616c01e28e44002aa76b13150518ca40e25?s=96&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Equally Wed","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"http:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/equally-wed-lgbtq-weddings-logo.jpg","url":"http:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/equally-wed-lgbtq-weddings-logo.jpg","width":218,"height":60}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/clare-hands-palladino-our-labor-of-love-intro.jpeg","url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/clare-hands-palladino-our-labor-of-love-intro.jpeg","height":210,"width":328},"url":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/a-mother-daughter-connection-outlives-death\/","about":["Community","Family"],"wordCount":1010,"keywords":["daughter","death","devotion","essays","family","mother"],"articleBody":" When my mother was diagnosed with bladder cancer, the first doctor she saw, whom she nicknamed \u201cthe Boy Scout\u201d because he was roughly one-third her age, wanted to remove her bladder. But my mother wasn\u2019t interested. \u201cHe\u2019s a surgeon,\u201d she explained. \u201cSurgeons love to cut. I don\u2019t want to live like that.\u201d By \u201clike that\u201d my mother meant without a bladder and with a nephrostomy tube running from her kidney to a urine bag strapped to her leg.The second doctor my mother saw recommended chemo but she wasn\u2019t interested in that either. \u201cThe cure is worse than the disease,\u201d she said, having witnessed the suffering of many of her friends. Finally my mother agreed to an endoscopic procedure that involved scraping the cancer cells out of her bladder. This treatment appealed to her because it had no side effects. She went in, came out, threw her portable oxygen tank over her shoulder and went on her way.The oxygen was needed because my mother also suffered from COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease). Both her illnesses were caused by a lifelong love affair with Chesterfield Kings, which began when my mother was 14. When she got sick, she reluctantly gave up her two-pack-a-day habit. But this was her only concession to either disease.Life went on. My mother refused to think of herself as sick, let alone dying. She lived the life she had always lived. She finished the New York Times crossword puzzle every morning and watched \u201cAll My Children\u201d every afternoon. She played mah jongg with her friends, and cooked dinner for my father.She dispensed advice to my brothers and me, doted on her grandson, and saw a doctor only when absolutely necessary. Sometimes I got frustrated with her denial. Other times I admired the way she lived in the moment.And then time ran out.Eight years after her cancer diagnosis, my mother\u2019s diseases began competing for her attention. Despite being on oxygen 24\/7, she often found herself gasping for breath. But that was the least of her worries. Because of painful, frequent urination, my mother knew her cancer had spread outside the bladder wall, which meant a trip back to the Boy Scout. This time there was no choice: her bladder had to come out. During surgery, the doctor discovered the cancer had wrapped itself around her ureters and spread to her liver and kidneys. He gave her six months to a year, a year being unlikely.When I told my mother, she simply nodded. \u201cEveryone dies of something,\u201d she said, matter-of-factly. \u201cThis is my something.\u201d Then she patted my hand, as if I were the one in need of comfort. \u201cIt\u2019s not a tragedy,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m 83 years old. I\u2019ve had a good life. I have a wonderful husband, and three wonderful children who are all speaking to me and to each other and not currently in jail,\u201d she joked. \u201cI\u2019m not afraid of dying.\u201d As time went on, my mother grew weaker. Still, she refused to see an oncologist or pulmonologist. \u201cWhat are they going to tell me that I don\u2019t already know?\u201d she asked. A year and a half passed. Then one night, my mother woke in terrible pain. I brought her to the hospital.After three days, the doctor told her she couldn\u2019t stay. \u201cYou\u2019re not getting better and you\u2019re not going to get better,\u201d she said and then gave my mother two options: a hospice facility or hospice care at home. My mother calmly finished her crossword puzzle and then told me she\u2019d like to go into a facility. This shocked me; she had always said she\u2019d leave her home of 50 years \u201cfeet first.\u201d\u201cThis will be easier on your father,\u201d she explained. \u201cIf I die at home, he won\u2019t want to live there any more.\u201dWhen my mother was settled at hospice, I asked if she wanted visitors: her three childhood friends whom I called \u201cthe aunts\u201d were desperate to see her. But she said no.\u201cYou don\u2019t understand,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re saying goodbye to one person. I\u2019m saying goodbye to everyone. It\u2019s too sad.\u201dMy aunts asked if they could come anyway, but I told them no. My job was to honor my mother\u2019s choices, even when I didn\u2019t agree with them.Her last choice was particularly difficult for me, despite being forewarned. A hospice nurse told me the very first day, \u201cYour mother won\u2019t die with you beside her. She won\u2019t be able to let go.\u201dI so wanted to be there holding my mother\u2019s hand at the end. But my mother had other ideas. On one of the few nights I didn\u2019t sleep on a cot in her room, I startled awake at exactly 7:14 a.m. according to the digital clock beside me. I called the hospice and was told my mother\u2019s nurse was too busy to talk. Twenty minutes later the nurse called to tell me that my mother had died at 7:14. It was as if she had tapped me on the shoulder to wake me up and tell me she was going. And then she was gone. Lesl\u00e9a Newman is a past poet laureate of Northampton, and the author of 65 books, including “Mommy, Mama, and Me” and “Daddy, Papa, and Me” and “Donovan’s Big Day.” Her latest poetry collection, \u201cI Carry my Mother,\u201d was published by Headmistress Press in January, 2015.Follow her on Twitter: @lesleanewmanThis essay was first published in the Daily Hampshire Gazette as part of their Dignity Project series and is reprinted with permission from the author and the newspaper.To submit your essay on devotion or any other topic, send a 700-1,500 word piece in the body of the email to editors AT equallywed DOT com. You retain the rights to your work, but it may not have appeared elsewhere before publication on equallywed.com.Photo: Our Labor of Love "},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"A Mother\/Daughter Connection Outlives Death","item":"https:\/\/equallywed.com\/a-mother-daughter-connection-outlives-death\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]