Admittedly I have not gotten much done here at the house since my mom had gone into the hospital, and even less since she passed.
This is depression setting in I'm sure, and I need to work through it before it gets to be too much for me to deal with or handle on my own.
After my dad had passed, and getting my mother's terminal diagnosis, I knew immediately that I wanted to put both of their wedding rings together in the urn that I placed them in once mom was gone too.
Finding my mother's rings were easy. They were on her nightstand in the bags that the hospital had placed them in, that I brought home. My dad's ring, I had not seen since it had been on his hand; it was removed in 2018 when he had his stroke, and I haven't seen it since.
I wanted to wait for the right time to ask my mom where it was because I didn't want to start an argument. There were days that she thought & felt that she was coming home and continue on just as she always did. Then some days where she remembered her fate, and I didn't want to make her cry by asking about her husband who was no longer with us anymore.
One day she told me that my dad had visited her in the hospital and that she went home that night and saw him in bed, but he wouldn't wake up... When I am able to write about everything that happened without being reduced to a puddle of tears, I will blog about it. As I mentioned before, I will tell the story of "Us", it will be a series of multiple posts as it will be a really long read.
So, navigating how much my mother remembered of her reality and how much of it she accepted of it, changed on a daily basis. I had to behave accordingly. She really didn't want to die, so I didn't bring anything up that would remind her of what the immediate future held for her. That meant that I would have to just hope and pray that I would find my dad's wedding band on my own.
And Pray I did! 🙏
As I was rifling through tons of jewelry boxes, bags, drawers, etc... I had unearthed items that I did not know existed. A trip down a memory lane that was in existence way before I was ever born.
I had to call my aunt to ask her as to what I was looking at because these items had my mother's maiden name all over it, which meant what I found were items from her childhood that I had never seen before so I knew nothing about them.
Turns out that I found the baby bracelets that were placed on my aunts & uncles by the hospital when they were born. These bracelets look like something out of an Arts & Crafts class as they are made of clay beads and each bead has a letter on it which spelled out their last name (again, not doxing anyone here) which happened to be my mother's maiden name.
In addition to that, I found a Mother's Ring that has a birthstone of ALL my mothers siblings on it; I assume this ring had belonged to my grandmother. I don't remember her wearing it though...
Then I found what appeared to be metal toe tag coins with the same last name on them. This leads me to believe that those were the ones that belonged to my Uncle Hank who passed in 1972. My mother was very close to him and they were the best of friends according to her. His passing affected her deeply.
I don't think she ever healed from that event.
I found a lovely silver bracelet with her and her siblings names & dates of birth on silhouette charms. All of these I will be keeping with me, especially now I know their history. I know the sentiment that they carried with my mom, so I will keep them safe.
I was ready to just give up the fight for the night, and just kept going through boxes and bags seeing what I would keep, send to family & friends, donate, or throw away.
I came across a bag that was the exact one that my dad had kept his medications in, and it was one for my mother. I have been pretty diligent about getting all the prescription medications out of the house, and these have all been well expired so there was no need to keep them.
As I was placing my mom's medications in the plastic bags to be taken to CVS for a Safe Disposal,
I looked down at the bottom of the bag and low & behold... there was my dad's wedding band!
I got so excited and shrieked with joy, I think I blew out the ear drum of the friend who was on the other end of the phone with me as I was going on this "archeological dig" for my dad's jewelry.
I put on some nitrile gloves, opened the urn for the last time, and placed my dad's wedding band within the ashes along with my mom's rings that were already in there.
They are now finally "home".
This makes me so very happy and relieved. It felt "incomplete" to me for their wedding bands to be separate from one another. This was not something that was asked of me by either parent, this was something I felt strongly in my heart to do.
Then as things were calming down for the day, and I was just picking through stuff, I came across a book that I'm sure that my mom got for helping her deal with the loss of my father.
I'm sure she would want me to read it as well.
Looks like another "gift" left behind from my mother to me, to help me deal with the loss of her and my dad.
I can't say that my mom didn't "take care of me" even after she died. As a matter of fact, it was the complete opposite. I have everything tangible I could ever need.
It's her physical presence, voice, and touch that I will have to learn to live without.
That will be the hardest part.
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