Angelface

I have a small "picture frame" in the corner of my desktop that scrolls through pictures like a slide show, and this one that is just so utterly precious of my mom popped up just seconds ago, and instead of getting happy, like I usually get when I look at her face, I got so incredibly angry that I could almost barely breathe. I don't understand why this happened. I could feel my lips pinch together and my eyes squint hard, and I looked up to the sky and asked, "Why did you do this to me? How could you do this?" I do not understand why God took her away. I am so angry at him. I will never understand.

I am shocked at this kind of emotion, after I have been feeling so solid for so long now. I know it hasn't even been two months since she died, but I was starting to feel comfortable with the idea, because, obviously, there's nothing else that can be done at this point except to accept it and move on. It will never change. She is not coming back.

This picture is so incredible, this one of her that made me feel this way. Usually, when I look at it, I get this feeling of comfort and contentment that sweeps over me and warms my heart in such a way that I actually feel happy from the inside out. Sometime in August, on one of her breaks from the hospital, we decided to venture out and take a trip to go see her sisters at a garage sale they were having. Several years ago, she got a tinkerbell t-shirt that was too small for her, which embarrassed her, and she kept it in the bottom of one of her drawers and never wore it, although I know she wished she could have. Because she lost so much weight, she decided to try it on, and not only did it fit, but it was actually a little too big for her. She came out of her bedroom and said, "Look! It fits!" She was so excited. I don't know why I got the idea to ask her to wear fairy wings, but I had them in my closet from an old Halloween costume, and they went along so well with the theme of her shirt. I can't believe she agreed to put them on, she usually was so afraid to do silly things like that. But she put them on, and my heart just melted. She had on perfectly white tennis shoes, dark blue jeans, her white and lime green tinkerbell shirt, a lime green ballcap, and these purple fairy wings. She even wore them to visit her sisters at the garage sale, and she smiled and laughed and I don't ever think she realized just how tooth-achingly sweet she really was that day. She was standing in front of some bails of hay, and as she turned around to look at me, I saw the joy and happiness perfectly etched on her face, happy to be in the sunshine and with her sisters. I asked if I could take a picture of her, fairy wings and all. I still can't believe that she agreed, and I took the picture and managed to capture that amazing joy and glow she had about her that day. This is my favorite picture of her. My absolute favorite. She is my little angelface, and she is just perfect.

What was so great about our relationship is that we loved each other just the way we were. She was always so cute, and she always wanted to wear "cool" clothes, but she was a little overweight and couldn't fit into everything she wanted to buy. I never thought she looked anything but as sweet as she always did. I just adored her. Several months before my mom was diagnosed, she started Weight Watchers and she really tried hard. I was so proud of her, because you could see how determined she was. I don't think she always had the best self-esteem, and it was really nice to finally see her paying attention to herself. She respected herself, and she was starting to see how great she could be. I can't tell you how happy this made me to see her have some faith in herself. Right before she was diagnosed, she hit the 30-pound mark. 30 pounds. Every Monday after her meeting, she'd call me and give me her results, too excited to wait until she got home to just tell me there. "Another pound and a half!" she'd say. I would explode with surprise and happiness, making sure to let her know how thrilled I was for her. I tried to be her own personal cheerleader, to help her in any way I could. She was diagnosed on a Monday. During the time she should have been in her Weight Watchers meeting, she was being told she had leukemia.

I know this sounds so weird, but one of the things I was most mad about when I found out was that she had finally realized she was worth that kind of effort to lose weight and get herself healthy again. She was really doing it, really trying as hard as she could, and she was so successful. I don't know why this was taken away from her. I don't understand why she couldn't be left alone, to see how far she could go all by herself. What amazing things it would have done for her to know that she could do anything she wanted, even something as hard as losing that kind of weight. Her blood pressure was going down, her cholesterol was going down, her sleep apnea was completely gone. She was starting to see the benefits of all of her hard work, and we even started going shopping for "cool" clothes. She was so proud of herself.

And it was all taken away.

She started to lose weight from chemo. From not eating. From being sick all the time. Because she couldn't taste her food, or she couldn't smell it, or because just looking at it made her want to throw up. Her muscles were wasting, and you could see her collar bones and how long and skinny her legs were. But not a good kind of long and skinny. The other kind. She was so thin and fragile. She was not fit and healthy and happy, like she wanted to be. I think of all the things I am angry about, this most definitely takes the top prize. She was finally getting there. Finally taking care of herself, because, for whatever reason, whatever triggered it, she finally realized she was worth it. I am so angry it was all just shattered right in front of her.

All I ever wanted was for her to be happy. Especially with herself. I have pledged my education and my volunteer work and my career to making people feel healthy and happy with themselves. I believe in food and exercise, in drive and determination far over dieting and surgery and pills. I believe in it so much that sometimes it is frustrating to see people defeated by it, because it works, and it makes people feel like they can do something. I always wanted her to realize how special she was and how much she deserved all the things life had to offer. For as long as I can remember, she always wanted to wear nicer things made for a more slender body, and she finally had that chance. She enjoyed things so much more, like going shopping with me. She had more energy, and you could tell something inside her really changed. She was so different, and I loved to see her confidence and her self-esteem soar. She smiled more, and she was genuinely happy with herself. It was contagious. I will never be able to fully describe how much I loved her, and 30 pounds lighter or not, I just couldn't get enough of her. I was so happy for her.

When she was diagnosed, I felt that confidence break, I could see it break inside her. She knew all of her efforts were being taken away. All of her hard work. All of her freedom. I will never understand how she felt at that moment, and I hope I never do, but I can imagine that it feels something like staring down the barrel of a gun. Life or death. In the blink of an eye. I hate that she felt this, and not just for a second, but over and over again. I hate that she was worried and scared all the time, and I hate the she had to be sick and stuck in the hospital for the majority of the last six months of her life. She was in remission. She could have come home and enjoyed her last several years, if it came to that, home and happy, with us, and with her sisters. But she chose to have the transplant, to fight for her life as hard as she possibly could, to give up so many things just for another chance. I am so angry that we didn't have her for longer. We could have and we didn't. It is a choice that I'm sure most people would make, but for me, from the beginning, it felt like a death sentence. I was so scared to lose her, and after the first meeting up in Cleveland Clinic about all the risks and potential complications, I felt like my time with her was limited. She was so much more positive and so much more faithful and upbeat than I was. I'm sorry she had to deal with me like that. I was too scared to function in any other capacity, I guess. I'm so angry that she was as scared as she was too, and that I didn't help more than I did. I'm so angry that she tried so hard and was so brave for all of us, more than for herself. I'm so angry at whoever was working there that brought in that strand of virus that is "only found in the hospital" that would ultimately end her life less than a week later.

I'm so angry that I cried the way I did in front of her the first day I saw her like that. She was so scared, and she knew exactly what was happening to her. I know she did. And I am angry that I am finally accepting that, because I denied it for so long, that she didn't know, that she was confused, that she couldn't hear us, that she wasn't in any pain. Bullshit. All of it. She knew. She knew everything. How naive we all were to try to protect ourselves into thinking she didn't. All I am thankful for is that I spent almost three hours alone with her, all by myself, and even though they were mortifying and they now haunt me more than I'd like to admit, they were still us together. I wouldn't want the nurses to have such a job. That kind of job is only for someone who loves you so monumentally that they would face it so you didn't have to be alone. I wouldn't trade it for the world that I got to pet her head and hold her hands and try to calm her every couple minutes when she would try to take her breathing mask off. I wouldn't trade the chance to tell her I love her over and over and to comfort her when she said she was scared. "I don't want to die" she'd say every so often, and I would just whisper quiet but empty promises to her. "I know, momma. You're going to be just fine." But I knew "just fine" meant Heaven, and even though it turned out for the worst, she really is just fine now, I suppose. But I am angry that she had to go through all of that and that she was so scared. The only thing I would trade it for is for me to take her place. Without a doubt, without a second thought, I would have agreed to it right then and there. I have thought that ever since our lives changed on March 16th when she was diagnosed. I would have given anything for it to be me instead of her. Anything.

I am mad, most of all, that she went through all of it for nothing. Absolutely nothing. I am so angry tonight, I am actually in complete and utter shock at myself.

I can't end this on a positive note, not tonight. I don't feel like it. I painted my nails dark gray.