[ music | Depeche Mode – Wrong ]

I fell asleep in a chinese restaurant, and woke up in a tub full of ice. They stole my hair!

Like a thief in the night...

I’m in a hotel room in Pittsburgh, waiting to go north for the funeral. Waiting on anything gives one time to think. One thing all of this ordeal over the past few years has taught me is that I’m not as much of a lone wolf as I used to be. I have found that I actually enjoy the whole “family” thing much more than I ever thought I would. I always knew I wanted to eventually get married, and have kids, etc. But I never thought I’d enjoy the thought of helping and caring for people as much as I do now.  As a friend said to me, “you’re discovering your true self.”  It’s as though I went to sleep one night and someone switched me with someone else while I wasn’t looking. It’s odd to discover big things like that about yourself beyond your teens. I don’t just want to do big things, I want to have a positive effect on the world around me. I’m not satisfied just succeeding, I want to die knowing I changed someone’s life as positively as my mother changed mine. I hope I manage it.

[ music | Samuel Barber – Adagio for Strings (Opus 11) ]

My mother passed away this morning. This is about a year and nine months after her stroke, when I had to admit her to a nursing home, and about 3 years after her diagnosis of dementia, specifically what we believe to have been vascular dementia. In retrospect, I can see the onset was somewhere in early 2002, with significant symptoms emerging in 2004. But she was active and agile into the start of 2008, even though she had have more care at the nursing home than I could provide. She was hit by it quite early in her life, relative to most patients, and sadly the earlier it strikes, the more aggressive it is (and vice versa). If it manages to affect a younger brain, it’s a more severe case, and the prognosis isn’t good. She died at about 8am today, halfway through her 65th year.

She was my only parent, and meant the world to me, we were very close, and I will miss her terribly. But I’m also glad she’s no longer suffering from the cruelest family of diseases, one that robs a person of their memories, their very being. She passed quietly and without much suffering at all. For a short while my site here will be in this monochrome scheme as a form of modern armband of mourning.

I’m leaving for the funeral and mass tomorrow morning, and should be back Saturday. Additionally, I’ll probably be slow on responding to contacts for a bit even after that. Bear with me on that. Please support stem cell and other research into treating Dementia, Alzheimer’s, and other neurodegenerative diseases so that maybe some day soon no families need ever see their loved ones slowly slip away from the inside out, and no one ever need forget who they are. Thanks.

Grey