Mortality: Gregg the Grim Reaper Is on His Way

Last Monday, as I sat down to eat some yogurt, I saw my mother come back inside the house, having been drinking on the deck outside. Her stumbling made it evident she'd consumed a substantial amount of wine, this intoxication being more frequent as of late. I'd put this down to the fact that she had to change positions at her place of work, this change taking her away from a position she loved so she can clean up the mistakes of others (my mum tells me that a lot of people who work there are either overambitious or just plain lazy, and having worked there myself, I know she isn't making this shit up :P). My mum doesn't get violent or abusive when she's drunk, and I usually don't care because I stay in my room and out of her way, leaving her to dance around and/or talk to herself. However, as I said, the frequency with which this drunkenness occurs has taken a sharp turn upwards, and this worried me.

I let her know that I was concerned, and she promptly defended herself by saying she "needed to forget her troubles" and that she did that through drinking.  I always knew my mum liked to drink, and I've thought to myself in the past that she's technically an alcoholic because she's clearly addicted to alcohol (no matter how little it's affected me), but this was the first time I thought to myself "Wow, you really are an alcoholic". I didn't say this to her, but I'd already made the implication through raising the issue of binging on wine night after night.

My mum then said "I have something to tell you". She then proceeded to tell me she had a serious illness and had anywhere from six months to five years to live.

At this point, I didn't really know how to feel. To be honest, my mum's health hasn't exactly been excellent in the past. I've already highlighted her drinking, but I haven't mentioned her smoking—I don't think it's quite a pack a day, but it's still a substantial amount. This makes it almost no surprise that the illness she spoke of was affecting her respiratory system. That actually made things click for me, because I'd noticed her coughing the same way my maternal grandmother did in her final years, thinking it was only an odd coincidence; though my grandmother neither smoked nor drank heavily, I'd say the two illnesses are rather similar. I asked my mother if there was a cure or something they could do to fix it, only to find out that there wasn't.

I was then told she'd had this illness for around two years; she'd decided not to let me know immediately due to the fact that I was undergoing the HSC at the time. At first, I didn't agree with this decision, but in the end, I understand that my ignorance was for my own good. Given the shit I was going through at the beginning of 2011 (mainly my first break-up, which crushed every positive iota in my body), I wouldn't have taken that news well.

She then became apathetic and nihilistic, saying that it didn't matter if she died. I then asked if she cared what would happen to me if and when she dies, at which point she walked off to the bathroom without answering my question. This frightened me—I thought she was about to commit suicide, her brain having finally snapped, as if she'd now realised that, no, she could not continue this façade of care for me and had to end things here. She closed the bathroom door (albeit only slightly), and asked me to go get her dressing gown. She was on the toilet, so I rushed to her bedroom, grabbed her gown, and jogged back to the bathroom. I stood outside the front door with the gown, listening for the noise of a drawer sliding open, or a door being opened—anything that wasn't the sound of the toilet roll being used or the cistern being flushed. Thankfully, she came out of the bathroom, simply wanting to relieve herself and having no intention to end her life. That was the most nerve-wracking part of this whole thing. I didn't pray to a god or wish for things to happen the way I wanted (that whole 'No atheists in foxholes' thing is bullshit :P); I just stood there waiting for her to do anything other than come out of there alive. After I told her I felt this way, she ensured me at least ten times that she would never ever kill herself; I believe her. She also started to cry upon realising how she'd scared me.

The rest of the discussion was depressing as all fuck, but not for me—I was still trying to figure out what to think and feel. I came to the conclusion midway through this that I wasn't gonna understand this quite yet, realising it was gonna take time for all this to sink in and take full effect. My mum, however, was now alternating between apologising for living her life the way she did while she cried, and telling me she loved me and how she would do anything for me, insisting on her refusal to leave me for any reason apart from death. I tried to reason with her and tell her that she didn't need to apologise for anything, but trying to reason with someone who's drunk and depressed is fucking impossible :P

On an off note, this whole thing right here was the final nail in the coffin for me drinking alcohol. If its consumption makes you this stupid and unreasonable, only serving to complicate matters that are complicated enough as it is, fuck it, I won't touch it. This doesn't mean I don't respect people who drink, nor does it mean I think drinking is amoral; I just don't see a single positive reason to drink, none that outweigh the negatives anyway. My mother was actually the reason I didn't really want to drink alcohol in the first place—her drunk episodes, whilst previously infrequent, were still rather embarrassing, an aspect of her personality I do not wish to emulate. If this failed mindset is the full extent of what drinking can lead to, however, I shall keep away in full.

I digress. She kept telling me about how sorry she was for the decisions she made—living a wild life, the drinking and smoking, even giving birth to me (remember, she's pissed as a parrot, so I'm not taking anything she's saying to heart)—but she was also telling me how she believed in fate, and that "When your time's up, your time's up". It's like 'Well, if you're a determinist and you believe you have no choice in these matters, why are you apologising when it was never your decision in the first place?' But she's inebriated, so logic and reason weren't gonna work here. I just had to bear the grunt and listen to her say the same shit over and over and over, hugging her every time she cried, and saying "I know" every time she said she loves me.

She eventually calmed down a little bit and became more positive, telling me we'd get through this and things would be OK for now. Things have indeed been fine for me lately (though mum is having cramps every night now, putting her in a lot of pain and really fucking with her sleep), but this has been on my mind ever since, just sitting there, leaving me with a whole ton of questions, the most prevalent, of course, being "When?"

For starters, this has got me thinking about my own mortality a little bit. For the past month or so, I've thought a lot about my eating habits, and I've always joked that they'll be the death of me. Thing is, it's true, and I really should start to eat better. I'll leave it to a different entry so I've got some space to explore the issue in detail, but this has made it rather clear that what you put into your body will largely determine how long you walk this earth.

Along with life ending, I've also thought about life beginning, namely children of my own. I honestly still couldn't really give a shit if I have children, but my mother has it in her head that I will have children no matter what. It's not like she's demanding I have kids; she just talks about her grandchildren as if they are a guaranteed occurrence. When she was crying, she kept mentioning how she'd never see her granddaughter, how she'd never get to be a part of her life and stuff. I've told my mum straight (on occasions well before all this happened): I haven't decided whether I want kids yet, and they are not a guarantee. They still aren't. If I meet the woman of my dreams, a woman who I want to spend the rest of my life with and start a family with, then so be it, bring 'em on; but for now, I am undecided, and I cannot be expected to reach a decision on this shit when I am nineteen :P

In addition to this talk, my mum spoke to me last night (sober this time :P) about what will happen when she's gone, or what she fears will happen anyway. She wasn't emotional this time, just a little concerned about some things, namely the fact that she won't be able to provide for me on an emotional level once she's dead. Fiscally, there's no real issue, because I inherit everything and there's enough to keep me going for a while, but my mum fears a void in me that only she can fill, one that will remain empty beyond her death, which could affect me rather severely.

This is what I mean when I say it'll take time for this to sink in: her dying might not get to me, but her death will. I can't rely on anyone else; I will be on my own. I can't trust my family to provide in the same way she did, because whilst they do love me, they don't love me in the same way my mother does. I can't trust my dad because he's a snake and will use the now-motherless house as a sanctuary from his wife and other kid, pretending to care for me just so he can continue being a pussy. As much as I already want to meet a girl more than ever before (something else I'll probably vent about soon :P), this makes me want to have a girlfriend just so when the inevitable happens, whilst I won't have my mother, I'll still have someone I can confide in, someone who I can rely on to comfort me and help me in what will probably be the most difficult time in my life up to that point.

I might write more on this later if more comes up, but for now, this is all I can think of to write. If anyone reading this is concerned, don't be—I am OK, and even though this is obviously on my mind, it's not distressing me, nor is it making me uncomfortable.