It's been a year

 A full year since I last blogged about anything. 

It's been a wonderful and truly horrible year.

After 38 years of marriage, my George died suddenly.  I will be forever grateful that his last day was so filled with joy. He spent several hours at the local war museum fixing old models and creating new ones for the various displays. He came home and ate his favorite meal, played with the dogs and spent some quality time with me just sharing what his day had been like.

He went to bed and was sleeping soundly....so was I...when I heard him make a noise.  I jumped from the bed, turned on the light and saw my George. I called 911,

He stopped breathing. I started CPR...the emts arrived and took over. George had not breathed on his own for over 1/2 hour. He was definitively brain damaged but I didn't know how badly...yet.

George was transferred to a local hospital where he was sent to the ICU....they had intubated him.  He had a DNR order but had never signed the blasted thing, so I had no legal options. My power of attorney did NOT give me the right to take him off the life support, even though it was quite obvious to everyone that his brain activity was less than fully functional. George, my George was gone...leaving a body behind that was being kept alive by machines.

He was hospitalized for four days.  Four days of not knowing who I was, of not being able to maintain eye contact or understand the spoken word. Four days of being unable to swallow...or control his body movements. 

His brothers came as soon as they could and arrived the same day I had finally persuaded his doctor to release him to Hospice care. A neurology report had come back to confirm that a massive stroke had rendered his brain far beyond repair....with only brain stem activity. 

George came home on the 22nd of September.  His brothers had a chance to say goodbye. Josh, the young man that George loved as a grandson had a chance to say goodbye.

George died peacefully the following day.

And my life changed. Completely and not for the better. My companion of 60 years, my best friend and my husband all left me. I am alone for the very first time in my life. I have no one to kiss awake or hug goodnight. No one to cook for...no one to clean for. Or make a quilt for. Or laugh with over silly British comedies, No one who remembers our elementary through high school years...or our raising kids.

There are no models in my dining room.  No shoes left in every room of the house for me to trip over.

I kept a bottle of his aftershave.  I open it carefully and just breath in the scent that George used...and I can see him in my mind's eye...I can hear his laugh. I can almost feel his arms around me. But it doesn't last and I feel cleaved in half yet again.

I feel. I feel guilt for living, for laughing and for being so very angry.  I want to scream at him..."how could you leave me?", "Why did you leave me?" "Damn it all George, you were supposed to live longer than me!".

George left me a list.  On it are "suggestions" for each week...at first it was for each day, but enough time has gone by that it is now a once per week thing. He left instructions for his modals, his books, his clothes records and dvd's. He left instructions to "change the bedroom" so it was truly mines and not ours.

 All of the things he wrote, arranged or suggested have helped enormously. I think without his words to me I would have simply given up. I would have found a way to join him. He knew I would feel that way and did his best to force me to live. His list has helped. I'm still here. I just don't want to be. But I still have six pages to go and I know that by the time I finish George's list to me, I will want to be alive again.