The Hardest Thing

The following was originally posted October 26, 2009, at http://www.parentclick.com/BlogPost.html?id=1275:

I just did the single most difficult thing I've done in my entire life.

I told my son that his Mamaw passed away.

Riley is 4 and just starting to understand the word "die." To him, it's a word that relates to video games, where dying means you're-starting at your last save point.

My mother-in-law babysat Riley and Jenna for the first few years of their lives, and the two of them have become really attached to her. Her health problems left her unable to watch them, especially Mason, who was born in January.

She was scared Mason didn't know her and wanted to start watching them again. At the time we told her it was silly and he'll grow to know and love her like the others, and that she could watch them when she was feeling better. We did give her and my father-in-law some babysitting duties here and there in the evenings while Crystal and I went out, but of course for a doting grandmother, she missed having the all-day contact with them.

It makes me sad now that she will be proven right. Mason will not have the chance to really know her, and for Riley and especially Jenna, as they grow their memories of her will grow more vague, and they'll never really know the impact she had on their life, and how much she was completely, totally in love with the three of them. It makes me sad that one day Mason will look at a picture of her and ask us who she is.

Linda had her first heart surgery of the year on Riley's birthday this past February. She passed in October, during her sixth procedure. She was only 57.

A collapsed lung (that was left untreated when the doctors were unable to diagnose it properly) from the first surgery left her on oxygen and unable to walk long distances and making things like picking up her grandkids an almost impossible task.

But still the three of them adapted to her as she did them. They learned to be careful around Mamaw and not step on her oxygen hose. Each time she went into the hospital we talked about how Mamaw's heart was broken and needed to be fixed, and Riley understood.

We'd hoped each operation would fix her problem enough that she could recover enough to spend time with them again.

She died at about 3:30 in the morning, and we got back home at about 7:00. Riley had just woke up and came downstairs just after we walked in. Crystal, who was a complete wreck, somehow summoned the courage to tell him. When I opened my mouth I found I couldn't will any sound to come out.

Finally she got through it, telling Riley that Mamaw is in heaven, and I came over to him. I could see he was confused, and soon he started crying, though I think it was in reaction to our own tears that he knew something was wrong.

I think now he understands that Mamaw is gone and won't be coming back. Last night, at a dinner we all had, he broke down crying, saying "I miss Mamaw." Jenna, who is 2, has just started asking to see Mamaw.

How the hell am I supposed to explain it to her?