I just look them in the eye as I tell them about how I held my mother’s hand as she drown in her own liquefied lungs. This was after I threw up a few times from the hours long horror show of restraining her as she flailed around in a panicked delerium of trying to pull her breathing mask off, already too brain damaged to understand it would kill her. Until finally the staff who were devoting the precious time they could to people they could actually save, got to her with some sedatives.
She had gotten so confused in those last couple of days before the turn. My dad caught it too and was not at all with it, but not hospitalized. My mom called him and he couldn’t even register that the phone was ringing. He heard the voicemail a week after she died… She was asking for him to come see her, confused and scared, not knowing where anyone was or why she was there.
Death rattle, if you’ve been there at the end for someone you know it. Thing is, there was nothing left to “rattle”, just the last puff of air at the top of her lungs that she didn’t have the strength to hold on to, naturally flowing out into a faint groan. Her heart monitor getting weaker, stopping, a few seconds later and another set of beats that looked more like a scribble than rhythm. Another pause, another attempt at the nervous system trying to grasp for life that just isn’t there. Gone.
All because of the bullshit and lies. She was about to get the J&J vaccine because it was a normal type of vaccine, but then the brief blood clot scare that the news overhyped scared her off of it. She was begging for the vaccine shortly before the turn, but couldn’t understand that it was too late.
How do I stay sane? I work to help people in any way I can. I try to enjoy what little time I have on earth. I build things that interest me. I play with my dog. I spend time loving my partner, and with my friends.
Those people are going to die, so will you, so will I, and every single person that exists or will exist. So focus on living what you’ve got, because it’s all you get and these stupid jerks and the stupid things they do and say will distract you from the shit that matters.
If my mom had died of a heart attack, I wouldn’t have people telling me heart attacks aren’t real. People will look me in the eye, and tell me she must not have died of Covid. She died before the vaccines were approved in late 2020. Got it from a coworker with anti-masking family. They all lived. Covid still isn’t real to them.
Sorry to hear that, I know it’s maddening. My mom’s sister was yelling at us to demand the doctors give her the horse paste. She believes that armageddon is going to happen before she dies too, because some old lady at her church told her it would.
One of my mom’s close friends told my partner at her funeral that “she died for what she believed in” and insinuated that we were lying about her asking for the vaccine. Same breed of psychosis.
At the end of the day there’s no point trying to argue or give them any energy or thought, you can’t reason with that level of delusion. This is one of those times where living well is a radical act.
cw: death
I just look them in the eye as I tell them about how I held my mother’s hand as she drown in her own liquefied lungs. This was after I threw up a few times from the hours long horror show of restraining her as she flailed around in a panicked delerium of trying to pull her breathing mask off, already too brain damaged to understand it would kill her. Until finally the staff who were devoting the precious time they could to people they could actually save, got to her with some sedatives.
She had gotten so confused in those last couple of days before the turn. My dad caught it too and was not at all with it, but not hospitalized. My mom called him and he couldn’t even register that the phone was ringing. He heard the voicemail a week after she died… She was asking for him to come see her, confused and scared, not knowing where anyone was or why she was there.
Death rattle, if you’ve been there at the end for someone you know it. Thing is, there was nothing left to “rattle”, just the last puff of air at the top of her lungs that she didn’t have the strength to hold on to, naturally flowing out into a faint groan. Her heart monitor getting weaker, stopping, a few seconds later and another set of beats that looked more like a scribble than rhythm. Another pause, another attempt at the nervous system trying to grasp for life that just isn’t there. Gone.
All because of the bullshit and lies. She was about to get the J&J vaccine because it was a normal type of vaccine, but then the brief blood clot scare that the news overhyped scared her off of it. She was begging for the vaccine shortly before the turn, but couldn’t understand that it was too late.
How do I stay sane? I work to help people in any way I can. I try to enjoy what little time I have on earth. I build things that interest me. I play with my dog. I spend time loving my partner, and with my friends. Those people are going to die, so will you, so will I, and every single person that exists or will exist. So focus on living what you’ve got, because it’s all you get and these stupid jerks and the stupid things they do and say will distract you from the shit that matters.
If my mom had died of a heart attack, I wouldn’t have people telling me heart attacks aren’t real. People will look me in the eye, and tell me she must not have died of Covid. She died before the vaccines were approved in late 2020. Got it from a coworker with anti-masking family. They all lived. Covid still isn’t real to them.
Sorry to hear that, I know it’s maddening. My mom’s sister was yelling at us to demand the doctors give her the horse paste. She believes that armageddon is going to happen before she dies too, because some old lady at her church told her it would. One of my mom’s close friends told my partner at her funeral that “she died for what she believed in” and insinuated that we were lying about her asking for the vaccine. Same breed of psychosis.
At the end of the day there’s no point trying to argue or give them any energy or thought, you can’t reason with that level of delusion. This is one of those times where living well is a radical act.
I’m sorry your family was affected like this. I’ll try to live as well as I can.
Same comrade, we got this.