Grief Fragments is a raw, ongoing diary about being by my mother’s side as she faces terminal cancer. It is an attempt to process—and survive—grief in real-time, to stay connected to life in the midst of death, to write the unspeakable, to bear the unbearable, and to record the final months, weeks, and days I have left with my mother. I am writing for my life.
May 20, 2025
The last spring with my mother. The last summer. Will there be an autumn and a winter? Time and the seasons are different now.
I never liked dystopia. I always preferred to dream of a better world. I held on to hope and possibility, a vision of what could be, despite how bleak my life is. I wanted the future to be better. Now, the future is an abyss. I look forward and see nothing. I look back and everything is gone. What do I have?
All the cruelty of this country is on full display through its health care system.
The local pharmacy would not fill her pain medication because she is a hospice patient. Apparently, they don't make enough money from hospice prescriptions. The cruelty of refusing to fill pain medication for a cancer patient. We found another pharmacy, but we can't pick it up until tomorrow. Her pain will be prolonged because of all this.
I will never forget the cruelty, the indifference, the stress of this time. I've lost faith in people and in life.
I am writing this during a thunderstorm. I listen to the rain outside my window. I want to remember the rain dripping in the dark as my mother sleeps in the next room, alive and warm.
