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 14, 2025
Last night, I organized my room a bit. Moved books, creating more book towers. I can't explain my mania and hunger for books. I'm still reading a Jane Kenyon biography.
I got out my floral comforter that was stored away. I want flowers and beauty. We gave mama a vase of flowers for Mother's Day, and they are still alive and beautiful, just like her.
I lay in bed at night and think of the silence to come. The emptiness.
I am alone. Where I am going, no one can come with me.
The wound dressing today was brutal [the cancerous tumor is on my mom's leg]. She was crying out in pain, wailing. I thought of Bergman's Cries and Whispers. It was unbearable to hear it and to watch it and to be powerless. Then, I stepped outside into a warm spring day. Radiant blue sky, luminous green trees and grass. It was offensive, to go from one world to another. The neighbor drove past me, and I could barely muster a wave. I feel myself turning away from people. The anger builds. Why me? Why my mother? Why our life? Why was my father taken from me at 16, and now my mother is being taken from me 20 years later? Why this suffering?
Stay connected to life. Stay devoted to life.
I must be grateful even for this weary, wretched, angry body. I must be grateful to have a body at all.
She has finally agreed to hospice. Everything is too real now.
I don't want to be conscious.
I can't find relief from the pain.
