Kates lesbian open diary

6/24/2009
Life has been rough. My grandparents whom have both lived full lives are now nearing the end of their journey. My grandparents would have celebrated 60 plus years of marriage this fall. My grandmother in the last 6 years has had breast cancer, colon cancer, and is now suffering from lung cancer and Alzheimer’s disease is now laying in her death bed and it is really hard to watch. In the last few years we have watched her struggle through all of this and still maintain a small margin of her, but that is no longer the case. She has been unable to get out of bed for about the last week and we are trying to make her last days in this world as comfortable as possible all the while supporting my grandfather who also has lung cancer and dementia. Her keeps calling me is daughter-in-law, but I am his granddaughter. I don’t take any of this personally. He just doesn’t know at this point. The other day I sat with him for many hours and he talked a little about everything with me. He told me of his childhood, of his days a POW, and he also talked of his work at a state police officer. All of my aunts and uncles are so thrilled that I am the only grandchild who has stepped up to the plate and I go and see him everyday … up to four times a day. I take care of all of his needs and even help with my grandmother as best as I can. My grandfather is always so happy to see me every day and I am the only one who makes him smile and take away some of this sadness, which is a weight that I don’t mind bearing. It just seems so sad to me to know that after all of these years he will have nothing in a few days to look forward to other than me when the woman he has spent a life time with will no longer be with us. Don’t take this the wrong way. I understand that it is their time and that this is just the way that their lives should end up. After all of those years they should go together. In the same moment and in the same breath life should be over for them. There was a point that I thought I understood, but I don’t. Every day I watch as my grandmother withers away to nothing and it bothers me more than I can say without tears in my eyes, but what really kills me is the sadness that is my grandfather’s and his alone to shoulder. None of us can understand the pain that he right now denies rather than accept. After 60 years my grandmother is more important to him than his own breath. He keeps telling that she will get better and then they will be able to go and do things. He is right she will get better, but not in the way he is thinking. She will get better with death and she will be waiting on the other side for him. I don’t know where my heart lays with this issue … is there a heaven? I don’t know for sure, but I do like to think that she will be somewhere waiting for him to join her. Which will not be long …