It has been a hard 24 hours.  Mark is not feeling real well after yesterday's chemo and Mark had very little restful sleep during the night. I was at the all night Walgreens at 3:30 am to get more prescriptions filled to help him rest for awhile.  It is very hard to feel that I am helping him at all.  After Don left for work, I knew I couldn't keep up with all of Mark's needs so I reluctantly called Grandma to come...which of course she did.  I was able to get a few hours rest so I would be ready for whatever Mark needed tonight.  I hate chemo days and how it makes Mark feel.  Makes me feel like a horrible nurse and an even worse mom. 

Four years ago and I remember it like it was today.  It was actually about this time that I wrote that.  Of all the nights we had Mark at home those six months, this was perhaps the very worst.

Mark was so sick all night.....so sick.  The nausea, the pain, the vomiting just wouldn't stop.  He sat on the floor with me and I literally held him all night.  At one point I said "This is getting to the point where it is too much" and he said "It is getting really close, Mom."   Without any further conversation, without any further thought, I knew that he had his fill and it was the beginning of the end.  I knew it.

Of all the nights, even that last one in the hospital, even the last two weeks at home, that night was the worst.

I ended up calling my mother at 6am and for the first time really cried on the phone, and begged her not to go to work.  Barely got the words out of my mouth.  I had finally been able to get Mark rested and sleeping, and I was physically and emotionally exhausted.  I had not slept for days.

I can feel now my body tense, and the visceral memory of the night is still with me.  I truly felt that I was a lousy mother, a lousy nurse.  It didn't seem to help no matter what I did...at least I thought that at the time.

It was one of those times where there was no one around but him and me.  Don was sleeping so he could go to work, despite being in pain himself, so that Mark would have health insurance.  It was one of the those times that Mark and me were totally on our own.  Neither of us had slept in a day or two.

After he fell asleep I got on the computer trying to find some sort of answer.  I drove to the all night Walgreens and just burst into tears when the pharmacist asked if he could help me.  I left with a couple of zofran and no answers.

It was by far, the longest, the darkest night we ever had. 

When I think of those six months.....a lot of the days, the hours just run together.  Not this night.  This is the one that makes me weak, makes me cry.  It was the horror of the whole experience enveloped into just a 12 hours.

Some of the things that happened during those six months have a second story....Mark finding it in himself to pull through when we were told he had hours.  The days at the hospital getting chemo and me sleeping in the shower, the fund raisers, the visits when hospice care started.   The magic of his last night and the visit from his brother, his sister in law, his coach and his friends and family.

Nothing had the horror of that night.

Yet, now, four years later, I can look back and remember and realize one important thing.  Something other mothers may just wonder as their children grow and assume to be true.

I know Mark loved me.

I now realize that I know one thing is certain.  I know that Mark loved me.  He wanted me there, he wanted me to hold him like he was three, he wanted me fighting for him when he no longer could.  I was given the gift of being his mom.  I think anything that happened to me during my childhood, my adulthood, my career, experiences as a mother and a wife......all were necessary to allow me and Mark to get through that one night. 

It was and remains so, the longest night of my life.  Pouring poison and drugs into my son......and he never complained....only minutely with the comment "It's getting close, Mom."

One day when he was home on hospice, I spent the entire morning helping him get cleaned up, changing suction equipment around, and my daily ritual of wiping down his room.  I was determine that he be in a very clean environment and that there was no odor of death anywhere.  At one point, he was sitting on his little couch...his belly big and his legs heavy.  I helped him lift his legs onto the footstool and he commented that he wanted his "cold towels" that Don kept in the refrigerator.  Don heard him and said he would bring him one.  Don gave it to Mark, and Mark stopped what he was saying to me and looked at Don and said very intently, "Thanks, Dad for doing that for me."   I looked at him and said "What the Hell?  How about me?  I have been working hard here!"  He looked at me with that Mark look and said, "That's your job."

And it was.  I don't think anyone ever needed me, wanted me there as much as Mark did at that time. 

I know Mark loved me.

I know he knew I would not leave him.  I knew he wanted me there and didn't want to let him go.  He knew there was nothing that I would not do for him.

It is something I always have known.  I cherish those nights..every night for six months....that I would sit at his bedside and not go to sleep until he did.  I cherish the memory that when his friends would come over...he would insist that I stay upstairs.  I know now that he knew from that dark December day when he had his scan, that Dr. Tan had told him he had only a few months to live.

He never ever looked back.  He never said "why me".  He never questioned God's plan.  He told me he believed in Jesus Christ and that he was going to Heaven...thus "I win either way".

I still feel so viscerally ill when I think of that night.  I felt so defeated, as I know he did too.  He just wasn't at the point to say "I give" and neither was I.  We allowed him to make every decision,every plan, every thing would be done the way he wanted.

I, in some strange twist of things, am blessed.  It is something that no one can ever take from me...and something I know a lot of other people cannot say for sure.

Oh, how I miss my beautiful boy so.

I haven't written here for awhile.  Mainly because I feel so empty so much of the time.  I concentrate on not talking about Mark and then find myself talking about him even more.  I have missed writing on the website and now that I have a new hard drive and won't have crashes, maybe I can resume this on a more regular basis.

It is the one time I feel that I can let out what is pented up....and also remember.

I have found over the four years that writing things down help.  I don't really care if anyone ever reads it.  I have nothing monumental to say.  I am no expert on dealing with the loss of someone so dear....I am only an expert on Mark.

I have been working on my family history again and tried hard last month when we were in Kansas City to find the grave of Archie Henderson.  He was my grandfather's brother who died at the age of 26.  I only have two pictures of him.  I don't know what kind of man he was, who loved him, who missed him, if he was married, what he did for work and I don't even know for sure what killed him.  I just felt compelled to find his grave since he left no children.  I want to be sure he is remembered.

I didn't find his grave.  I have a picture of it from findagrave.com that someone else was able to locate.  It just shows that almost every activity I do...I can relate back to Mark.

While in Kansas City, Don, my brother Mike and his wife Debbie...went to Crown Center.  Mike and Debbie also look for "signs" from Mark.  We found one at Crown Center without even looking.  We got there after hours and many of the shops were closed.  We turned the corner and could smell the sweetness of soaps and lavendar.  We saw the shop and started to go in it.....then saw the name of the shop..."Sage and Daisy."  Those are the names of the two dogs that belonged to Mark.  So, I went in determined to buy something and the very first thing I saw was a medal for a necklace...yep, a dragonfly.

The coming months will be bittersweet.  Lisa is getting married and Mark loved her so.  She was so much help to us during those months that she will forever be a part of us.  He would be so pleased that she is so happy.

We have another wedding in September.  Mark's cousin Mick is getting married.  I have known that there will be a few things that will come along in life that are going to tap me emotionally and Mick's wedding has always been one that I have to get myself ready for. 

I will need this website, and the writings, and the support that comes with it for the coming months.

Just like I did four years ago tonight at this very moment.

I was so blessed to have been his mom.