Loss.. in all HONESTY

Losing a loved one, in all honesty SUCKS! I received a message asking me to write about the loss of a loved one. I have only experienced losing someone I was close with three times. So when that message came through I was a little stuck. Then at the end of July, I lost one of my favorite people on this earth, my grandpa (PeePaw as I call him). I have been trying to muster the strength to write about it since a week after we got back from my home town in Missouri. Being stuck in the house for the past week due to Hurricane Dorian has helped me realize a few things. 1.) My neurotic personality helps me prepare for natural disasters. 2.) Being stuck inside with my three daughters has helped me appreciate SAHM’s of multiple children. 3.) I always feel better when I write. So here we go.

My PeePaw was the kind of Grandpa every kid wishes for. He took us on fishing trips, played the pull my finger trick, snuck us ice cream, woke us up at the ass-crack of dawn to feed the horses, he would take us to Sunday school and then teach it, he taught us about Baseball (Go Cardinals!) and most of all he made us smile with his contagious laugh. He never raised his voice at us, but we respected him more than anyone. We would stare at the pictures of him standing at attention, a mere 16 years old. His fight in WWII was not a topic he spoke of much. But when he did we knew it was going to be good. My siblings, cousins and I would all squeeze on to his lap and surround the carpet in front of his brown leather recliner staring at him with complete awe. He was our hero. His ice blue eyes would stare into the abbess; as his smile dropped and his eyes wandered you could almost see the demons that taunted him. Then out of nowhere his story would trail off into a made up world and we wouldn’t even realize it until he scared the shit out of us by jumping up yelling “Booga Booga”, making everyone scream.

His doctor always said “Paul, you’re as healthy as a horse”. When I was in grade school, he experienced his first heart related problem. Though for the life of me I cannot remember what it was. I remember my parents telling us we were going to the hospital, because Grandpa’s heart needed some work. After his surgery I insisted on seeing him, I had to see for myself that he was okay. My dad reluctantly took me down the long sterile aisle until I saw a man in a dark hospital room. It was clear he was unconscious and he had a huge tube coming out of his mouth. I froze, but I didn’t cry. I think I was more in shock that I wasn’t scared than I was about the large tube. My dad squeezed my shoulder and said “That is what Grandpa is going to look like, are you sure you can do this?” I took a deep breath and with the confidence of a Derek Jeter stepping up to bat I said “Yes”. We passed two more rooms when I felt my dad slow down. He squeezed my shoulder once more and I knew we had arrived. I turned slowly to my left and saw my hero, with a big white tube down his throat. I didn’t see much else before my eyes filled with tears and I spun around shoving my face into my father’s shirt.

Decades go by, and many more amazing memories, I never took a single moment with him for granite. Especially, after he was diagnosed with dementia. I introduced him to all of my children more than once (as his memory was not as good as it once was). Every phone call was about the same topics, but at least he was talking. When my Grandmother (MeeMaw) passed away in December of 2017, we mourned together. I held him in his wheelchair as he sat at her casket. My hero was in shambles, but looking at him you would never know. His eyes glossed with tears that he was holding back. I knew at some point in his life, perhaps during the war, someone told him he had to be strong. I remember whispering to him “PewwPaw, it’s okay to cry. If they ask just tell them I cried all over you.” With a small smirk, he wept. My Uncles, Aunt and my Father now surrounding us held him close. Every day we had to remind him, but it was just one more conversation that I was able to have with him.

On Tuesday July 23, 2019 around 6:20 am I walked into the living room where my phone was charging, and had multiple missed calls/texts from my Aunt (his caretaker). My world stopped. Maybe not for long, but much like when the heart skips a beat, everything stopped. My body went numb and my mind went blank. My throat was dry and no combination of words can even graze the surface of the emotions my body was feeling. Everything around me froze. I had to face that my hero, was gone. Those conversations were now memories.

Losing a loved one is never easy. Over time your tears of remembrance will be accompanied with smiles. This doesn’t mean it’s any easier that they are gone. You will always mourn the loss. It simply means that you have moved out of the shock and into celebrating. They say there are 5 stages of grief, denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. I say there is one more, celebratory. This is the stage that you not only have accepted that they are no longer psychically with us, but you celebrate their life and the moments you had with them. You look at pictures and smile, because you are celebrating that moment. Everyone is different, sometimes it takes years to get to this stage, but I promise you that day will come. Today I celebrate my Grandpa. I still cycle back through denial, anger, bargaining, and depression but on good days, I smile, laugh and cry that my PeePaw, my hero is not just a phone call away.

Forever a Hero; MY Hero - Paul F. Hillis

- KB in all HONESTY...

My Grandfather's Casket | Photographed by Kelsey Bergner