You know that feeling when a baby looks at you and it's like you're their whole world and they love you unconditionally and they know they can just trust you? When my auntie was really sick, that's how she looked at me. She generally listened to my mom. My mom took care of her and she usually knew just what to say to make Robin understand when we needed to do something or we needed to make a decision, big or small. But sometimes... There was a way about my softspoken voice and an unthreatening manner about the fact that I was and had always always always been on her side for our whole lives that if mom couldn't make her understand, I could. Sometimes she just didn't wanna hear it from the person who had all the rules and all the medicine and had to make all the tough calls. That's where I came in. And let me tell you as much as I wish we didn't have to make any decisions or talk about any of those things, it sure felt good to look her in the eyes after she'd refused mom over and over and say "hey... I know we don't wanna do this but you know I'd only be telling you this if it was really important. Do you think maybe we could talk about it?" and have her think for a minute and go... "Yeah... Okay." To look her in the eyes with true love and give her a reassuring nod and have that change her mind and help her understand... That was amazing.
There were days when she didn't wanna see friends or that she didn't understand that a friend was coming to say goodbye when only I could be the voice of reason. When she didn't want anymore motherfucking medicine and only I could talk her into it. Of course she always listened to mom but sometimes she only wanted to hear it from me. I have never felt more loved than that.
There were times... Those last four days... She couldn't talk. She could barely lay there for that matter... And friends and family would come in to talk to her for those last few times. She could hear and she could understand but she couldn't respond. I know her, that killed her. She would have wanted to participate in everything we were doing outside of her room or at least to have those final conversations. That was the last sisterly thing I did for Robin. I was lucky enough to get to know almost every side of her in our 21 years (there were many) so I sat next to her in bed and "responded" the way Robin would have wanted to. Made the jokes Robin would have made. Helped her be present in a moment when she was almost already gone.
If you're ever questioning true, unconditional love... This is my definition.
No comments:
Post a Comment