Is It Wrong to Feel Relieved That My Mother is Dead?

With grief there was also a flutter of relief and the unbidden thought, “now I am free.”

Photo by Alex Jones on Unsplash

My husband stood in the room in his underwear, and my mother sprawled across the bed in hers. I had called him to help while he was still in the shower, and water beaded on his shoulders.

“I can’t do this,” I said. “It’s beyond me.”

He hoisted my flailing, protesting mother from bed and deposited her in a wicker chair in the corner. This gave me a chance to bathe her, dress her, and change her bedding. Ignoring her moans, I tugged soggy sheets from the thin hospital mattress and stuffed them in a trash bag, turned the mattress over and tucked a clean sheet over the corners.

When I told him everything was ready, he slid his hands under her arms and heaved her, protesting, from the chair. But she, dead weight, slumped toward the floor.

“”I’m losing her,” he said. “She’s going down.”

I sprang into action, a whirling dervish, grabbing my mother and slamming her to the bed, abandoning any pretense at gentleness. She stared up at us, too stunned to protest.

Later, when we had shifted her to a more comfortable position, raised the hospital bed and covered her with…