When one is an adult child with older parents, one is more aware that at any moment they

can leave, especially when they have conditions. It’s like a time bomb that can explode at
any moment, and that is what happened with my mom because she suffered from
hypertension, and it was not very controlled. That Monday night, November 9, 2010, my
brother calls me, he was on his way to the hospital, and he tells me I must go. It was about
8:20, it was rainy and very cold, I remember that afternoon I went to look for you at school
and then went to her house. I didn't want to go inside because my brother was sick, I told her
not to take you or look for you at school because I didn't want you to get sick too. When he
called, I thought it was because she had the virus, but when I arrived and saw people's
faces, I realized something bad happened. When I went to the emergency room, they had
her in a separate room and they were putting stuff on her while she did not respond, she
seemed to have trouble breathing. The doctor told me that he had some theories about what
might’ve happened, he thought it was a stroke because her blood pressure was very high.
My cousin Olga asked how the results had come out, the doctor verified and when he
opened the computer, there were certain parts of her brain that could not be seen due to her
internal bleeding. It could also be seen that her brain was being compressed by the
hemorrhage. He said that he understood that she was not going to survive, at that time the
machines began to beep because her breathing was failing. We had to decide if we wanted
to intubate her or not, everyone was stunned and didn’t answer the questions. I remembered
that your dad's uncle had something similar happen to him and when they intubated him
everything was fixed, so I decided yes. When the decision was made all the doctors took us
out and I got so nervous that I went back to the car. After a while, I decided to go in and
when the doctor arrived, he told me that only a miracle was going to save her and that the
rest of her bodily functions were going to fail until she died. We were waiting for a hospital to
accept her, but no hospital wanted to risk it due to her critical condition. The Medical Centre
hospital accepted her, and we followed her. After waiting all day, the doctors finally came out
and explained her situation to us. She was drained and now it was a matter of time to see if
the pressure in her brain could be controlled. So, we would go every day, either in the
morning or the afternoon. We would go to the hospital every day to check on her. So, we
stayed for three months, traveling back and forward from the house to the hospital and from
the hospital to the house. I came home from 10:00 to 10:30 and it was in February. She
opened her eyes, but she did not respond to anything, she did not speak, and they tried to
remove the machines, but they could not because her body did not produce oxygen by itself.
They gave her a gastro to feed her and that month they released her, and we spent 17 long
months with her. We took care of her because she needed assistance, she opened her eyes,
but she did not respond, she was completely still.

When did her body pass away? When did it stop working? She died that day, that day of the
stroke, she stopped being her. For some scientific reason, or maybe for ourselves, maybe
we didn't want to let her go. She stayed 17 more months, why? I do not know, maybe to give
us the opportunity to assimilate the news and prepare ourselves. Because at that moment
when everything happened, we were not prepared, at least I wasn’t, and in those 17 months,
she was deteriorating in that bed. She became skinny and dry, and since she no longer
responded, I understood that yes, it was time for her to go.

- Do you think that you are ever ready for that moment? –
No, no one is, not the priests, not the religious or the most spiritual people, if they are human
beings, they will never be. No one is ready to lose a loved one.

- Do you regret having tubed her and tied her to those machines? –

On the one hand, yes, on the other hand, no. I regret the machines because once you make
the decision you cannot go back and the moment you realize that person is suffering you
wish you could reverse it, but you cannot. You must leave it there until her body stops
working and that's what happened to her. So, for that part, I understand the decision was
made in a moment of shock and when you are in shock you are going to think about what
you want and what you want is not to lose the person, so you are going to think about what
to do so that that person does not die and does not leave. But over time you realize that the
person who was in your life is not the same person who is laying in that bed. She is not the
person you knew that you would have wanted not to leave. I had many dreams, I dreamed
that I found Mom in the hallway up with the robe. But that dream was an ideal that I wanted
to have, something that never happened.

After that, mom passed away on Viernes Santo, you know it, she passed away with me and
went into a deep sleep. She began to show breathing problems and we decided that we
were not going to take her to the hospital. Everyone started taking turns night after night, we
stayed almost two weeks until the day came. I was checking her, seeing that everything was
fine and for the moment she opened her eyes and I listened when she made a sigh. I put my
hand on her forehead and said, "Mommy go in peace, we will be fine" and she left calmly. I
had never seen someone die in front of me, so I touched her, but I saw her chest move, it
could be the effect of the machine, and something told me to check her feet and I saw that
her nails were tight, and it meant they no longer had oxygen. I got nervous, I didn't know
what to do, so I called your dad and said: "Wilberto, I think Mom died". He called my brother
and he came home. He passed through the streets at high speed and people began to
suspect what had happened. When the nurse arrives and declares her deceased, all the
people arrived to the house.

- Is there anything else you want to contribute? -

After that, I must tell you, what changes? you change, you change a lot, you feel less happy.

- are you crying? -

*chuckles* yeah

It changes your life; you feel less happy.

I used to tell her “The day you die you tell God to give you another husband and to give him
different parents" because those are the roots of evil.