Hole Spackle

My grandma has been very ill. Not quite immediate deathbed ill, but she may not recover, long term, and could be looking at a move to a nursing home if she does pull out of it. Best case scenario is it takes a month or more for her to recover from the pneumonia she's got after aspirating into her lungs last week. Aspirating into her lungs because, even though she'd been in the hospital for three days, weak from wracking coughs and needing several blood transfusions, but had pulled out of it and had been released, she decided to clean her assisted living apartment for FOUR HOURS and then treat herself to a freaking BURRITO afterward. So she went to bed, completely exhausted, and then woke in the middle of the night coughing, went to the bathroom, fell down, aspirated, and couldn't get back up. She was found in the morning lying in her body's refuse, weak and very cold. I mean, fuck yeah, I've got a ballsy, brassy, sarcastic, stubborn as all hell, 96 pound grandmother who gets out of the hospital and decides she's gonna clean and then treat herself to a flippin' burrito, but FUCK YOU grandma for not taking some fucking time to chill the fuck out and watch some tv instead of cleaning and eating a burrito when you've got serious acid reflux and shouldn't be eating that shit ever again.

So, as a result of this, most of my family made the trip to Iowa this weekend to see her, as it's possible this may be the last time we can see her. She's determined to get better, but she's also a stubborn asshole who wasn't eating the food the hospital gave her because it's tepid, unseasoned and gross. Of course you don't wanna eat it, grandma, but you have to. No one wants to eat pureed baked chicken, but you can't even put your dentures in because your bones are wearing through your gums, so just suck it the fuck up and eat for chrissakes so you can get the eff outta there. We basically sat around her bed and bullied her into eating.

Even more unfortunate than dealing with a dying grandmother (my last living grandparent), this weekend I also had to deal with seeing the uncle who did something untoward to me when I was very small, and definitely did many completely inappropriate things to and around me my entire childhood and early adulthood, until finally, I refused to be around him anymore after my cousin's wedding in 2006. That was the last time he was allowed to hug me and touch my ass. That was the last time he was able to sit across a room and take dozens of photos of me, only me, over and over again. With a year of therapy and a lot of work, I haven't had a nightmare about him in over two years.

On the way to Iowa, I found out he'd be down there.

Now, anyone who knows me knows I don't really freeze up. I may get emotional, I may break down, I may get anxious and over-communicate, but for me to become very still and shut down is incredibly rare. And that's what happened when I had to be around him, for years. He'd come near me to hug me, but I wouldn't be able to say a word, I wouldn't be able to move away, I'd just become very still, my throat would go dry, and tears would well up in my eyes and I'd just wait for it to be over. This is pretty common in the sexually abused, I know, and I resent it in myself. I want to fight, to scream, to throw things, but I can't. I want to yell at him, but I just shut down. Maybe this is why I was so angry for so many years, because I couldn't let it out on him.

So, the second I heard he'd be there, I got very still. Tears welled up. My throat went dry. Sitting in the back seat of my parents' car. My mother assured me she wouldn't let him near me. That I'd be safe. But that kind of safety isn't possible when he's there. In fact, the only time I'll ever be truly safe is after he's dead. But, he's an incredibly unhealthy, alcoholic cockroach of a man. He'll never die. At the least, he'll be around another twenty years.

We arrived at my uncle's house in Iowa, and bad uncle wasn't there yet. He was at the hospital, seeing my grandma. I was so worried about seeing him, it was hard to enjoy seeing the family I'd missed. My other uncle piped up immediately to the uncle whose home it was, "What are we going to do to about sleeping arrangements to keep ___ away from Sarah?" I may have audibly sucked in my breath. It was the FIRST time anyone had ever said, in front of anyone else in my family, that there was a problem. Granted, it was also the first time bad uncle and I had been in the same space in over six years. I became very still. My throat went dry. My eyes welled up with tears, and spilled down my cheeks. My mom, dad, two uncles and two aunts discussed what could be done. My mother suggested getting a hotel. Everyone looked at me, asked what I wanted. I spoke in a meek voice that didn't feel like me. "A hotel would make me more comfortable," and tears ran down my face. My aunt came over to me and put her arms around me. It was decided we'd stay in a hotel.

I stood on my guard for over an hour. Afraid to sit down, lest I'd be trapped if he came in suddenly, afraid to wander too far away from my mom and dad. I kept watching the windows, and when he came up the sidewalk, I braced myself for the worst, that he'd go around and hug everyone, and he'd find his way to me, and no one would be able to stop him, and he'd touch me, he'd hug me, he'd touch my ass, and all I'd be able to do was stand there, very still, my throat dry, tears welling up in my eyes.

But he actually stayed far away. From everyone. He said his hellos, hugged a couple of people, but mostly he wandered away and stayed away. Didn't even make eye contact with me. The second he was out of sight and my aunt thought he might be coming around a corner nearer to me, she stiffened and made eye contact, clearly ready to leap in between us if it came to that. I assured her he'd gone away, and we shared a laugh about her vigilance.

And it went this way all weekend, and he even accidentally bumped into me at one point, but by then, even though it was a constantly stressful thing to be around him, I wasn't really affected by it. He was as surprised as I was. And so, I got through it, minute by minute, deep breaths, calming thoughts, and staying very near my mother or my aunt at all times.

The scariest thing about my grandma dying has been the thought that at her funeral, and the family time surrounding that, that I would have to spend more time focused on keeping him away from me than grieving, especially since everyone else would be grieving, and it would be easy for everyone else to not be on their guard for me. But that's just not the way it went this weekend, and I think, when the funeral comes, it won't be easy, I'll still be stressed being near him, but I know I'll have my family to support me.

This is so enormously huge. I have always felt loved by my family, but "love" in my family is always tough, never soft, never tender, and my parents have never been supportive of any aspect of my lifestyle, from my art, writing and music, to my drinking and inability to stay in a relationship for too long. Suddenly, just in the last couple of months, since Chris and I broke up, I feel supported. I feel a love that is soft and tender. I feel like my choices are respected, even if they're not understood.

I feel like a giant fucking hole in me has been filled and I just could not have imagined how incredible it feels.

It did all make me miss Chris enormously, though. He's the first man I've dated who took a very aggressive, masculine stance toward the abuse from my uncle, saying he'd love to kill him for me, to get rid of him, and make the world safer for me. Typically, the response is tenderness and love and apologies for my having gone through it, but wanting to actively do something to make things better for me isn't the response as a general rule. Not in my boyfriends, at least. And Chris was so perfectly wonderful about saying just the right thing to ease my upsets, to soothe me and make me laugh, and make me feel completely loved and safe. I mean, in the last month, he rarely did that, but in the beginning, it was something I'd never known. I wanted so much to contact him, but I resisted it. I keep telling myself, if he and I are to ever have any kind of relationship, even friendship, it's him that needs to come to me. I can't chase him, I can't poke him and convince him that I should be in his life.

In the meantime, that's a hole that'll slowly get smaller and heal on its own. Even though I'm still resisting it, because I worry time is going to let it get so small and so repaired, there's not even room for him to get back in.