June 11, 2020
My grandmother passed away on May 29th. Since December 2019, her suffering had been increasing and her functioning had been decreasing.
First, she fell and broke her arm. I remember my mum saying "I'm worried she'll never walk again". I didn't understand how a broken arm could lead to never walking again. But here's how. Because she needed a cane or a walker, and she couldn't put weight on her dominant hand, she couldn't walk without someone supporting her. Because she was in a lot of pain and on a lot of meds, she didn't want to get out of bed. She stayed in hospital for weeks before being transferred to another facility.
I was in Mexico with my family in early February, when we got a call from an emerge doctor in Toronto. My grandmother had developed a clot in her leg, likely due to anti-coagulants from her arm surgery and lying in bed for over a month. She needed yet another surgery to remove the clot. We were told she may even lose the lower half of her leg. My mum flew back to Toronto while my grandmother recovered from her second surgery in as many months. They removed the clot, and thankfully they did not have to amputate. However, she had variable sensation in her foot, and was in a lot of pain when she moved it. Now she certainly wasn't walking. Her caregivers tried to get her to sit in a wheelchair for an hour a day. She wouldn't do it, it was too uncomfortable.
Just as social distancing guidelines set in, I got to see my grandmother one last time. She had a follow-up appointment in mid-late March to see if they could finally remove the contraption that was holding her arm bones in place while they grew back. Her bones were healing slowly but surely, but they still had a ways to go. Although that appointment was essentially useless, it offered me an opportunity to see my grandmother. If she hadn't needed to go to an appointment, I wouldn't have been able to see her. By that point we were not allowed to enter long term care facilities to visit loved ones. Despite her pain, the setting (a hospital), and the primary topic we discussed (COVID), I think we were both happy we got to see one another. I'm guessing I was the last visitor she had until her last week of life.
In April, she came down with a lung condition and had to go back to hospital. I was sure it was COVID, because there was an outbreak at her facility. Nope. Pneumonia. Probably because she had been lying down for months on end. The meds cleared it up quickly though. However, she continued to decline and in late May my mum got a call saying that she should visit my grandmother very soon to say goodbye.
My grandmother died during COVID. At first, we were all very uncertain about if and how we would grieve communally. It was so hard not being able to go over to my mum's house and give her a hug. When grieving, physical touch and acts of service are important to me. I couldn't show my mum how much I care through touch. But I also couldn't help by doing things I would usually do if we could be in the house together. So I thought of the only thing I could do - offer to coordinate a Zoom memorial services.
My mum, my uncle, and I put together an agenda, sent out a Zoom invite, and today we had the memorial services. It was weird to start a memorial service by providing information about how to mute and unmute, turn video on and off, and use the chat box, but the service surprisingly went amazingly well. I expected technological difficulties, especially since many of the attendees were my grandmother's friends who I did not expect to be familiar with applications like Zoom. However, we're almost 3 months into this pandemic, and I'm guessing everybody in attendance is now familiar with the technology.
There were a number of really positive things that we hadn't anticipated by doing a service online:
People could attend who were in other cities. One of my grandmother's close friends who lives on the other side of the country was able to do a speech! My aunt from the other side of country was able to join. My brother joined from our cottage. And my cousins from the States even attended! In a way, COVID opened up our eyes to different ways of communally grieving. Many of those loved ones would not have been able to attend and would have missed out on on sharing and hearing about my grandmother's life.
Because of the chat box on Zoom, we could share messages privately and to the whole group. This offered another avenue for people to share their feelings, who may not have otherwise been invited to speak formally or who did not feel comfortable speaking in front of a group.
And we were able to record the memorial service and share it with others who weren't able to attend. And now we can keep that video and once again listen to the many stories of my grandmother.
I really didn't know what to expect of an online memorial. But it was really meaningful. We had 5 family members and 4 of her friends do speeches. Another friend who was also a Bishop told stories and led some prayers. My step-dad played some of the music she like on the piano. We had a slideshow of pictures of my grandmother from all walks of life. And my mum led us through a meditation.
Of course it wasn't the same as being able to see people in person and have informal conversations after the service, but we were able to grieve together and share stories. I learned a lot about my grandmother that I didn't know. I'm grateful that we were able to come together. And when this is all over, I expect that we will come together again, in person.
- Roo