It’s hard to believe that it’s been a year since my grandmother, Oma, as she was affectionately known, passed away. There have been many times over the last 365 days I wished I could pick up the phone and tell her the latest news, a tradition that we did multiple times throughout any given day. Or, that I could stop my day at 4:30 PM to head over to the nursing home to feed her dinner and sing her favorite Johnny Mathis and Frank Sinatra songs with her. Instead, my tradition these days, is to visit her grave every couple of weeks and put her favorite fresh flowers down, something I will do today to commemorate the day.
I can still remember everything about this time last year and when I got the call. I had just returned home from a client shoot in Philadelphia. While I never liked to be away for more than an overnight, this trip had me gone for three. I felt uneasy about being away for what felt like so long, but when I told my grandmother that I would be gone and asked if she would be okay, she assured me that she would be fine. With that, we said our goodbyes and I love you’s, which turned out to be our last.
I returned from the trip after midnight, and had just enough energy to take a shower and get myself to bed. I was eager to see my grandmother later that day and was preparing to celebrate June 17 as the day that marked ten years as a thyroid cancer survivor for me. I never imagined what it would also come to signify.
At 4 AM, I heard my phone. But in my slumber, and not realizing the time, I assumed it was my alarm to take my thyroid medication. I hit my phone to silence it, but it kept on ringing. Eventually, I woke up enough to realize I was getting a call. While it’s never usually good news one gets in the middle of the night, it wasn’t exactly uncommon for me to get a call from the nursing home at that hour. But somehow, this call felt different.
When I picked up, the woman on the other end of the call wasted no time in delivering the news. She informed me that when they went in to check on my grandmother, she had peacefully passed away. The day that I always knew would come was here, and I felt unprepared. I wasn’t quite sure what to say to the woman, what to do next, or even how to feel at that moment. It was too early to deliver the news to anyone else or to start making preparations, so I stayed in bed and stared at the ceiling. In a matter of minutes, I had lost my grandmother and was no longer a caregiver—my identity felt like it had just died with her.
The nursing home had told me that I could come for one final goodbye, which I did around 8 AM. The place I had spent so much time in over the past two years felt foreign and cold. As I took the elevator to the third floor, walked the long hallway, and rounded the corner to my grandmother’s room, a route I had taken so many times before, I had temporarily forgotten the reason for my early morning visit. I entered her room like I always had, expecting her to perk up when she heard my voice. But the lifelessness stopped me in my tracks. I played her favorite songs one final time, as I held her hand, and tears flowed down my face.
The next few days felt like a blur as condolence cards, flowers, and texts came in. I tried to remember the conversations my grandmother and I had had around life and death to ease the pain, but I was consumed with guilt for not having been there when she passed—something I still struggle with to this day.
As I mark the first anniversary of my grandmother’s passing, I miss all of the moments that we used to share. From taking her to doctor’s appointments to our weekly grocery visits to King Kullen to her calls to make sure I got home okay. I’ve learned that grief doesn’t get easier, but that you find ways to handle it better. And that the slightest thing in the course of a day can trigger those feelings of love and loss. But time has also helped me see things from a new perspective. While the nursing home was far from an ideal situation, I’m grateful for the moments we shared there and that I was able to connect with my grandmother on a deeper level through music. Despite the challenges, our close relationship remained intact until the end. And that’s something I will cherish forever.
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