Mortality reckoning

Mortality hit me in the face yesterday.

Not my own mortality, of course.

I'm not writing this while deceased.

Since the end of February, my family has dealt with...

• the death of my uncle's longtime partner.
• my dad's open heart surgery, pacemaker implantation, and soon-to-follow defibrillator implantation in July. 
• my mom's breast cancer diagnosis and surgery (and to-be-determined treatment plan).
• my nephew's surgery for pectus excavatum.

Up until yesterday, I had emotionally handled all this stress just fine until my dad texted me that my aunt (his sister) had only hours to live.

We knew that hospice was being called in, but we had been told on Saturday that it would be weeks.

By Sunday morning, it was hours.

She passed away in the wee hours of this morning.

My parents, my brother and I went to the hospital yesterday morning to see her a final time.

And my sadness wasn't for my aunt.

She was 86 years old and had a good run.

She had been in declining health for at least six months (as had my uncle's partner, who I considered an aunt).

But what hit me, and still hits me now, is the reality that I am having to deal with all of these "grown-up" issues.

Because inside, I don't feel my age. 

I am still the young child Carrie.

I am not the 45-year-old Carrie with parents in their late 70s and early 80s who are beginning to have health considerations. 

Watching my aunts pass away, women I saw fairly frequently during my childhood, means watching that childhood slip away. 

It is fast becoming, truly, a thing of the past. 

A piece of history.

Seeing my cousins come unglued at the hospital weakened my resolve and sucked any reserves and composure I had felt all these months.

When my brother and I left the hospital, I started talking in the elevator and just couldn't hold back tears.

They were, of course, tears of sadness for my cousins and for my dad and uncle.

But they were also my fears coming out, knowing that my brother and I will be in the midst of actively dealing with this situation in the coming years.

Aren't we just kids, me and K?

How is it possible that we are grown?