dreadful funeral today

[WitchyOoman]

I'm feeling about as low as I've ever felt. I just crawled home. CRAWLED in the door. I'm beat, exhausted, low, depressed, so sad I can't even explain how depressed... and I wish I'd jumped into Uncle Charlie's grave right along with his plain pine casket today. I have no will to do anything. Nothing left in me. My beloved gentle Uncle Charlie is gone forever. I'm so sick. I thought it was terrible when he stopped recognizing me (all of us). No, it wasn't. Because he loved people so much, he just thought he was back in his younger days teaching his patients about their eyes. He never minded spending time with new people, so getting to know us allover again, each time we visited him was happy for him... stressful of us, perhaps, but it made him happy enough. Not terrible. I thought it was terrible when he mistook me for his long-dead sister. No it wasn't. He loved her dearly and it gave him great joy to "be with her" again. Stressful (and confusing) for me, yes. But joyful for him. I thought it was horrifying for my Aunt Bernice to have to watch her beloved husband of 63 years (yes, you read that right, they had been married for 63 years!) deteriorate. If it was, my aunt - always the great lady - never let on that she felt any horror. I sure as hell felt horror - plenty of it! But I tried to emulate my beloved Aunt Bernice and pretend that the horror didn't exist. If my aunt could do it, so must I be able to do it... right? Jewish funerals are sooo lacking; a a scant hour in a bare room devoid of all flowers and the casket - just a large, empty, cold room (usually painted white) with rows of folding chairs... that's it. Nothing else. Cut flowers are "dead" so Jews will not have them near them, especially at funerals. Dead bodies are ritually "unclean", so Jews do not let dead bodies near them, either, even at funerals - so the corpse must not be near the mourners, or they could not pray properly (being ritually unclean). Really, that is just as well, since Judaism also does not permit any form of preservation OR prettying up of the corpse (only ritual washing of the body), and they may only bury in a plain wooden box or a plain shroud with no metal ornamentation. Nothing that does not decompose. Dust to dust, for real! I just can't deal with this, I just can't handle it. No! Not my Uncle Charlie!! No! He was my only refuge from a family full of abusers! No!! I could always run to Uncle Charlie's and Aunt Bernice's house.. or hop the train downtown and walk over to Lit Brother's on Market Street and go to Uncle Charlie' office, where I could always amuse myself by trying on all of the eyeglass frames until he could see me in between his patients' appointments!! I knew how to get from Fox Chase to Center City by train by the time I was 6 years old. And circa 1968, few people asked a little girl questions if she looked like she knew what she was doing. The train conductors always gave e free rides and usually let me ride up front with the engineers... that would never happen today! LOL I had to make a 2 1/2 hour drive down to North Broad St at Ogontz today, then all the way down to Delaware County for the burial, then a 3 1/2 hour drive back home. I'm done. Finished. I can't stand the pain of knowing that my beloved Uncle Charlie exists no more. He is dead and gone. He lived 92 years on this earth, loving all people that he ever met. Now he's gone, nothing, dead. I can't stop crying. I am so sick deep inside. So hollow. So empty. I can't stop shaking. How is my Aunt Bernice going to survive now? I can't lose her, too... I am sick to my stomach, now. Still shaking, can't stop it.

[SamChabs]

[WitchyOoman]

Thank u Sam. I'm still shaking, never stopped. What misery! I can't stand this misery. How will I ever take care of my family? I just can't. I can't.

[LinSkinny]

Hang in there.

The first funeral I went to was my grandmother on my Dad's side. She was in a coma, but would squeeze the hand once or twice in response to questions. I was in the room with her 6 grown children, (my dad, aunts and uncles) then her daughter from England arrived and she passed as she held that daughter's hand. I cried like a colicky baby for days. A grown man acting like that, but the pain of all those years of her calling me to come visit---I was too busy trying to make a living in this world. The funeral was the first time I saw my dad cry. Let the tears flow freely. Time will make it easier to deal with even though the pain might never go away. Again, hang in there.