keeping it surreal (or: why nesta's been missing the past three days)

the past three days, some of you (probably not) may have noticed i've not been around. this isn't necessarily entirely psychedelic related, but it is at least partially and i wish to post it here. i'd like to share my experiences with you, and ask for your prayers, meditations and/or hopeful thoughts.

thursday evening:
started out rough. after not smoking pot all day, went to work in an agitated mood. it was supposed to be my last day on the job, having had put in my two weeks notice, but they called me earlier and asked me to stay on a little longer. i committed to staying another two weeks on a reduced schedule, because i need the money and they need me. early in the night the owner (who i've never like but have always been amiable and friendly with out of common courtesy) pissed me off beyond belief making comments about "faggots," etc. i walked out and verbally ripped him a new asshole. i don't know any other job i've ever worked at where i could walk out and give the owner the finger and actually be in my car driving off, and still be begged to come back and finish the shift, let alone the next two weeks.

after finishing the nights work (reluctantly, like i said i need the cash) i went home and decided to trip. my drug use had become quite routine as of late, and i'd been wanting to do something i don't usually use to mix things up, give me some new perspectives and (hopefully) insight. do to it's low cost, garaunteed dosages and composition, and ready availability i chose DXM as my substance for the evening. 600mg's of DXM in sucrets and robitussin maximum strength cough capsules later i was in probably one of the most bizarre drug induced states of my life. it was far more psychedelic than i would have expected, and much different from my earlier, lower dosage experiments with the drug. while i don't condone the general use of DXM, i think once in a blue moon it can be a useful tool. it began rough, and i became quite scared. the itch was unbearable, and i actually scratched to the point of bleeding in some areas. i took a shower, and that helped a little. most frightening was my inability to find an antihistamine, fearing i'd had an allergic reaction. this fear was due largely to a sensation of having severely swollen fingers - my hands felt like cartoonish balloon hands. i coped well once i lied down, though. laying still in the dark on my bed, i closed my eyes and didn't move for the majority of the time. it was far easier for me to simply lay back and accept it and allow my mind to take me wherever it wanted. i felt my body transforming, shifting into different shapes and forms; i saw fields of colors and slight patterning behind closed eyes. introspection and thought processes were all present. it was not by any means a pleasant trip, but it was quite a bit more useful than i'd imagined. at about eight in the morning i managed to get to sleep.

friday:
at about ten o'clock i awoke again, unable to get back to sleep. after an hour of tossing and turning, i got up for the day and took a shower. i heard my roommate (who was unaware of all of last nights activities - he came home around 3 am when i was already resigned to my room. hearing him scared the hell out of my and i turned the lights in my room on and off and stumbled around in my dissosciative state trying to make sure of something, but i can't remember what. about half an hour later i went to the bathroom and vommitted. i guess this isn't too important to mention, actually) playing guitar and singing. i went in his room and filled him in on what had happened. after, still stumbling and disoriented from the previous nights events, i went downstairs and decided to make myself useful and start the dishes. after unloading the dishwasher i thought to check my phone for missed calls. i had missed six calls from my sister and parents' home. calling back, i learned that my grandmother was in the hospital and they were keeping her alive with dopamine and other stuff for a few hours until most of the family would be able to make it to indy (out of state for most of us) when they would take her off life support. they expected her to fall asleep and pass away within a few hours. the rest of the day was spent in the car or the hospital, witnessing the tearful goodbyes of her children (with the exception of her son who is in jail, but he managed to get a phone call to her) and grandchildren. she said she was ready, and the doctors unhooked her, leaving her with nothing but juice and an oxygen mask. later that night, still conscious and coherent, she began slipping in and out of lucidity. she became frightened and began asking to go. sometimes it sounded as if she was saying "ok lets go (i'm ready to die)" and sometimes it was very clearly "ok lets go, take me to the car." at one point she insisted her husband (who has been dead for fifteen years) was waiting to go out the door with her. perhaps this was related to the pre-death changes in brain chemistry leading to "hallucinations." who knows. she's not been mentally stable for the past few years at any rate, so it's hard to tell. i've never witnessed anyone else on their deathbed, i have nothing to compare it to. that night i slept on my uncle's porch chair, which leans back for sleeping. i only slept about four hours, and woke up this morning with a stiff neck and headache.

today, saturday:
after everyone was awake and showered, those of us not already at the hospital went. she's no longer conscious or coherent, due to the amount of morphine and sedatives they've started giving her, but her body is still fighting it. she's always been a very stubborn woman. at this point they are now telling us that she may linger like this for a few hours, maybe for a few days. her pulse, breathing, and blood pressure weren't changing much, so my mother (her daughter) stayed in indy while my father and siblings and i returned to ohio. we await the call that she's passed on so we may reunite with family for the funeral. it's unsure when or how we need to prepare, but it's imminent. we've all come to terms with it now, and her being unconscious is far easier to deal with than her slipping in and out of "reality." as bad as this may sound, i wish that active euthanasia were a plausible solution in this case, but its not. she deserves a more dignified death than suffocation or starvation, covered in bedsores and barely comprehending whats going on. its time for her to pass, and i hope that whatever divine force may act upon this world sees it fit to allow her a swift and painless demise within the next few hours so that she, and the rest of us, can move on more easily.

while it was shocking and frightening at first when i heard what was going on yesterday, mostly due to the wierdness of thursday night, i think having just recently been in a challenging dissociative state helped me accept it all. i had just had practice coping with highly unusual (for me) and frightening circumstances, which i managed quite well. i was able to calm myself down and accept the DXM, and later i was able to calm myself down and accept that i was about to witness a relative's death. perhaps also it is my concept of life/death that helped me cope. actually, it undoubtedly helped. i view death as much a natural and beautiful process as birth, and indeed no different in almost any regard. what was difficult was not so much that she was dying, or that (i thought) i would be there to see her last breath, but the effect it had on her children and my other relatives, and the frightened and perhaps skewed state of mind she developed a few hours later. it was hard, and the difficulty isn't over.

i don't know why i chose to share it, or why exactly i chose to share it here. but i just wanted to get this out, get my true thoughts and reflections out in a way that i can't with my largely conservative christian (extended) family.

please keep us in your hearts and minds.

 

will do.

 

wow, what a rough couple of days...i dont want to sound insensitive but death can be a positive thing, it really makes an individual stronger. You seem to be taking it very well. hope everything goes well.

 

why didnt they keep her on dopamine until she died?

death is probably a pretty amazing experience, why have her die in her sleep?

 

i know, and i think its probably the right time for her to go. its not knowing she's dying that bothers me, its seeing the effect on the family, and seeing her lose what little grip she has on reality last night....things like that which bother me.

 

your lucky youve had a grandma till your 20 i recon

 

i think i'm the second youngest of her grandchildren....most of my cousins on that side are married and/or have kids. i suppose i'm lucky, because she helps to bind the family together, even if by and large i wouldn't like these people if they weren't family.

what will be much harder on me is when my dad's parents finally pass away. they're very, very special to me and i would give anything to keep them alive as long as i live. they're in great health, active, very sharp mentally, and they're wonderful people. my grandfather in particular i consider to be one of my biggest role models. he's a rennaisance man; he's a professional artist, an art collector, he majored in chemistry in his college days for a while and still knows a good bit about that, he knows carpentry, he knows wiring, he was a music teacher and went into the army, he used to be a professional hypnotist and stage magician, he learned to write pharsee to communicate with my iranian uncle's parents when my aunt decided to marry him (my uncle), they travel a lot, and he is so fluent in french that while in france people have told him he could pass for french (which i'm lead to believe would be considered quite a complement in a way), and he's just an overall amazing person. they are very young at heart and remain active and healthy, but they're getting so old, who knows what will happen in the near future? that will be very, very difficult on me.

well, i suppose i better wrap this up. my grandmother's condition is worsening, and they expect her to pass today. so i guess this means another 4 hour car trip. but it was expected, and i could have insisted on staying. at least this way i was able to get stoned yesterday for the first time in like 4 days...

 

Sorry to hear it man. I've never experienced the death of a family member before, but I know it can't be easy. Take care.

 

well, she's dead. i wonder what she is experiencing right now, and how she's handling it?

at any rate, i leave again tomorrow afternoon.

 

It's only the beginning. She's "alive" elsewhere now.