Since I've managed to bring my Mom's passing into focus, this
seems like a logical place to go into some detail about it. Mom had rheumatic fever as a child and, with
medical science where it was in the 1930s, she suffered the after-affects of
that illness.
For the unfamiliar:
Rheumatic Fever Facts. Rheumatic fever is a complication of
a streptococcal pharyngitis infection (strep throat) that can cause damage to
the heart, joints, brain, and skin. The most serious complication of rheumatic
fever is rheumatic heart disease. Most
significant of the complications are cardiac in nature.
Patients with rheumatic
fever who develop carditis may develop long-lasting heart dysfunction. Often
the mitral valve or the aortic valve is affected, and if patients are not responsive
to medications, surgical valve replacement may become necessary. Atrial
fibrillation (irregular fast heart rate) and heart failure can occur.
Sydenham's chorea can be the most difficult complication to treat, and the
individuals with this complication may get recurrence of the disease. A few
people remain very susceptible to reinfection with GABHS and may require
lifetime antibiotic treatment.
Of course, back then there were no valve replacements and
few antibiotics. The post-fever advice
she was given was to avoid stress and not have children. Fortunately for my brother and I, she ignored
that. Unfortunately for her, it ended
badly... I guess... Unless she was at peace in the knowledge that
she had risked everything to bear and raise children. At her passing, I was 20 in college and my
brother was 24 in the Air Force in Southeast Asia. Who knows how to judge such things in life?
Anyway, I was working on a term paper that was due right
after the holiday, pecking away at my typewriter, focused on getting my
assignment completed. My father was at
work with my grandfather (maternal) in the candy/stationary store around the
corner. It was New Years Day so Mom was off
work, home cleaning our spacious 4 room apartment. I remember hearing the vacuum… Some time later… might have been 15 minutes or 30 minutes… I realized it was quiet and figured she had
finished with the Electrolux. Another
few minutes and I went out to read her something I had written. She always had a good fresh slant on things
and I always relied on her to check my language.
At 20, I had exactly zero experience with death. Yes, my grandmother (maternal) had died in
August of 1959 while I was away at camp as a 12 year old. And I recall visiting my grandfather
(paternal) in a hospital shortly before he died a few years earlier. I remember his appearance as someone who was wasting
away, likely a cancer victim. We were
never close but he was dead shortly after.
Working in the store, I would hear that this one or that one died. And on Yom Kippur, I knew my grandfather
(maternal) would always go with my mother to the synagogue to attend the special
Yizkor service for the deceased. Dad
would always stay outside… I never
understood why but he never went in.
Meantime, death was something that ‘happened’… To me, it was an impersonal event that meant a
life was over. There was nothing
emotional about it. Looking back, I can’t
believe how coldly I thought about it.
It was a clinical thing… divorced
from any sense of loss or grief.
Today, I look back and want to believe I was living in a
bubble with a hard shell, protecting myself from any feeling. Somehow, feelings were a sign of weakness.
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