This is a story written by a friend of mine who is grieving the loss of her grandmother. I don't have much knowledge of bereavement so I would like some advise on what to tell this young lady....many thanks for those who contribute and God Bless!



My grandmother has been abducted and replaced by a old person.
The smell that welcomes us when we enter the small 2 rooms and kitchen apartment is a smell i just remember from one time before, when I was at a place where the old people wait.
We says, "Hello! we are here now!". I know the smell now.
Steralised excrements.
My ears are screaming and 23 drilling machines are doing their best to drive me insane,"just say something, just say something, say something SAY SOMETHING! SA...." a weak sound is heard from the bedroom. I dare to look into the apartment for the first ime since i walked in.The most wonderful weak sound ive everheard has saved the world from going under. This feeling is very quickly vanished.
The old lady in my grandmothers bed neither looks like nor sounds like her. Her bones are showing and sticking out from the thin nightingdress, and i barely dare to hug her for the fear of breaking her.She is so small.
Mum sits down on the bed beside her and starts talking about something.
I cant handle this, i start looking for a glas, in the kitchen i find perfectly stapled glases on a shelf and fill it up with cold water.
Its blurry in front of my eyes and the drilling machines are back,all dizzy, what is happening? Need to throw up.
An old foodcarton is giving away a bad smell and i open the trashcan to throw it away. In the can there is a diaper. The smell reveals that its been used. It burns in my nostrils like acid.
Old lady diaperfilled with old lady poop.
Its hard to decide there at the moment if its the smell that makes me jump or the thought of that my beloved grandmother cant go to the toilet anymore.
The old lady without teeth smiles at me when i come back to the bedroom and reaches for the glass of water. Smile, no it looks more like a wax figure that started to melt.
She starts giving m compliments for my hat, and its obvious she has one of the confusing days.
I dont wear a hat.

Later that evening in a discussion about cars and drivers licenses the tears wont stop falling.
But smehow they feel just as unreal as the old lady we met before. could it be my grandmother,
My dear beloved little grandmother.

I saw her like that one more time, in the hospital, friday the 4th of july, 4 pm between two workshifts.
Our conversation was denying that it was the last time we spoke and we made up plans for the next weekend, she started talking about when they made had a birthday party last summer in our garden and how much she loved it. Then she needed to sleep a little.
8.00 AM 5th july 2008 dad called me while mopping the floors in the mall with a halfbroken floormachine. He told me gram had taken her last breath that night.

It was a beautiful funeral, more than beautiful. t was breathtaking and no words can be found, But nothing could match up to the unique and very special and beaitiful woman she was. And when i was walking towards the urn to place my single rose beside her picture my knees woldnt carry me and my body did not follow my thoughts,I knew that if i let go of that flower she would be lost forever, it was really the last goodbye. I have never felt such an undecribble feeling of sorrow, loss, love and pride for anyone in my hole life, even that is undescribable, but as i write just theese lines one year after her passing away. My tears fall, and my body screams off love for her. And these last lines might be hard to read.

I have witten so much about her or about thought around her and her influence in my and my familys life, yes everyone that met her knows what i mean. She was no angel, she was no devil, but she sure wasnt an ordinary human either.




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