Still with us

Though we aren't having much of any interaction with my mother anymore, I wanted to share a few other moments we did have earlier, that I had noted down but forgot to mention in my earlier posts about the snippets of conversations:

One time when I was hanging out with her, feeding her a meal, I had to turn and sneeze all of a sudden. My mom opened her eyes wide and exclaimed, "Wow!" I laughed and said, "That was a loud sneeze, wasn't it?" She chuckled and said, "Yeah."

When Leo came into the room one time, he was meowing as he made his presence known, and my mom responded to him, saying "Meow." I looked at her with surprise and laughed. And then I said "meow" back to her, and she said "meow" again. We did that a few times - like all of a sudden we were talking in cat language to each other, with Leo.

I think Monday or Tuesday was the last day we really had any interaction, eye contact or a few words. But even after that stopped, for a little while I noticed that although she appeared to be sleeping, occasionally I would hear her chuckle in her sleep. It was such a nice sound to hear - a positive sound that made me think, perhaps she is remembering something funny.

And then last night... she smiled at us!! For the first time in what felt like ages. It was such a precious moment to treasure. We hadn't had any interaction for days. The night nurse had started to swab her mouth to get a little moisture in, and I think that woke her up a bit. She opened her eyes up and when I saw that, I came right over to talk to her. When I did that, she smiled at us. How beautiful! She wasn't really looking at us, but she flashed us that beautiful smile, and we ate it up. My dad immediately came over and leaned in towards my mom to speak to her as well, and she obviously heard him. She moved her head towards him a little and moved her eyes to look in his direction. It was a clear response, and it was oh so precious.

She is clearly still in there. They say that the hearing is the last sense to go, and so it is good to keep talking to her, continue to be with her. Though she can't respond, she knows we are here with her and that is the most important thing.