We ask ourselves “Why me?” all the time. We blurt the question when we get bad grades and our parents yell. We ask it when our boyfriends or our girlfriends cheat on us or forget an important thing or event. We even ask the question when we have a bad day, like if it rain on our birthday, or if the dog eats our homework or a favorite tee shirt. “Why me?”
Well there are some people who actually deserve to use that question. Like the kids who are constantly bullied. Or the girl whose grandmother just died because of a drunk driver. The kids who can’t live their lives normally because of cancer or another deathly illness, they deserve to use that question. Some kids live their lives in terror, having to live in the fear of not knowing if they’re going to wake up tomorrow.
First hand, I know what it’s like to live with the fear your Grandma won’t be there when you wake up. I know what it’s like to stay by her side through the chemo, through the pain, through the tears. I would sit there, next to her bedside, and try to get her to eat. When she pushed the food away, I would fight back there tears. The chemo made the thought of eating hurt her stomach, but the act of her not eating pushed me to tears.
I had to hide my tears from her, so I could be strong for the both of us. It was even harder to be strong when she lost her hair, she would hide her head under a scarf and a dumb woven straw hat I had bought for her. She loved to brush her hair before the chemo and the cancer took it from her, each day she would look at her old brush with pain and frustration. Every day, when I saw that look I would push back my tears and unwind my waist long braid and let her brush my hair till she felt better. I would make some excuse to leave the room after she was done, then find a quiet place to cry till I couldn't cry any more.
Over the weeks she had to endure the chemo, the bad days outweighed the good by almost a million to one. She became frustrated and angry, she took it out on the nurses, at the awful care facility, and a few times me. I didn't blame her, I still don’t. it was the cancer, chemo and pain talking, not my loving and kind Grandmother.
Her battle with cancer ended in the most cruel way I can imagine. We were told she had only one day or so, the cancer had ravaged her body and take everything it could, now it was to take her life. I stayed by her side all night and waited for the machines to blare in alarm, signaling her departure from this world. But they never did. She made it through the whole night and even woke up asking what’s for breakfast.

She was able to eat a few spoonfuls of eggs and almost a whole piece of toast, more than she’d been able to eat in a long time. When I took her plat away, she grabbed my hand and smiled, the words she spoke next, I will always remember.
“No matter where I am, no matter how far you go, no matter what you do, I will always love you.”
I smiled as a single tear fell from her face, I told her I loved her too and that I would be right back. I had to go get the nurses so they could change her sheets, the pink ones were her favorite and I had brought them for her.
As the nurses lifted her off the bed and into the recliner, they had to remove the heart monitor pads. I put a blanket over her legs and turned to put the beautiful sheets on the bed. When I was done, I pulled her mother’s quilt out of my bag and spread it out over the bed, turning down one corner so I could cover her when she was back in bed. As the nurse put her back in bed, doing so gently because she had fallen asleep, he went to hook up the heart monitor pads again.
She looked so happy and calm, having fallen asleep with a small smile on her face. I tucked the blanket around her knowing she’d be so happy to see it when she woke up. But something felt wrong, she felt wrong. She felt ….cold.
My blood ran cold as the monitor was attached and there was only a monotone, high-pitched note coming from the machine.
She wasn't sleeping.
She was gone.
She is gone.

As the nurses tried to cover her head to wait for the funeral home, I stopped them. She hates having the blanket over her head. Oh, wait. Hated. She’s gone now. Tears flowed as that thought crossed my mind. I just stood there and cried. That’s all I could do, cry and hold her cold hand that once held so much warmth. The hand that would start all the warm hugs, the ones that would pat my shoulder when she walked into a room. The hand that now hung lifeless and cold in my own warm one.

The question “Why me?” didn't cross my mind, it didn't. Not even once. But the one question that not only came across my mind, but filled it, was; “Why her? Why NOT me?” She meant so much to me and to so many people. But now she is gone.



“Why her?”