Random thoughts of an only child
With my dad’s surgery coming up, it has just dawned on me that I am “the family” since my mother died. As in when the doctor needs to talk to “the family” after surgery, I am it.
I’m not overwrought about it or anything, it’s just weird to me.
We are going to be facing that at some point on my husband’s side of the family. He is an only child, and his father is now an only child (his only brother passed away last year of colon cancer, never married, no children). It was very strange when my husband’s grandmother visited recently – her entire family in one room – son & daughter-in-law, grandson & granddaughter-in-law, two great-grandchildren. It is a very strange feeling, especially compared to me – three siblings, many phone calls and emails, always lots of people to talk to/catch up with.
I too am an only child. My step mother had an only son, but he was so distant that I became her only child as well. I was the one who would go with her to the surgeries, and I was the one the doctor told that she was terminal, but out of respect to her son, I wanted him to be the one to tell her. He, of course, didn’t. When I had to move them here from there home in another city, I was the one who became care taker. I was the one who got her into M D Anderson. So I became her only child then. It is hard being an only!