First off, thank you for all you've done for my mother over the last few years. I've known we were on borrowed time since she was diagnosed with cancer in 2013: I was able to give her an existence – you were able to give her the life she wanted. Know that I truly appreciate all that you've done.

But I also need to lay out some boundaries as we move through this situation.

I have, over the last ten years, put my own health, mind, marriage, career, and spirit at considerable risk doing everything humanly possible to keep my mother, your friend, your daughter, your cousin, your whatever, alive and healthy. I have been at her beck and call, heeding each of her demands, realistic or not, as best I could. I have done all of this because it is the right thing to do – because it is the job that needs doing.

And right now, my job is to see to it that her final wishes are followed to the letter; to see that her body is delivered to where she wishes it to be; that her life be erased, bit by bit, in accordance with her last will and testament; and, finally, to give her father, my grandfather, the best life possible in whatever time he has left.

Let me be clear: once she passes, my central concern is the well-being of my grandfather. No parent should have to live through the death of a child but this is life: it is chaos and it is pain; it joy and it is sadness; it is day and it is night. I will do everything I can to be the pride and joy that he's called me for all of my 40 years and help him through however much time he is here.

While it is my job to see that her life ends, both physically, and legally, as comfortably as possible over the coming days and weeks, it is up to you to keep her memory with you.

There will be no funeral service, no obituary in the paper. She will be cremated and her remains will be put alongside those of her husband. This is the letter of her last wishes, and I will honor them as such.

However: after some time has passed (read: let me get her apartment cleaned out, legal stuff taken care of, and find my own equilibrium), if you would like to organize your own thing / celebration of life gathering, you are more than welcome to do so. Please know that, while I will wish you all well with this and endorse, fully, all you want to do, I will have no part in the organization or execution of said gathering. I must move forward.

Further, while I respect, understand, and appreciate your grief, I must ask that you, a.) allow me the space to not only execute the considerable administrative tasks that lie before me but to process the extremely complex emotions I'm processing in these final days with my mother, and b.) not use me as a willow upon which to hang your own grief or your frustrations over your lack of control over the situation: while I have the utmost empathy for you, I am not – CANNOT –, nor will I serve as, your chaplain, therapist, or shoulder to cry on. What I can do is grant your grieving process as much empathy and caring as I can muster in this inordinately difficult and, for me, emotionally complex time; I ask only that you grant a similar respect to the boundaries of mine.

Thank you again for all you have done for her.

Best,

Tyler