Pancakes, Tea and Lightness

Three conversations. One unanimous decision. That was yesterday.

Today.

I swear I woke up this morning feeling lighter.

Physically. Tangibly. Lighter.

I made pancakes.

I rearranged the tea cupboard.

I laughed without trying.

My head was......open. Like it had space in it.

Like it was........clear. Yes, that's it. My head felt clearer.

I'm not trying to be poetic here, or symbolic, or abstract. My head literally felt clearer. Like I'd had a stuffy, plugged up brain for a really long time and now.........it was gone.

I guess you don't know how bad things are, until they aren't bad anymore.

Right now.......It feels really good NOT to feel "bad", or heavy, or plugged up.

Let me be clear. I am not speaking of celebration here. There is no celebration in not being able to care for one's aging parent. But there is a certain relief in finally admitting one's own limitations......before it's too late.

Stopped in the Roundabout

I got stuck in a roundabout today.

Driving to CostCo.

In Sequim.

Stopped dead.

In a ROOOOOUNNNNNDDD-a-bout!

Who STOPS in a roundabout? Isn't that oxymoronic?

Then again....... it seemed oddly apt.

It occurred to me, whilst being stopped in the roundabout, that I've been stuck in sort of a crazy roundabout for the last two weeks. No, wait. The last month. For those of you just tuning in, it went something like this:

1. Mom plummets into a downward spiral of anxiety and paranoia.

2. Mom does not sleep for days at a time.

3. Mom falls repeatedly.

4. Denise does not sleep for days at a time.

5. Denise loses most of her patience around the third sleepless night.

6. Dad loses all of his patience after the first sleepless night.

7. Much cussing is exchanged at random times throughout the day over ridiculous things.

8. Mom is evaluated for assisted living facility, which refuses to take her because of her medication/anxiety issues. Assisted living facility recommends Geriatric/Psychiatry unit in Tukwila.

9. Mom goes to G/P unit in Tukwila.

So the last two weeks has been a strange mix of introspective-thought-talk. "WHEN will Mom come home?" "WILL Mom come home?" "SHOULD Mom come home?" "Would Mom KNOW if she was home even if she DID come home?" and sprinkled in between all of those questions was the persistent, guilt-smothered, nagging of "Do I WANT Mom to come home?"

I've been thinking a lot about the week before Mom went to Tukwila, and how my body was in some sort of weird auto-pilot mode--give Mom her pills, change the Depends, check the bandages, empty the commode, feed Mom, clean up Mom, check the Depends again, check Mom again, give Mom her pills, and on, and on, and on. It's like that last week of school before summer vacation, when all you do is study, review, study, review, study, review, and maybe you eat, but you don't really do it consciously, it just sort of magically happens because you're completely immersed in study, review, study, review, study, review.....

That's how it was for me the week before Mom went to Tukwila. And when I came home afterwards, the house was eerily quiet. It wasn't a quiet house. It wasn't a relaxing house. It was the same house. It was just the house without Mom.

It hasn't changed much in the last two weeks. Her absence is palpable. She's here, but she isn't. It's a relief, but it isn't. I should have more free time, but I don't. I should be able to relax, but I can't.

I keep thinking, "I should prepare for when she comes home." I ask myself, "Will it be harder? Should I hire more help? Will I be able to work my regular job when she comes back? Will she be able to walk? Will I still have to feed her?"

I think through all the different scenarios in my sleep. I'm haunted by the sounds of phantom bells, and distant wails that aren't there. I dream one night, that Mom is standing in the garage holding a carpetbag and rocking back and forth, back and forth, and then her arms outstretch in front of her and I go to grab her so she doesn't fall and my hands move right through her ghostly flesh. Like I said, she's here, but she isn't.

Then today, a conference call with the doc and case worker from Tukwila. Mom is stable, they say. She's off two of her meds, they say. She scoots around in a wheelchair, they tell me. She sleeps six to seven hours most nights, they add. They strongly suggest, without actually strongly suggesting, that she requires more care than I alone can give her. They ask if they should discharge her to an assisted living facility. I want to say "yes. " I want to say "no." I want to say something that means both, like......"nyes" or "yeno." I ask for some time to talk with the family. They say, "No problem."

The family consensus is to discharge Mom to assisted living.....at least for now, so she can get the care she needs. The family consensus appears to be that.......it's time. Time for the house to be just a house. Not a house without Mom.

The consensus comes after a few hours of conversation with Dad and one phone conversation with my brother. It's kind of an Occam's Razor moment--the simplest solution (discharge Mom to assisted living) ending up being the best one.

The consensus comes and goes and I find myself walking, then sitting, then getting up, and then going to another room for no particular reason, and then repeating it all again. Something strange is sinking into the zone of reality in my brain and I'm having some serious trouble processing it.

My brain says to me, "Wait......that means..........you won't have to check the Depends, feed the yogurt, empty the commode, get up during the night..."

I ask my brain, "Wait.......what.......does........that.......mean????"

I'm stopped in the roundabout.

Mountain

The day I drove my mother to the geriatric-psychiatry unit in Tukwila......

Dad and I help Mom nestle into the sheepskin seatcover on the passenger seat of my car, and I notice later, with her sitting right next to me, how small she's gotten. In fact, there were many moments during that drive over, when I glanced over and thought about how my mom has changed--her withered body, contorted by the rigors of age, her thinning white hair barely covering her scalp, her mouth hanging open as she napped.

The day seemed ripped from a "Wish you were here" postcard--the sun blazing across the blue sky, the snow-capped mountains looming in the distance, Mom's scrunched up body sitting so low in the seat that the sun shone right onto her face as she slept. Even with the visor down, her face was still covered in sunlight, so I spent much of the drive with my right arm stretched out in mid-air, in front of her face, shielding it from the brightness. I had a full-circle moment remembering her doing the same for me when I was little.

One hour into the drive, Mount Rainier suddenly appears in front of us in the distance. It's like a huge, snow-covered rocky beacon, guiding us along as we drive east through Silverdale toward Tacoma. Mt. Rainier looks bigger on a clear day like today, and that seems apt.

At the Tacoma Bridge Mom wakes up for a moment, confused, and asks why it's taking so long. I tell her we're almost there, about a half hour to go. She goes back to sleep. I've told her we're going to see a specialist about her "medication issues." She doesn't know she's staying for two weeks. Because of her history with anxiety/panic attacks, the consensus was not to disclose the extended stay portion of her visit.

We arrive. It takes almost two hours to get Mom admitted. I'm at the end of the last form when I can hear my mother starting to wail from her wheelchair in the hallway. I think, "Uh oh, the lorazepam is wearing off." I hear one of the nurses talking to Mom, consoling her, and suggesting they take a ride back to her room. I hand in the completed forms to the charge nurse who seems to instantly sense my thoughts.

"She'll be okay. You've done the right thing."

I want to jump over the counter and hug the charge nurse. I want to collapse on the floor and cry myself into the linoleum because I've been holding all of my emotions in check for so long that I'm not sure what I'm feeling anymore and it would just feel so good, I think, to let everything out. But I don't.

"Really?" I ask instead.

"She'll be fine" she says again.

Then I sort of lean in, though I'm not sure why, to ask quietly, "You know....Mom gets a little wild when she has an anxiety attack.....Do you.....I mean, is that.....?"

And the nurse sends me a smile that wraps itself around every stressed-out, exhausted nerve in my entire body and says, "That's what we do. She'll be fine."

I didn't know what else to say except, "Thank you."

And then I leave. Back into the elevator, down to the first floor, back into my car. Back toward home. I pull out of the hospital parking lot. I glance in the rearview mirror--Mt. Rainier is behind me.

Walnuts

It was somewhere around the fifth or sixth spoonful of Grape-Nuts I was feeding into my mother's mouth that it hit me.

I can't do this anymore. And it's ok.

And during each spoonful after that one (the fifth or sixth), I pieced through the journey. I guess you could say I sort of stepped back and looked at the chain of events that had led me to that moment--sitting next to my mom, in what used to be HER chair, feeding her spoonfuls of soggy Grape-Nuts as she sat in her walker (because, as of yesterday, she no longer can maneuver from her walker into the chair). I remembered the falls, the surgeries, the trips to the ER, the sleepless nights, the changes in her medication schedule, the setbacks, the injuries, the progression of her dementia to where it is now.

"And here we are now", I thought to myself. That next step was suddenly so clear, so logical to me.

You know those key moments in your life when the significance of a single decision hits you like a sledgehammer? This was one of those.

I kept the spoonfuls of Grape-Nuts coming. We sat in silence for many minutes--me cogitating; Mom......well, I'm not really sure what she was doing. But at least she was quiet. (A welcomed relief from the last ten hours during which she wailed incessantly for "MARION!" and then "GRANDMA!" from around 10pm last night until around 6am this morning when she finally, FINALLY, dozed off for a couple of hours.) Yeah. At least it was finally quiet in the house.

During a couple of spoonfuls, I wondered if I really WAS doing the right thing--admitting I cannot continue to take care of Mom and making the decision to place her in a facility. Maybe she's not as bad as I thought, I thought. Maybe it was just a bad night, I thought. Maybe she'll die soon, I thought. Maybe, maybe, maybe. I was scraping up the last few mouthfuls of cereal and Mocha Mix with the spoon as I continued to examine all the options I thought I had. I remembered the caregiver suggesting months ago that Mom (and I?) might be better off where she could get round the clock care. Then the doctor suggested it. Then the cleaning lady suggested it. Then the bath-aid, then friends....

The many minutes of silence were abruptly broken by Mom's singular question. Asked oh-so innocently, and with perfect clarity, and using every functioning neural fiber left in her over-medicated brain.

"Do you like walnuts?"

Sometimes, validation comes from very strange places.

Slender Thread

When the going gets tough, the tough do pushups. I mean.......what the hell else am I supposed to do when I've given Mom the maximum dose of every anti-depressant, anti-anxiety, muscle relaxant pill prescribed to her and she's STILL (emphasis on the STILL) awake, and wailing, and delirious, and trying to get out of bed, and, oh, did I mention WAILING?!

First it was a light workout to "just take the edge off" before bed.

That was around ten-thirty.

Now it's almost one and I'm five sets of twenty pushups into what is appearing to be a futile attempt to burn off steam.

I believe it may be time to re-evaluate my reason for being here.

A Very Very Sarcastic Perspective of a Very Very Crazy Day

Dearest Most Beloved Diary,

What did I do today Diary? Golly, gee, it was such a goofy, wacky day, I don't even know where to begin! Hmmm, well let's see if I can try...

Okee-Dokee welllll.......First, I got up this morning around seven because my mother was calling for help. Gosh I just love it when she does that! Especially when it turns out she really doesn't need help with anything! Hahahah! She's such a jokster! This time was different though! Can you guess why? Can you? Can you??? RIGHT! She fell in her bedroom. Again! Oh no, I hate when that happens! It's okay though, she wasn't hurt or anything and between the two of us, we were able to get her back into bed without having to call 911. Wowee! I didn't even throw out my back! Yayyyyy us! What a team!

But hold on Diary Buddy, there's more! Second, I had to go to the dentist and have my temporary caps fixed for the second time! Why you ask? Well, because they keep popping off, silly! Why do they keep popping off? Well, because I seem to have been born with Teeth From Hell! Lucky me! But gee, how I do love going to see the dentist and having my teeth sanded and ground withOUT novocaine! Gosh it's fun!

And ya know what Diary? I thought that was a wacky way to start my day, but boy was I wrong! It was just starting! Third, after the dentist, I came home to find one of my two cats lying in the corner throwing up some clear mucous stuff and looking pretty much like he wished he was dead. Can you believe it?! But no problem! I called the vet and made an appointment at 4:15!

Bet you can't wait to hear what happened next, huh Diary? Okay, okay, I'll tell you. Fourth, I sat down to the computer to finally start a work project I was supposed to start last week but couldn't because I had to take Mom to the ER and sit there for four hours while they ran a bunch of tests that turned up nothing. Ooh golly, I sure do remember how much fun that was! But anyways where was I? Oh yeah, so I sat down to work, except I kept getting distracted because my sick cat kept throwing up in the hallway and, well.......somebody had to clean it up. Can you guess who that was, Diary? Right! Lucky me!

Okay Diary, now here comes the best part. Fifth, I took my sick cat to the vet, only to find out that apparently my cat ate something that poked a hole in his stomach and caused stomach acid to leak out and destroy a whole bunch of tissue in his gut. Poor kitty boy! So now......$1300 later, kitty boy has necrotic tissue removed, hole sewn up, tummy stapled together, and a whole lot of pain medication. Whoozy kitty boy! Kinda like Mom! Wow, how about that?! Gee-willikers, who knew I'd be spending $1300 on my cat today!!??? Wow, I love surprises like that!!

And Diary, here's the kicker of the whole entire crazy wacky day! Sixth, I came home from the vet, only to find my mom lying on the dining room floor and Dad sitting in the chair next to her. Ohhh noooo! Can you guess what happened Diary? You're right! Mom fell again! Another unexpected surprise! What a goofy day! Wait! I know, I know.....let's call 911 and get the big burly EMT guys to come over and help Mom up! Good idea! The big burly EMTs came. They put Mom to bed and she fell asleep pretty quickly. Wow, she had a big day didn't she?! Two falls in one day?! Bet she sleeps well tonight!

So Dearest Diary......we all had a pretty insane day here today! Wait, did I just use the word......in-sane???! Hahahahahahahah! That's so funny!

Aaaaaand......I'm back.

5:34pm conversation from the living room:

[Mom getting up out of her hydraulic chair]

Dad: Where ya goin'!?

Mom: ....Go......get......undressed....

Dad: You're going to get undressed?!

Mom: Yesssss.....

Dad: Want some help!!!???

Mom: Yessss......

Dad: I would love to come and help you get undressed! (Can you hear the lilt in his voice on the word "love"?)

Mom: I....lllllllike......it.........whennnnn....I.....geeeeet......undressed......

Cue audible sigh of relief from me. The funk has officially subsided.

A Silent Tree

Today, I found out that a close friend of mine from high school was killed in the big San Diego County Cedar Fire of 2003. She's been gone for over seven years but I didn't know. In some tiny part of my memories, she has been existing, until today.

So now, I'm wrestling with having to unexpectedly redefine the existence of a high school friend whose wonderful and poignant memory I had tucked safely away in some part of my brain. Erasing my hope that one day soon we would re-connect and sit down together for a long catch-up session over tea, share photos of our children and grandchildren, compare our weirdly parallel lives, and laugh, and cry.

Instead, I'm only crying, by myself.

Tonight, my mother started whining and whimpering that she wanted to die and all I could think of was that she's 89 years old, with a full rich life behind her, and a grown family, and decades of wonderful memories, and yet she voluntarily wants to chuck it all and leave because, why?, because she feels old and depressed?

My friend was 50 years old when the fire took her life, with more talent in her big toe than I have in my entire being. Up until today, there was a sort of unconscious comfort for me in knowing that somewhere in the world my friend was existing and sharing her gifts with others. I was envious at the great pieces of art I was sure she was creating somewhere for somebody. Occasionally, I would wonder where she might be, what she might be doing with her gifts, was she happy, was she fulfilled, how might I contact her so we could connect? Now, as of today, I can't wonder any of those things anymore.

Instead I have to listen to my mother complain about not having her television on the right channel, not remembering where her jewelry is, not having enough fruit on her Grape-Nuts, not running out of pills.

My mom exists. She has existence. She's still alive. But she's not really emotionally or socially or intellectually present.

My friend stopped existing on October 26, 2003. For me, she stopped existing today. Yet, she still feels completely present.

Part of me wishes I hadn't found out.

That way, in my world anyway, she'd still exist.

Crying Wolf

The dementiadventure continues.

Dad and I have been exchanging shrugs all week. Correction.....we've been exchanging shrugs by the hour.

Here's the dementia dance that we do at least twenty times a day:

Mom wails from her room for help.

Either Dad or I go in to see what she needs.

Mom can't remember why she called for help.

We leave.

Ten minutes later, it starts all over.

The only things that interrupt this dance are sleep, meals, doctor's appointments, Home Health visits, or lorazepam.

The result? Both Dad and I think twice, or three or four times, about dropping whatever we're doing and running in to see what Mom needs.

Chasing down non-existent wolves is exhausting.

Just another morning...

Interesting morning.

Started out well. Two hours ago.

But since about 9:30, Mom has spoken in nothing but Dementia-ese, making no sense to either Dad nor I.

Oh.......and when she went to the bathroom just now, there was a Thanksgiving napkin stuck inside her Depends. (Shrug #3)

Oh.....and two minutes ago, Mom weebled into my office because she'd "lost some velcro" and couldn't find it. (Shrug #3 again)

So now I have a call into the doc to find out how often I can give Mom the lorazepam.

Almost a restful, relaxing, great day.

Imagine you're a parent.

You leave your two kids with a babysitter for the day while you drive into the big city for some rest and relaxation. All is well in the morning when you leave. Everyone's happy and in a good space, cheerful goodbyes are exchanged, the sitter assures you that you needn't worry, "Just go and have a great day", she says optimistically.

So you go. You do have a great day. A relaxing day. A restful day. You drive home thinking, "I really needed to do that."

Then you come home.

You walk in the door to silence. The sitter has left you a note describing how the day went. She says that one of the children was frantic, fretful, and very needy all day. You walk into one of the children's bedrooms only to find half of the knick-knacks on the dresser are either knocked over, on the floor, or askew. And before you can ask what happened, the other child runs in and begins yelling angrily at you because you didn't tell him where you put one the other child's toys. Then before you can try to make sense out of the outburst (and the askewed knick-knacks), the other child comes in and starts whining because she wants to go to the bathroom and nobody will help her, to which the non-whining child responds by yelling at her too.

Now imagine that those are your parents.

Sauvignon Blanc

I don't even know where to begin.

So I'll begin with Dad pouring me a glass of wine. Remember, I don't drink. But, you know, there are moments when it just seems like the perfect thing to do. So I did.

Then Dad and I toasted each other, "Happy Holidays! Bon Vivre! Lacheim! A votre vivre!" All of those toasts. It had been a long day. Mom, in a downward turn of depression most of the day, had exhausted both of us, the Home Health aide, the housecleaner, AND the pedicurist. I was so verklempt I left to "run errands" and came back with ingredients to make turkey soup with the leftover turkey.

The soup was simmering as Dad and I clinked our glasses of sauvignon blanc. Then we started talking about Christmas and I reminded him that I was going to be gone for Christmas (I'm going to Birmingham December 22-28 to spend Christmas with my son, his wife, my first granddaughter, my nephew and his family, and my daughter. My first Christmas, except for one, away from my parents since I moved here.). Of course, Dad had forgotten that I was going. I expected that. So did he actually. I reminded him again, and he was fine with that.

But.......the trouble started because Mom overheard the conversation from the living room and instantly plummeted into a full-blown anxiety attack as soon as she heard that I was going to be gone for Christmas.

She yelled. She wailed. She whined. She complained. She even threw her glasses on the floor.

Here's the fundamental difference between my mom and my dad. When I reminded Dad that I was going to Birmingham to spend Christmas with family, his immediate response, "GREAT! I think that's wonderful that you're going to spend Christmas with everyone! "

Mom's response? Well, it was along the lines of, "I DON'T THINK THAT'S FAIR! SHE SHOULDN'T BE LEAVING US!"

About that time, still in the kitchen (resisting the urge to go into the living room and face my mother's wrath), I poured my second glass of Sauvignon Blanc. (Funny how it tasted even better the second time.) Dad wheeled into the living room to deal with Mom's tantrum.

Then Dad kind of ripped into Mom telling her, "I think that's very inconsiderate of you Patreesha. Denise deserves to have her own life. You should be happy that she's able to go spend Christmas with everyone." (Picture me toasting Dad, in the air, from the kitchen.)

But the real fun didn't start until Mom wheeled into the kitchen to "give me a piece of her mind." Now remember, I have two glasses of wine in me when she finally decides to come into the kitchen and pour out her wrath in my general direction. And remember.......I don't drink. Also remember, Mom has dementia in a really big way so it takes her.........a looooooong time to say anything. And most of the time, WHAT she is able to say, doesn't even make sense. Here's the gist of what she laid on me: She thought it was downright wrong of me to leave and if she and Dad couldn't go to Birmingham with me (a logistical impossibility--think of the bathroom issue), then I should stay home with them.

Then she tried the guilt trip, "I can't believe you would leave us like that."

Then she tried the super-guilt trip, "I'm going to commit suicide."

Let me just say........I'm not an advocate of "the drink." But it's amazing the assertiveness one gains after two glasses of wine.

So......to the guilt trip ploy I said, "Well Mom, I AM leaving, for five days. And you will be in splendid hands while I'm gone. And I will take lots of pictures of everyone and show you all of them when I get back. "

And......to the super-guilt trip ploy I said, "Really Mom? How exactly areya gonna do that? And even if you did Mom, then you'd miss seeing all the pictures of everyone that I'm going to bring back! Why would you wanna do that?!"

Then........I swear on a stack of bibles...........my mother who, just minutes previously had read me the riot act for having the gall to abandon her over Christmas, looked at me with her sunken eyes and overly-medicated stare and said, "What should Dad and I have for Christmas dinner?"

And I said, "Would you like to plan the Christmas dinner for you and Dad?"

And she said, "Yeeeeees."

And I said, "I think that would be lovely Mom. You can plan the dinner, I'll have it all ready for Dad to warm up, and you can spend a wonderful, romantic Christmas dinner with the man you have spent the last 65 years with. "

"67," she quickly corrected me.

"OK! Sixty-seven years then! Even better!" I said.

"I like that idea," she said.

"Me too," I said.........looking for my glass of wine.

Black Mules

I'm not a chatty person.

In fact, I've found that in the last year, I've become less and less chatty. It's not that I don't have anything to say. I just prefer to listen. Especially with my parents.

Used to be, whenever I had to drive Dad to an appointment, or to CostCo, I'd make a point of controlling the conversation just to keep him away from the three deadly topics--religion, politics, and money.

But lately, I just get in the car and clam up. If Dad goes off on one of his religious or political rants, I simply listen, and maybe toss out a "yep" or a "right" every now and then. It's either that or end up screaming at him, not out of anger, but because that's the only way he can hear anymore. If I say something once, he'll say, "WHAT?" almost immediately, then I'll say it louder, and he'll say almost immediately again, "WHAT"! and then I just out and out yell whatever I said at him.

Kinda takes away the enjoyment of a good conversation.

Anyway, Dad had an appointment with the hearing aid specialist at CostCo this afternoon. Mom chose to stay home (after changing her mind three times).

Dad and I climbed into the jeep and set off on our way, about a ten minute drive, to CostCo. In keeping with my current trend, there was no conversation except for Dad's intermittent banging on the dashboard--his signal that he wants the heat turned up. Real subtle.

Then we passed by the big field where there is almost always a group of horses, mules, and brown and white cows grazing and roaming.

As we pass, Dad blurts out, "BLACK ANGUS! Look at those beautiful black angus! Those are black angus! Did you see those beautiful black angus??" He whacks me across the right upper arm with his left hand. (He does this all the time when he wants to punctuate a point. He thinks it's funny. And it is. The first time.)

And the thing is, the creatures he thinks are black angus......are mules. And since I'm feeling belligerent, I say, "No, those are mules."

"MULES!?" Dad recoils, appalled, unbelieving. "What do you mean MULES?!"

"Those are mules, Dad, not black angus." I'm calm, matter-of-fact, slightly smart-alecky.

"Why are they so black?" Dad's challenging me now. He does that a lot. Dad loves to press my buttons. He knows I prefer not to talk, so he needles me to make me do exactly what I don't want to do.

"They're BLACK mules." It's the best I can come up with.

Dad is silent.

We continue on, down Hendrickson Road, then I turn up Priest Road, which just happens to have a field on it where three big black angus steers are grazing.

I point them out to Dad, "THOSE are black angus." I'm smug. I'm a smart-ass. But it's been a long week trying to get Mom stable and I'm tired and not feeling very patient. Smart-ass is the best I can do. More importantly, I forget how well my father knows me. He may be 94, and stubborn, and belligerent, but dang if he isn't incredibly quick some times. This was one of those times.

As soon as I proudly point out the three black angus to him, he immediately comes back with, "Nah, those are black mules."

Smart aleck.

She's Back

The Mom of Monday morning is a welcomed relief from the Mom of last week. Both Dad and I are buoyed at not having to put out any Mom-fires this morning.

Dad has a hearing-aid appointment at 12:30 today. Mom says she wants to come along.

Great!

Mom asks me to come in and help her pick out something to wear.

Great!

I tell her I'll be in as soon as I finish what I'm doing (which, I kid you not, was writing the previous blog).

Great!

I try to wrap up the blog post. No more than two minutes pass. And yet.......it comes. The anxious breathing from the next room. The random whimpers.

Great.

I keeping tapping away ferociously on the keyboard so I can get into Mom's room before the anxiety that seems to be mounting completely takes her over and ruins what is, so far, a really, really good day.

Too late. Two minutes was clearly too much time.

I post the blog.

I turn to get out of my office chair.

And there she is, standing in my doorway, clothed in only a Depends (Large/Moderate Absorbency), her hip brace, her shoes, and her foot brace. Oh yeah, and her walker.

"Did.......yyyyyyyyou..........forget.......meeee?"

Damn those aliens.

Every Morning's Another Day...Or Another Mother

"When what to my wondering eyes should appear"............(when I came in to Mom's bedroom at 9am to see if she was still asleep).....but my mother, propped comfortably, contentedly even, up in her bed, glasses on, reading the new Julie Andrews book (which has been lying on Mom's bed, unread, untouched, and ignored for months).

I stopped in the doorway. I mean, imagine my surprise. Every morning for the past week, Mom's morning has begun with confusion, anxiety, and incoherence. The woman lying so casually on her bed now, was.....well, it was a little odd to see.

Mom looked up briefly from her book and said casually to me (normally....as if this is how she starts every morning), "Well good morning! How are you?"

So.....my question is.........what devious alien kidnapped my dementia-ridden mother during the night and replaced her with a lucid one?

And.......can I keep this one?

Shrinkage

And for the record: I noticed this morning, when I was walking behind Mom into the dining room, that she is significantly shorter than she was two weeks ago, before I went to NYC.

Two weeks.

People can shrink in two weeks?

You know what it makes me think of? (And I'm certain this is NOT a new idea. Just new to me.) It makes me think of the fetal position, and how we start out in that position, become more and more upright as we mature, then become more and more "down-right" as we age and sort of revert back to the fetal position.

I love it when life hits you square in the face one of those "full circle" things.

"Foosey!"

Clearly Mom's on a roll today. She just wheeled into my office and declared clearly and loudly, "I'm a foosey!" (Of course, I knew she meant to say 'floozy', which is why I nearly choked on my T'giving leftovers.).

I asked her why she thought she was a "foosey".

She said, "Because I can't figure out how to make the TV guide work."
So, excuse me now while I go and explain to my mother: 1. The definition of floozy; and 2. How the TV guide works.

Guess I'll finish my leftovers later.

Short Circuit

Okay so my mother, who has been unable to piece together more than two words in the last week (and that is NOT an exaggeration), weebled herself over to the glass doors just now, gazed out at the early morning sun and snow-covered mountains, and then blurted out "LOOK-AT-THE-BEAUTIFUL-SUNSHINE-ON-THE-MOUNTAINS!!!!"
Scared the crap out of me.

Thanks, Giving, and Tawny Port

This is going to be strange Thanksgiving. I've decided on a rather warped strategy for getting through today. It will include a play-by-play update. It'll be like you, the reader, are right there with me! "Oh goody!", you're saying right now. Right?! Here we go.

8:58am: Mom is fretting and whimpering. Kind of a pre-anxiety attack. She keeps asking me where everybody is. I told her it's just her, Dad, and me, and Dad's asleep. She wants to climb into bed with him. I convince her that's not such a good idea. They haven't slept together in thirty years. We're already one half of an anti-anxiety pill into the day.

9:01am: The parade is starting. I'm watching from the living room. I can hear Mom whimpering in her room. I think seriously of sipping on a teensy bit of the tawny port. But, in reality, I'll probably wait. At least until ten.

9:44am: Trying to jumpstart Mom back into her normal routine, and hopefully a relatively normal state of mind. Got her into the dining room for her breakfast, while I start tearing up Challah for the stuffing. I pull out the big, blue wooden bowl that is always traditionally the Fleener Stuffing Bowl.

I ask Mom, "Where'd you get this bowl Mom?" And this spawns a whole stream of fragmented comments....."Marshall Field"...."wedding gift"......"spices and herbs" (?!).........."couldn't find it....."........then, as Emily, the bulldog started licking up a dab of cereal Mom had dropped on the floor earlier, Mom yells out, clear as a bell, "Clean it up Emily, it's all you're going to get today!"

10:44am: Dad's up. Bracing myself for his presence--sticking his nose (literally) into anything everything I'm trying to cook. He wheels into the kitchen and starts asking questions about EVERYTHING, and in the midst of my trying to explain to him why I was cutting up onions (for the stuffing), Mom blurts out, "And Pauline was Jewish!" which stops both Dad and I cold.

(Oh, by the way, Pauline was my grandfather's secretary.) (Yeah......like that makes Mom's outburst any more logical....) Okay. The tawny port is out of the liquor cabinet and now setting on the kitchen counter.

10:55am: Dad: (after snooping around the kitchen and discovering the bottle of tawny port) "Hey! What are you gonna do with that bottle of tawny port?"
Me: "I'm gonna drink it!"
And then he made the face that's posted on the side.

12:10pm: Turkey's stuffed and in the oven. Mom's pulling catalogs and blankets and other crap out of the basket next to her chair in the living room. She's looking for something. I ask her what. She says: "For.......something........night.........scare my face.........table......." and then she just gives up and goes back to looking.
What's Dad doing? Reading the paper. (like any other day)

12:44P M.; Dad: (to no one and to everyone, and without looking up from the paper) "Well I'll be damned, another royal wedding! Did you see this Patreesha?"
Mom: (her brain thinking it understands, but doesn't at all) "Oh yes, how about that?"
Thirty seconds goes by.
Mom: "Who's getting married?"
Then Dad explains the whole Prince William thing to ...her. Which doesn't help but hey, it's always worth a try.
About five minutes goes by.
Mom: (to me) "Did you show Dad your locket?"
Me: "What?" (subtext = wtf?)
Because.......I don't own a locket.
Mom: "Tell Dad about that ring that Myrt gave you." (Myrt was my dad's mother.)
So....the tawny port is now opened.......

!:41pm: (note the tawny port-induced typos that have started to pop up) Welllllll...... leave it to dogs and babies, right? The National Dog Show has been on since noon and Mom is now as calm and as content as a kisker's whitten. Oh wait.......well, you know what I mean. That was the port talking.

3:50pm: Turkey comes out in a half hour; the greens are simmering on the stove (mushrooms, kale, leeks, yam medallions, and sherry), Dad's still reading the paper, with Emily at his feet (see photo), and Mom's in her room fretting over how to get Dr. Oz on her television (even though it already is). Oh, Sweet Turkey-Induced-Sleep, where are you?!

4:17pm: The turkey rest-ith. The green/yams simmer-ith. Mom's still trying to find Dr. Oz. (Aren't we all?)

5:51pm: Done. Everything put away. Kitchen cleaned.
Family members will appreciate Dad's big remark at dinner......"Hey, ya know what'd be great?!" (Family members will know what's coming.)
He just keeps talking (because he never waits for acknowledgment anyway), "It'd be great if everyone came here for Thanksgiving next year!! Wouldn't that be GREAT?!" (For non-family members, this is probably the stupidest idea in the universe.)

Then he spends the next five minutes trying to count how many people
"EVERYBODY" would actually come to (Wait.......honestly, it was more like ten
minutes......Dad is soooo NOT good with numbers!).

"Nineteen people! That'd be nineteen people! Wouldn't that be GREAT?!"
Again, no acknowledgment.

And then fifteen minutes later, "It'll never happen." (Which is what family members were all saying when they read the remark in the first place.)

And while Dad was going on about having EVERYBODY getting together and how great that would be, my inner dialogue was out of control! In fact, I had, like, sixteen different inner dialogues talking over and under each other, and then rebutting each other, and then agreeing with each other, and it all got so crazy I had to just get up from the table and go have more pie. There's nothing like pie to quell the inner dialogue. "s."

Preparing to Disembark: Part Trois

My suitcase is packed and loaded in the car.

Mom, formally referred to as The Woman Who Bore Me, is resting. Her breathing, for the first time today, is inaudible.

I'm minutes from actually, really, leaving.

How do you describe with letters the sound of a heavy exhale? Hahhhhhhhhhhh? Does that work? Picture the exhale that comes from the toes. That's the one that just came out of me.

Thanks to all who offered words of encouragement and support. Thanks especially to the incredible Home Health professionals who turned a seemingly impossible situation into an optimistic one.

C'est tout.......for now.

Preparing to Disembark: Part Deux

As they say........It's not over til the Fat Lady sings.

And........in my case, I'm not going anywhere til I'm on the airplane.

I'm scheduled to leave for NYC tonight. Scheduled.

In the meantime, The Woman Who Bore Me is in the throes of an anxiety attack because.......well, because this is what she does when I try to go visit anywhere for any substantial length of time.

My father and I were both awakened early this morning when Mom pressed her LifeLine button (the first time). "Take me to the hospital!" she wailed. (Which........is tempting for a few reasons. But since there was nothing physically the matter with Mom........soooo not really an option.)

The second time Mom pressed her LifeLine button was not more than two minutes after Dad had just suggested we remove Mom's LifeLine button and I had reassured him that she wouldn't press it anymore. (Yeah, a lot I know.) That's when Dad looked at me and said, "You should just leave" then turned around and went back to bed.

So.....it's been Mom and me........since 6am.........

And, as I type this, TWWBM is wailing, "Deniiiiiiise, come in here so I can see you!!" And I can't help but wonder, why doesn't she climb in her walker and come into me?"

Oh wait.........wait..........she's wailing again, "I'm coming to you. I'm going away!" And I can hear her getting up........taking off the brakes of her walker.........and now wheeling out of her bedroom........and.......and..........there she goes right past my office where I'm sitting........and into the living room still wailing, "I'm going away Denise! I'm going awayyyyy!"......and now she's turning around.......back down the hallway........past my office.......past Dad's bedroom (Dad is up now).......and back into her own bedroom. Dad's wheels in to see how she's doing.

He asks, "Are you doing better now?"

Mom says, "Why did you agree to this?"

Dad doesn't hear her (like it would matter anyway) but he sees the cat perched on top of Mom's dresser and says, "I think it's wonderful how the cat jumps right up onto the dresser like that. Isn't that wonderful Patricia?"

Then he wheels back into his own room to brush his teeth.

And now........here comes Mom again.....this time she wheels into my office (seriously.....I am typing this as it is happening!) and says to me, "I'm going to fall! I'm coming into tell you to tell you I'm going to fall!"

And I keep typing and say, "You're not going to fall unless you want to."

Then she turns around and wheels out and back into her bedroom saying, "I don't want to fall, I don't want to fall...."

But wait there's more.......

Now she's on her bed wailing to me, "Deniiiiise, come heeere! I've got something for you!"

Hang on.........let's go see what it is, shall we??? Hang on........

Okay, back. She wanted to give me her wedding ring.

oy vay.

Preparing to Disembark

I love the ferry.

And what's not to love? The smell of saltwater, the sounds of Puget Sound crashing against the boat, the Seattle cityscape in the approaching distance.

I was riding a ferry once......I'm not sure where, although I know it wasn't the Seattle ferry.......and as the boat neared its destination, an announcement came over the speaker system, "Please prepare to disembark."

For some reason, I always found this humorous. It was so formal. It suggested that many, many complicated details had to be addressed before leaving the boat when all most people did was turn the key in their car and drive off.

So even though the Seattle ferry does not make the "Prepare to disembark" announcement as we reach our destination, I always still hear it in my head.

On Saturday, I leave for NYC to spend two weeks with my daughter, who is graduating from her theatre conservatory. As I've learned from taking short trips to visit family, Mom doesn't deal very well with my leaving to go anywhere for longer than a few hours. Because of this, Dad and I both agreed not to tell her about my upcoming two week trip until we absolutely had to.

Today was the "absolutely had to" day.

The caregiver came over this morning to get checked out on the morning and evening routine. She has covered for me before. Mom and Dad both are very fond of her and I know that they're in excellent hands. Nevertheless, because the caregiver was here this morning, Mom asked the obvious question, "Are you going somewhere?"

To which I answered, "Yes Mom, I'm going to NYC."

To which she asked (after a rather lengthy pause), "When are you leaving?"

To which I answered (after throwing a glance to the caregiver), "Saturday night."

Then, like any well-trained Pavlovian dog, my mother squeezed her eyes shut, pressed her face together, and sobbed.

That was four hours ago. Since then, I have had to: search for the tv remote four times; search for Mom's Afrin twice; and answer three wails for apparently no reason at all.

As of today, I am preparing to disembark.

Hellooooo Miiiiindy...

It's election time.

Forgive my cynicism but when election time rolls around I think about one thing and one thing only--the inevitable bombardment of political phone calls.

I don't know about you, but at our house, it seems like in the span of about two weeks, the number of politically-driven phone calls per day goes from "maybe one" to at least a half dozen....and most of those come between 4pm and 8pm.

Because I'm the one who generally answers the house phone (i.e. the landline phone), I'm the one who has to contend with all of the election-focused phone calls (taped and real-person).

Here's how these calls usually go:

1. The phone rings.

2. I think about whether or not I'll answer it. (Actually, this is how I deal with most phone calls. I'm not a big fan of the phone.)

3. If I answer it, I pick up the receiver and say, "Hello."

4. I wait for who, or whatever, is on the other end to respond.

5. If what I hear next is an obviously taped message, I hang up. If what I hear next is the voice of an actual, living, breathing human being who starts talking about anything political..... I hang up. (As I said, I'm not a fan.)

Yesterday afternoon, as I walked through the living room, past my dad who was engrossed (I thought) in his daily habit of absorbing The Seattle times, Dad stopped reading, waved me down and said, "Hey! Somebody called earlier, but it was a political somethingorother."

"Yeah, I know. It's election time. "

Dad threw up his hands and sort of barked, "I just hung up on them. " (Said the "mighty apple tree" to the "little apple.")

We exchanged a little chuckle and I kept walking.

Now cut to around 8pm that night. I was in my bedroom (far away, thankfully from the house phone).

The phone rang.

True to my custom, I thought about whether or not to go in and answer it.

But before I could make a decision, Dad picked it up! (I should mention........Dad got a new hearing aid last week and, since he can now hear a bit better than before, he has been choosing to answer the phone from time to time. (Apparently he was feeling a little frisky.)

Dad: HELLO!

Phone Person: Good evening sir, I'm calling from the Washington State of ........... (I have no idea who this person.....it was a woman......was representing.....couldn't really hear and it doesn't really matter because Dad totally cut the woman off mid-sentence.)

Dad: WAIT! WAIT! Who is this?

Phone Person: (She repeats her little speech again.....Dad cuts her off again.)

Dad: WAIT! Slow down! You're talking too fast!

Phone Person starts again, slower. Dad interrupts again.

Dad: WAIT! Who is this? What's your name?

Phone Person: Excuse me sir?

Dad: I SAID, What's. Your. Name?

Phone Person: My name is Mindy, sir.

Then there's a pause of about five seconds until Dad speaks again. But this time, he's strangely calm and weirdly flirtatious.

Dad: Well, hellooooo Miiiindy.

Phone Person: (click)

Heh, heh, heh. Election time just got a little easier.

It's a Privilege to Pee

There is definitely going to be a......ahem......running theme here.

The good news is, it doesn't involve poop.

I took a "ME" afternoon today (woohoo me!). Went to a movement workshop in Port Townsend. But before I left, I spent a couple of hours working on my audition monologues and songs. One of those songs is a little diddy from a musical called Urinetown. Some of you may be familiar, most may not. That's okay. Suffice to say, the title of the song is "It's a Privilege to Pee."

In a word, I spent the first part of my morning singing about.......well, singing about pee (which, I might add, is a far cry better than what I've been cleaning up the last few mornings.....but that's another story....or not).

Anyway..........I go to the workshop and, lo and behold, one of the exercises is to write one's name with one's clenched buttocks. I think the exact instructions were "pretend you have to pee really badly and write your name with a hypothetical pen that is sticking out of your butt."

Oh, did I mention the instructor is Italian? And speaks through a translator?

(And for the record? "Write your name with a pen sticking out of your butt" sounds wayyyyyyy more poetic in Italian than it does in English.)

Anyway, the workshop was a much-needed diversion, and I can't wait to go back tomorrow night for the next installment. But as I was walking to my car to come home, I couldn't help but think, "I should use the bathroom before I go, otherwise I'm going to really have to go bad by the time I get home."

But, of course, my next thought was, "Nah! I'm fine. Just get into the car and go!"

So I did.

Cut to home.

I arrive. I get out of the car with one thought, and one thought only--get thee to a bathroom first thing.

I open the door.

My father is standing in the kitchen. He turns. He gives me Shrug #2. (For those of you who missed the Shrug blog--Shrug #2 is the one Dad and I exchange that is code for "Mom is acting realllllllly weird and I have no idea what to do about it.") Then I hear Mom wailing from the hallway, "Is that Denise???!!!!"

Buttocks clenched. "What's up Mom?"

"I neeeeed.......yourrrr......hhhhhhelllllllp."

I look at Dad. He gives me Shrug #2 again. I tell him with my raised palm, "I got it" and I follow Mom back to her bedroom.

Now you're probably wondering what the "crisis" was?

It was..........

The TV Guide.....s.

Plural.

See..........Mom pulls out the TV Guide insert from the newspaper every Sunday so she can pick and choose what she watches (Even though the only channels she watches are CNN and the Western channel! But of course I always just let that go.......it's her TV afterall.).

The trouble is (at least the trouble for Mom today was).......we get two newspapers, each with its own TV Guide. So Mom has pulled out both guides (and they're both printed in that microscopically small font) and now they're both setting on her bed. Separately. One setting "over there"; the other setting "over here." But for some reason, she's clearly terribly confused at having two TV Guides and not knowing which one is the "right" one, or the "old" one, or the "new" one, or the......whatever.

Remember--I have to pee! So my patience is running very, very, VERY thin (that's patience with a capital P.....as in PEEEEEE!)

So I ask her, "Okay Mom, which guide would you rather use?"

She points to one.

I take the other one, "Okay, then you don't need this one" and I turn to take it to the recycle bin. Except..........my mother now has this aghast expression on her face like I just dismembered her favorite puppy.

So I stop. "Okay Mom, let's do this. You use the one that's on your bed. And I'll set this other one down on this chair over here. And if you think you need it, you can just go over to the chair and get it. Okay?"

A compliant, "yesssssss."

Then she says to me, "Do you have to go to the ladies' room?"

"What?"

And she says, "Well you're squirming around like you have to use the ladies' room."

And I chuckle and say, "As a matter of fact Mom, yes. Yes I DO have to pee. Really, really, really badly."

"Well then you should go," she says oh-so logically.

(Notice she had no trouble getting those words out. Weird how that works.)

Note to self: Go before you go.

Flu Shot

Remember those hypnotists that used to be on TV all the time? They'd pop up on The Ed Sullivan Show or The Tonight Show; they'd have volunteers from the audience thinking they were dogs, or cats, or dogs AND cats.

I never understood it. Never really "got" how people could allow themselves to do such crazy things. In public no less.

Several years later (well, realistically?, it was probably more like a decade or two later) I remember reading a book about hypnotism and the suggestive personality, and the whole "barking like a dog" and "meowing like a cat" under hypnosis thing suddenly made sense--Aha! The subject has to be OPEN to being hypnotized! Like........some little part of the subject's mind had to sort of "want" to do whatever the hypnotist asked them to do.

It not only made sense to me, it reassured me that NO hypnotist would ever be makin' ME get down on the floor in public and bark like a freakin' dog. No way I would EVER let that happen to me.

My father calls that being stubborn.

I call it being in control of what I do in public!

My mother.........well, she'd be the one on the floor barking like a dog.

So I was at Safeway the other day with Mom to pick up a couple of jugs of prune juice (the current anti-constipation choice at the Fleener Home For The Feeble). Mom waited in the car while I dashed inside.

Safeway had a big sandwich-board sign out front that said Flu Shots Today.

Mom saw it.

When I got back to the car, the first thing out of Mom's mouth was, "I need.........to get.......a...a...aaa......fl........fl........"

"Flu shot?" I said.

"yessssss." She answered.

"Okay, I'll check the schedule at CostCo and we'll all go in and get them."

Then I turned on the car and started to pull out of the parking space.

Mom again. "Where are you going?!" (Funny how she never has any problem talking when she's agitated....)

"I'm going home!" I told her, a little agitated because it was a heavy work day for me and I really needed to get home.

"What about the flu shot?!" she wailed.

The thing is.......my mother is one of the most suggestible people I have ever known. One little headline in the Peninsula Daily News about a robbery and she frets the entire day because she's convinced some criminal is going to break into our house THAT DAY and maul her to death. Seriously. I am NOT exaggerating.

So, guess what happened when Mom saw the Flu Shot sign? Right. She instantly became fearful that she was going to get the flu THAT DAY and she had better darn well get her flu shot immediately if not sooner.

I told Mom, "No, no, no, we're not going to get it today Mom. I'll check the schedule at CostCo and we'll get them there."

"ok" she said, her wheels still turning.

We came home. I went back to work. The afternoon passed. The evening came and went. Mom was getting into bed and I was still working in the office (which is next to her bedroom). I could hear her sort of whimpering and working herself up into a state. I went in to see what the problem was.

"What's up Mom?" I asked her.

And between whimpers she said, "I'm afraid.........to go...........to.........sleep.........because........I'm.......afraid.........I'll get......the......fl....fl......fl.......flu.......and die........and....and.....not.....wake....up."

Damn that sandwich-board. Damn Safeway. Damn having to go get prune juice. Damn constipation. Damn having a mother who could've been one of those barking people-dogs on The Tonight Show.

But you know what? Two can play at this game.

So I say, "Oh Mom, you don't need the shot until November. The doctor told you last year that getting the shot before then was pointless. So we'll get it the first week of November. Okay?"

And she stopped whimpering, and stopped fretting and looked up at me and said, "Okay." And suddenly she was feeling okay about going to sleep.

"Now Mom, could you get down on the floor and bark like a dog?"

Kidding! I'm kidding! I didn't really say that.

Oh yes, we have NO bananyas!

The blue and white porcelain fruit bowl is empty.

Empty.

Did you get that? It's E-M-P-T-Y!

Wait.....maybe you didn't quite understand me. THE FRUIT BOWL IS EMMMPPPTTTTYYYY!

The AlwaysFullOfBanayas, SeeminglyBottomlessBananyaBowl, MustAlwaysBeFullOfBanayasBowl is E.M.P.T.Y.

And more importantly? It's going to STAY empty!

Why?

Well, because.....Are you ready for this? Are you sitting down? Because, you probably should.

It's going to stay empty because.......I have declared a Banana Ban!

That's right! Hoist the flags! Free the prisoners! Bang the drums! Storm the Bastille! (sorry....getting carried away here)

Now I'm sure you're dying to know what prompted the banana revolt. I'm certain that you are sitting on the edge of your ergonomic office chair right now, waiting for me to fill you in on all the gory details surrounding this unforeseen rebellion against what has been such a stalwart mainstay in the Fleener kitchen.

Well I'm gonna tell ya.......

Poop.

That's right girls and boys--poop. Plain and simple, it was poop, or actually, the lack of poop, that led me to officially declare war on the almighty bananya. And trust me, you would've done the same had you been in my shoes this week.

In reality, it was really constipation that brought all of this on. Mom's constipation. And lemme jus' say........ya haven't lived until you've experienced an 89 year-old woman wailing and moaning her way through half a day's worth of really, really bad constipation. Suffice to say, I laid down the law--

No More Bananas and No More EatingAnEntireCartonOfCottageCheeseEveryDay (okay, okay, it was probably the cottage cheese that was really to blame for the constipation but, come on!, you gotta capitalize on your opportunities!).

So forgive me now. I'm overwhelmed with a sudden urge (no.....not what you're thinking!)

I think I'll go do something totally wacky and completely crazy and.........

PUT AN APPLE IN THE FRUIT BOWL!

Wish me luck.

Leakage

Scene: Waiting room at the local ophthalmologist's office. Dad's hour-long appointment. I had dropped Dad off earlier, then gone home briefly to check on Mom, then returned to pick him up. Four other people in the waiting room, along with three receptionists behind the front desk. All is quiet and calm, save for the soft sounds of the Sequim radio station purring some old Sinatra tune into the background. Then.......

Dad: (at full volume...as always) I THINK I'M ON THE VERGE OF INCONTINENCE.

I look around to see if anyone in the waiting room, or behind the reception desk reacts. They don't. All heads are down, engrossed in magazines or work.

Me: Really?

Dad: WHAT?!

Me: I said,.... Really? (Checking the downcast heads in my periphery. They're either just being polite, or they're all completely absorbed in their respective magazines. I think, what are the chances of the latter being true? I decide it's gotta be the former.)

Dad: Well, YEAH!

Me: That's uh......(searching for something to say just so Dad won't say anything else...)...well......that's uh.....

Dad: I'VE GOT LEAKAGE!

Up come the heads. Great.

I make some kind of semi-panicked epiglottal vocalization.

Dad: WHAT?! (He thinks I said something to him.)

Me: Nothing I.....

Dad: LEAKAGE!!

And now we have eye contact. From every person in the waiting room. And I just sit there, shaking my head in here-we-go-again disbelief. And, of course, Dad doesn't stop. He continues with....

Dad: THOSE PILLS THE DOC GAVE ME AREN'T HELPING. AND THEY'RE GIVING ME CONSTIPATION TOO!

And here's the really good part....

Me: (I lean into his good ear cuz I don't want to have to repeat this.) That's great Dad. And it's really nice of you to share all of that with everyone here in the waiting room.

Cue nervous laughter from the waiting room and receptionists.

Dad: (Who momentarily cracks up.) WELL WHAT THE HELL! IT'S A DOCTOR'S OFFICE!

Cue legitimate laughter from waiting room and receptionists.

Cue eye-roll from me.

BlogClogSkinMowCockaNuts

You're probably wondering about the title. Don't worry. It'll all make sense. Trust me.

OK. I'm just going to come right out say it. I'm having trouble writing the blogs.

It's not writer's block.

It's not apathy.

It's not a matter of having the time to do it.

And it's certainly not a matter of having enough material.

I can't tell you how many times I've found myself driving in the car and saying to myself (out loud.....I talk to myself a lot when I'm driving), "That thing that Dad did this morning.....I should write about that!" Or, "That conversation Mom and Dad had yesterday....I should write about that!"

Then I get home. And it never happens. It's not that I forget what I was going to write about. It's more about the motivation. I WANT to write. I just don't do it. I start to sort of dread the energy it takes to sit down and actually hammer out something on the keyboard. It reminds me of that lazy lumpy feeling I sometimes get before I workout. Like whining little kid who moans and groans because they have to take the trash out....I really don't want to do it, but I know I need to.

And the thing is......I always feel so much better after I've written a new post (again.....much like the workout). There's a certain exhilaration to it. I think, "Great! Another little chunk of this adventure recorded for posterity!" I even recognize, on some level, the multiple reasons I have for writing (again....like the workout). But for the last three weeks.........I have voluntarily avoided, purposely self-distracted, consciously re-directed myself from doing exactly that--from doing, in fact, what I am doing right now.

So.....woohoo. Yay me!..... I guess. But now that I'm here, rather than churn out all of those "great" ideas by writing one blog after the other, I think I'll present a nutshell version of each one. You'll get the idea, right?

There was the idea I had to write a piece called "Skin" that would somehow connect my recent observations of Dad's 94 year old skin (that I decided looks like a wadded up, flesh-colored sheet of ancient plastic wrap that was discovered in a tomb somewhere, unearthed, spread out, and then wrapped around my father's body) with the near-virgin skin of my 4 1/2 month old granddaughter (that feels like finely polished glass, if glass were soft and billowy, and smelled like.......well, like babies).

There was the one I was going to call "To Mow..." which would have described how Dad suddenly decided one day that he felt good enough to mow again (He had announced to me about two months ago that he was officially handing over the task of mowing to me, since he was feeling too much pain in his back and hips.), and how I watched him from my office, carving tracks out of the grass, back and forth, around and around, and then suddenly stopping in the middle of the 1/2 acre and just sitting there motionless, which caused me to jump up (fearing he was feeling dizzy or faint or worse, having a heart attack) and go out to see what was wrong, and walking up to Dad-On-Stopped-Tractor and asking, "Everything ok?" he replying with only, "Oh yeah! I'm just sitting here enjoying the beautiful day."

And finally, there's the one I was going to write called "CockaNuts" about Dad's recent craving for donuts which coincidentally started when my brother and I discovered a new local donut shop, CockaDoodleDonuts, and brought home a sampling. Let me be clear. Nobody, I repeat, NObody, knows the nutritionally vapid nature of donuts more than I. But Dad's philosophy is, "I'm 94. I've lived a great life. Now I'm going to do whatever I want." So now, he's decided he wants donuts. A lot of donuts. Fritters. Apple fritters. Regularly. It's crazy. I set out a plate of fresh donuts in the morning. And by the next morning, there is only one gnawed off half of a donut left.

Get the title now?

A Bird Better Than Vicodin

So...........Dad sprained his ankle last week and has been complaining of the pain every day since. He moans at almost every step. Groans whenever he puts weight on it. Winces at every turn. Retires earlier than normal so he can simply go to sleep rather than think about the pain. All of that being the everyday SOP (standard operating procedure) for nearly a week now.........until today. Specifically, until this afternoon.

Some people take pain killers. Some people drink. Some people use drugs. Some people eat chocolate. My father watches the Seattle Storm play (and defeat) Phoenix in the WNBA playoff game and magically, he is pain-free. Infused with the narcotic of professional women's sports, he lies on his bed, Sennheiser earphones firmly in place over his left hearing-aided-ear and right non-functional ear, LCD TV displaying in glorious flat-panel color, Dad focused intently (and ONLY) on the thrill of watching competitive women's basketball. From the living room we can hear Dad cheer Sue Bird and her teammates on after each Seattle score. We stroll down the hall to his bedroom to sneak a peak at him from time to time. Like a schoolboy screaming enthusiastically at his favorite team, Dad pumps his fists (yes, BOTH fists) every time the Storm takes the lead.

"SHOOT!" he shouts.

"Three points! Shoot it! Shoot it!!" he shouts louder.

The real "high" comes when the Storm finally proves victorious "with 23 seconds to go!" Dad is on his feet and not (I repeat, NOT, holding on to his walker at all) and filling the entire house with the euphoric pride of a devoted fan.

"Did you see that Sue Bird?! What a player!!" Then a short pause, and then......."Terr-IF-ic!" Grinning from ear to ear. The biggest smile I've seen on Dad's face in......well, in at least a week.

For those of you who have kept track, I have, from time to time, thanked several seemingly obscure entities for unknowingly contributing to my parents' ongoing welfare and sanity--Horsey's political cartoons in the Seattle PI; Maureen Dowd's editorial in the Seattle Times; Julia Roberts and her....well, whatever; cottage cheese with chives; CostCo; MochaMix. (A while back, I made a point of thanking the Chilean blueberry farmers so that Mom can enjoy blueberries on her Grape-Nuts even in the dead of the PNW winter.)

And now I can add one more simple pleasure to that list.

Today, Sue Bird and her team made an ailing 94 year old man very, VERY, happy. Thank you Sue Bird. Looking forward to the next game.

Wanted: Fresh Set of Patience

The giant reservoir that holds my patience, empathy, sympathy, and boundless understanding is constantly fluctuating. I know my "levels" are waning when certain signs and symptoms start to bubble their ugly little heads up to the surface of that reservoir.

For example, I know I need a break when Dad holds up one of two dozen fresh figs, newly-purchased from CostCo, and says, "Here eat this! It's delicious!" and all I can say is, "No, and stop telling me what to do!"

Or when Mom toddles into my room, whimpering and whining, and says, in a panic, "Where are all of my clothes!? Somebody took all of my clothes!" and all I can say is, "Wh...wh.....WHAT?! (because, of course, all of her clothes are in her closet where they've always been, and what's really happening is that Mom is having.....uh......one of her moments.....again.).

Or when Dad asks me, like he did this morning, if I've seen that "great new movie that just came out. That one with..." And I cut him off mid-sentence with an emphatic "NO!" because I KNOW he's about to ask me about Julia Roberts' new yet-another-Hollywoodized-book-to-screen-superstar-vehicle flick, "Eat, Pray, Love." (Dad idolizes Julia Roberts. He wastes no time at all in telling me, whenever the opportunity arises, like this morning, how much "CH-arisma" she has (and yes, he ALLways pronounces the "CH" like......like in....."CHAINSAW." He knows it presses my buttons. And, while I greatly admire Ms. Roberts as a person, the mere thought of having to see that enormous mouth of hers on any screen one more time, and/or hear that spine-jarring guffaw-like laugh of hers one more time, makes me want to eat my own eyeballs.)

These are examples of signs that I need a break. That my reservoir of patience is nearly empty. That my threshold for unconditional understanding has been passed.

But never fear. My brothers are both scheduled for rescue visits within days of this post. AND.......I just scheduled an all day whale-viewing boat excursion out of Friday Harbor for next Monday.

Thank god my eyeballs are safe....for a while.

Cake.

There was a time when those who knew me reallllly well could gauge how stressed out I was based on how clean my kitchen was. Something about wiping down counters........I dunno.......it's just very Zen........back and forth........back and forth.

I still do the counter thing. But...........in the last couple of years I seem to have added a new means of staying sane in the face of stress. A not-so-Zen mechanism.

Baking.

Yes. I bake. When Mom is on her second and third streak through the living room; when I've emptied the commode more times than I care to count; when Dad has stuck his finger in my yogurt one too many times because he wants to see what it tastes like (god forbid he asks); when Dad tries one more time to sing the aria from Pagliacci and is STILL three half-steps away from being on pitch........I bake. I bake like there's no tomorrow. Last week for example, I whipped up a luscious Hummingbird Layer Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (the Magnolia Bakery recipe). The week before, I baked four dozen of my Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies. The week before, it was a sheet of Toffee Bars.

Thankfully, Dad eats whatever I bake. Thankfully, I don't. (Thank god there are some benefits to being depressed.)

I'd go into more detail but........I have a Banana Layer Cake that needs to be frosted.

Loopier than........

a crocheted potholder.

Shrug #3

The shoulder shrug. Such a simple expression of unspoken emotion. Depending on its delivery, it can communicate friendly indifference, or escalating apathy, or complete and utter frustration. I love the shrug. And now I will tell you why.

A few years ago, my mother, in the midst of one of her meltdowns, answered the telephone by "answering" the tv remote. I remember being pretty amazed, at the time, that my own mom was capable of such profound confusion. Of course, I had no way of knowing then, that that was just the beginning.

This past week (and still) Mom has been riding a wild roller coaster of emotional meltdowns. In the past few days, I have observed more neural short circuits, detours and dead ends manifesting themselves in my mother's erratic behavior than I can shake a stick at.

There was the night she tried to change the tv channel by pointing her mechanical pick-up stick straight at the tv screen and squeezing the pick-up claw. Seriously. Have you ever SEEN somebody attempt to, with FULL commitment, change the tv station using a mechanical pick-up stick? The phrase, "What's wrong with this picture?" doesn't even cover it. I'm serious here. Picture it in your head. Visualize the commitment. When I saw my mother doing it......well.......my brain didn't know what to make of it.

Then there was the afternoon she wanted to change her tv to the classical music station. Mom keeps a little post-it right next to her bed, with her three favorite channel numbers written on it. She kept pushing the channel number written on the paper and couldn't understand why the tv was still on CNN. Again.....you really have to picture the sense of commitment.

Then there was the morning I came in, like I always do, to say good morning, see how she was doing, etc. She was in good spirits and all seemed okay, until she looked long and hard at me and asked, "Are you the one who's in charge of all the shenanigans around here?" (And quite honestly, I didn't know how to answer that question. How do you answer any question with the word "shenanigans" in it?)

But there's more.

Just the other afternoon, Mom was "this close" to pressing her Lifeline button (the "Help, I've fallen and can't get up" button she wears around her neck) because she couldn't get her shoes on. She actually wanted the EMTs to come to the house to help her get her shoes on. Epilogue: Dad has confiscated Mom's Lifeline button.

And most recently (just a couple of hours ago in fact) Mom was wailing from the bathroom (specifically, from the toilet) for help. I ran in, asked what the problem was, and she said, "I think I'm having a BM."

And I said, "okay....."

And she just sat there.

So I said, "So.......why did you call for help?"

And she said, "Because I need somebody to come in and do it for me."

And I said, "....do what?" (Because I couldn't imagine she meant she actually wanted somebody to "do" the BM for her.)

And she said, "The BM." (Okay, so I was wrong)

Dad and I have developed a sort of unspoken communication between the two of us that we use to convey what we're "really" thinking when Mom says or does something that's, uh, shall we say, "off the charts." It's nothing elaborate, just a few finely-tuned shoulder shrugs. But it's how we let each other know how we're thinking, without having to say anything out loud. The most casual one, shrug #1, is just a simple shirk of the shoulders that generally means "Whatever Mom just said/did makes no sense, but it seems harmless enough so just ignore it." The next gradation up from that, shrug #2, is a more pronounced shrug, usually coupled with a double-eyebrow-raise--this is the "What the hell did Mom just say/do?!" shrug. Finally, shrug #3, the shrug we reserve for only the most off-the-wall stuff. It actually has a sort of desperate head-roll added to it. This is the "I have no idea what Mom just said/did and.......screw it, I'm going for a walk" shrug.

Like I said, I love the shrug. I walked 36 miles last week.

Figs. Really?

There's this great moment in the movie, "Love Actually" when Laura Linney is standing at her front door with easily the hottest first date any woman could imagine, and after she timidly asks the gorgeous guy if he'd like to come upstairs for "a little bit" (and he, of course, says yes), she stops and says to him, "Good. Yeah. Could you....just.....give me......a moment?" He says, "Sure", and she calmly excuses herself, hands him the keys to hold, walks carefully through the door, around the corner, and up the first four stairs of her apartment where she then proceeds to silently scream (no that is NOT an oxymoron. I do it all the time, for totally different reasons.....which is the reason for today's blog) as she inaudibly explodes in elation and unbridled joy.

Case in point: The g.d.m.f.c.s. Bell rang for a good twenty seconds straight (STRAIGHT!) this morning at 8:30 and I dutifully walked to the other end of the house, half-naked, teeth unbrushed, brain semi-functional, only to find my mother calmly and happily lying in bed smiling at me from ear to ear.

"Good morning!" she greeted me.

I threw up a hand in a half-hearted, non-spoken hi.

Then a pause.......during which Mom just laid there smiling at me. (I hate it when she does that. She used to do it every time I came home from high school. I'd walk through the door and before I could even get the door closed she'd be there, big smile, "Hel-Lo!!!" and then nothing for what seemed like an eternity before I would finally mutter something like, "hey..." and then go directly to the solitude of my bedroom.)

But back to this morning........so I finally asked her, "So.........what do you need?"

Then another pause.........during which Mom searched her mental Rolodex (cuz by that time she had, of course, forgotten why she rang the bell).

Then she finally said, "Oh nothing. I just wondered if you were up."

Seriously? I mean...........SEERiously?!

So I turned around and went back to my room to wait for my brain to wake up.

That's how the day started. But there's more.

A few hours later, after Mom has had breakfast, I've done all the morning chores and have nestled into my office to work, Dad rolls in as usual and immediately barks at me, "THIS A WORK DAY!?" (That's not a typo. That is exactly how he says it.)

Let me explain something here. There's one of those Six Degrees of Separation things that happens between the way Dad gets himself completely worked up over money matters and almost any other subject.......like whether or not I'm working. Here's how it goes.......If I'm working, that means I'm earning money, which means I'm able to pay my bills, which means he doesn't feel responsible. (Okay......four degrees.....)

All right. I wasn't born yesterday, so what do YOU think I say to him when he asks me, "This a work day?"

Anyone?

RIGHT! I say "yes." Of course I say "yes"!

He's satisfied. He says, "Okay" and then turns around and leaves. It's one of the many little verbal "dances" we do.

Anyway........so we do the whole "this a work day?" exchange. But today he doesn't leave. Instead he launches into a soap box tirade about figs. (Yes, FIGS. And, can I just point out that, I really WAS trying to work.)

"You know, "he says, "............FIGS only ripen on the tree."

okay.

He continues,"They have a Very Short Shelf Life."

right.

"That's why you can't always get them in the store."

yeah.

"So..........we need to go to CostCo and get some more."

See what he did there? Wound his way all around the map JUST to get to the fact that he NEEDS to go to CostCo for.........figs. Today.

"So when can we go to CostCo? WE NEED to go to CostCo!"

for figs.

really Dad?

Let me explain something else. Okay. So..........first off.......I've started my day by being summoned by the Almighty Bell for no-good reason. Now, I'm trying to get in a solid several hours of work because.......it's Thursday.........which means Mom has her 1pm hair appointment and Dad has his 3pm retinologist appointment and I have rehearsal at 6:30 for a show that opens in a week (theatre folks, you know what THAT means). In other words, I have a couple of relatively narrow windows of time during which I need to get a solid several hours of work done, take my morning/afternoon walk, eat two substantial meals, and shower before I have to leave for rehearsal at 5:30. The day's a little tight. And now Dad NEEDS to go to CostCo......for FIGS.......because they have a really short shelf life..........because they only ripen on the tree (which, by the way, is true, cuz I Googled it).

So I say to Dad, "I don't have time to go to CostCo today..."

And before I can complete the sentence, Dad cuts me off, "Well when can we go?! We have to go!"

And I vent back at him, "I don't know! I have rehearsal every night for the next week and I have work to do every morning! I'll stop at Sunny Farms and pick up some figs on my way to rehearsal!"

And he barks back, "Well something's got to give!" (which is one of those button statements that Dad throws out when he thinks he's being assertive but he's actually just being ridiculous)

And he follows up the bark with an equally ridiculous statement, "I'll go by myself if I have to!"

really Dad?

And I just look at him and say, "Be my guest."

So here I sit, in my office, emphatically tapping away at my little keyboard and..........well..........could you.........just...........give me.......a moment?

Cuz I'm feeling a little.........overwhelmed at the moment.

A Warped Stability

Don'tcha jus' luuuuuv stability?

I'm not talking about the stability found in most homes--the rhythmic perc of the Mr. Coffee machine, the gentle sizzle of eggs in the frying pan, the soothing hum of a quiet nap on the front porch, the pitter-patter of little children. Oh no,no,no, I'm talking about a whole different kind of stability. Like beauty, art, and pizza, it's a relative term to be sure. But I realized yesterday afternoon that finally (FINALLY!), after three weeks post-rehab, my mom, my dad, me, the two dogs, and now, the two cats, had settled into a satisfying, (Although I hesitate to say "peaceful" and it goes without saying that it's anything but "normal") routine.

Ahhhh stability--Dad napping in his recliner, his mouth randomly opening and closing, closing and opening, then suddenly snapping shut, then slowly falling open again; Mom half-asleep in her recliner, eyes fixed on the living room TV where CNNHD pretends to enlighten us with more trivial details than anybody wants to know about the slimy mess in the Gulf; the just-slightly-unsynchronized echo coming from CNNHD playing from the TV in Mom's bedroom; Emily, the bulldog, sprawled out in front of the glass door where the sunshine warms her characteristically-yet-weirdly-porcine-like canine torso, her left lip fluttering with each exhale; Uma, the field-bred spaniel poised in perfect attention outside on the deck, her gaze fixed on the ground below the birdfeeder where, she hopes, some unfortunate pigeon will come to peck up seeds spilled from above; the two cats, Peter and Rufus, curled in typical feline fashion on their newly-claimed favorite spots--the top of the carpeted climbing structure for Peter, the chair next to the window seat for Rufus; and me, reflecting on the serenity that has, at long last, been achieved after three weeks of ups and downs and semi-sleepless nights, and medication changes for Mom.

I glance at the clock. Four hours until Mom gets her 2 oxycodones, which she now takes every six hours, and which she starts asking for at exactly thirty minutes BEFORE she's due to take them. The 10am, 4pm, 10pm schedule appears to be working for her (Of course, that's 2 oxycodones on top of the three other anti-depressants, AND the twice-a-day oxycontin. Is it any wonder that I'm repulsed by addiction and dependency of any kind?).

All living things are stable. It's a little weird, but I'll take it.

The Bell....

I've attempted to write a new blog entry three times now in the last three weeks. Never got further than the first sentence in any of 'em. That's got to be indicative of something, right? I mean.......right? And if you just agreed with me, will you tell me what it is? Cuz I'm at a loss.

Maybe I'm exhausted.

Maybe my brain is fried.

Maybe I just don't care.

Maybe all of those are true.

All I know is...........for the last two weeks, I've spent more one-on-one tutorial time with my mother and that damned (Now see........that's a bad sign.......swearing right out of the gate like that....) tv remote control than I care to recall. Lemme just say that I HATE DEMENTIA. (Uh oh, see? All caps.........another bad sign.......). But what I despise even more is.........having to conduct these little tv remote tutorials at 1:30 IN THE MORNING..........for the THIRD TIME SINCE MIDNIGHT!!!!! (Arrrrgh! And now, the repeating exclamation points.......this is deteriorating rapidly.)

okay. Deep breath. (Please pause as I take revisit my kriya yoga deep-breathing technique.)

All right. As I was saying...............It's just been very difficult for me to figure what to write about...........and then, HOW to write about it even if I COULD figure out what it was I should write about! (Note the single exclamation point.)

And then there's.....The Bell. The sweet little antique silver bell Mom uses to ring when she needs me to come help her go to the bathroom. At least, that's what the bell is SUPPOSED to be used for. The. Bell. The bell. The bell. ThebellthebellthebellTHEBELLLLLL! The freakin', stinkin', stupid-ass, g.d., m.f., c.s. BELL!!!!!!!! Do you know how many times I get awakened out of completely sound and deliciously deep sleep by that @#$@#% bell???? (Oh f___ the repeating punctuation!!!!!!!!!! Screw the swearing!!!!!) Crawled out of my nice comfortable bed, staggered in my sleepy stupor to the other end of the house to see what "emergency" I was being summoned to address........only to find out that Mom couldn't remember how to change the F----ing channel from CNN to the Western channel........when it's already ON the f______ Western channel??????

"Ringy,ringy,ringy,ringy,ringy!"

Oh.

My.

God.

She's ringing her bell for me RIGHT NOW! While I'm sitting here trying to write (finally) a blog entry!!!!

Ringy, ringy, ringy, ringy, ringy!"

And again........

Does this count as a blog entry?