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.