The Good Times

A couple of different people have told me recently that they are now taking care of their parents. A lot of us not only want to do it, but financially it makes more sense.

I believe that hard times can make or break a marriage. We have been through some
very hard times from pretty much the beginning of our marriage. Major times, like overdoses, suicides, cancers, plane crashes,and divorces, just to name a few. There were times that we didn't look like we would make it but something always happened to bring us back to hanging in together.

We have both lost parents,step-parents and grandparents. My Mom is the last parent that we have now. I am amazed at how much and how well my husband cares for her.They seem to laugh together far more than she and I do. At breakfast the other morning, my Mom said to Arnie "Take my hand". This is her way of showing you how cold she is. I would have said that,"yes,I see you are cold." Arnie's response was "why, are you a Stranger in Paradise?" (from the musical Kismet,I believe).They both just laughed and the concern over cold hands was forgotten.

The photo in this blog is of Arnie having dressed Mom in warm clothes so he could take her out and show her the mountains that were dusted with snow on a Sunday morning. He said "We have to take her out and show her how beautiful it is. She can't appreciate that from a window." I went into the other room to find my camera. When I came out, he all ready had her outside, he had dressed her in a ski jacket and mittens. It was touching to me.

Recently,after spending a few days in Tucson,when we came home, I just said "Hi Mom",but he ran over to kiss her. I was like, "oops" and ran over to do the same.

What is it about our spouses/partners that makes us love them more for their tenderness with others that we love? I don't know exactly, but thank goodness for that good-ness.

Disclaimer to prior blog

In response to some of you...I did not write the blog to embarrass my Mother. I think this is a sad and uncomfortable situation for both of us. What I was trying to express here, is the feeling of not being qualified enough to know what the medication cocktail is for optimum function. When systems are not functioning well....life is VERY hard, very painful. There is certainly a huge amount of fear when the nurse walks out and its ME and Mom.

I am not trying to get folks to say how amazing I am, how sad this is... or fishing for sympathy. I HATE that this is how my Mom's life is now and my inability to do a darn thing about it.

Is it time to make changes? I don't know. Is it possible that I won't be able to have her here until the end? I don't know. The only therapist that I saw, told me that we needed to have her in a care center environment. This was a year and a half ago.

The times that I see my Mom at her most vulnerable are not toilet times but when she is
trying to brush her teeth. She stands at the sink, so small and frail, working so hard to do a perfect job. Somehow that stays in my mind the most. The little-ness of her.

Things I have never wanted to be

No offense to anyone I want to say that right! There are some jobs I have never been interested in doing: real estate agent, insurance agent, and certainly a nurse. As I said, I have no prejudice against the people who do these jobs, I have just never been interested in doing them myself. One of my dearest friends went to back to school to study nursing after having 3 children; my riding teacher gave that career upso she could study nursing. They are wonderful at their professions, I just do not get what made them want to do them. On that note I must say I have HUGE amounts of gratitude and awe for people who choose these professions.

I,as I said, never had any desire to do that job. Which is why I am bewildered to be
an untrained person doing this job. I now have to make decisions for my Mom that I feel totally unqualified to do, but I do them. This past week was really hard. My Mother ended up with an impacted bowel. I usually can handle
these situations on my own,(yes I have dis-impacted my Mother) but this was beyond my capability. The nurse and the nursing assistant had to work with suppository and enema and I got to hear the crying and screaming that accompanied that task. Of course, since neither one will move with us (even though I offered to cook whatever they wanted for meals), I was left to see what would happen in the afternoon.....would there be uncontrollable diarrhea, which can commonly follow an impaction? More of the impaction? Some trips to the bathroom that would ease the problem? I didn't know. If I gave her atavan, would that ease things or make it worse? How much to give her? Would she be willing to use oxygen since she was so exhausted?

One of the problems was that I not noticed how long it had been since she had moved her bowels. The reason I had not noticed was because my husband had gone to have his radiation markers placed on Monday. Since I had no caregiver that day, a kind friend took him. When he came home he was completely "zonked" as we used to say. I was caught up in caring for him. My mother too had not felt well on Monday.

Mom had back pain on Monday. I decided to give her atavan, not morphine since that is constipating. She had all ready had 1000 mg. of Tylenol and that had not worked.

These are the kinds of decisions, that I,who am not a nurse, make. What kind of pain meds. What do I do about constipation? If I use too much Miralax, then there is diarrhea, and if I give her too little there is impaction. In addition, when there is too much diarrhea, a bladder infection can occur. My Mom is completely asymptomatic and the only clue we have is increasing disorientation. However, I am seeing that anyway and I believe it may be her dementia increasing. If I give her the antibiotic(there is only one kind left that she is not allergic to) and if she doesn't have an infection, I may be increasing her resistance to this one antibiotic that she still take. Chronic diarrhea also increases soreness to the skin, so I have to watch out for bedsores, treating them with a paste that the Hospice people taught me to make out of 3 different balms. (They call it Pat's Paste, I call it Rena's Rump Rub) It is best to catch that red skin before a stage one and if not, at least take care of it before it gets to stage two. (can you believe I use these terms? Stage one and stage two??)

Wait a minute here? Does she need a little oxygen? I need to find that out. Is the filter clean and is there enough water in the canister before I start it up. By the way, I am quite good at cleaning wax out of a hearing aid.

For my last job....I never thought about being a beautician, but I just dried and styled Mom's hair, after her CNA washed it. Later, I will clip and file her nails.

I think what I am trying to say here is that I feel really inadequate in making the decisions I make on a daily basis. I really don't know what the right meds are and what the right time to give them is and what they will do or affect. I sometimes just wonder if I am slowly killing my Mom or really making her last days happy and comfortable.

Who are/were you? Who am/was I?

These silhouettes were done many years ago at Silvers Temple in Cleveland Ohio. I remember it being some kind of fund raiser and my Mom had these done. At the time I wasn't all that happy about it. That was the kind of kid I was. Kind of rebellious and non-cooperative. I did my own thing when I could get away with it.

My Mom was someone that I was kind of scared of because she had this sixth sense of what could happen. She told me that a mother always knows when a child lies. I asked why and she said that a line appeared on the child's forehead. From that point on I always managed to do an interesting hand to forward maneuver when I had to "fib".

My Mom knew a lot of good information and taught me many good things. I was always afraid of her predictions of what could happen,but headstrong enough to disobey her.
I still wondered as I was in the process of disobeying her what if "God really did punish me"? This was one of my Mother's biggest admonishments.

My Mom also was an amazing cook, baker and gardener. She seemed quite invincible and stalwart. I was defiant and wild for a many years. I won't go into that at this point. (my actual behaviors) Just suffice it to say Mom was good, I was not.

So who are we now? My Mom is so tiny, fragile, and doesn't remember so many things including cooking tips and other information. It makes me sad and also frustrates me at times.

I,too, feel so different than I was. What happened to the energy and curiosity? The spunkiness? I am just humbled and tired these days. Neither of us is the same. Is it just part of aging? Our situation? Wish there was a blend of the old and the now for both of us. A few dreams still out there to be fulfilled.