Someone said

I know it has been a long time! I started the blog because I felt I had come through some tough times and learned a lot about myself, life,tolerance, love, and my Mom. I wanted this to be a positive journal of a journey. In many ways, my blogging is my therapist. A road to my own examinations of thoughts and feelings. People can read or not read, or stop in the middle when they find me "too negative."

Lately I am just tired and at night when I finally get into bed, I crash. The rest of time, I find I am compulsively playing cards on my i-Pod and hating myself for it.

I think I had talked to someone about some of the health issues that Mom was having of late and my back and shoulder aches due to her increasing inability to get up and down by herself. I have also been interviewing lots of caregivers so that I am not tied down to one person. I find it kind of stressful to interview (and did even when I interviewed for employees). I have told Mom that she is to be a part of the interview, help me pick a person that she would enjoy spending sometime with.

Anyway the comment was made that I was a "really good daughter." I thought that was nice, but at this time in my life, I wanted to be a really good wife and a really good grandmother. I can't help but be jealous of my retired friends who are taking classes, traveling and hiking. A short trip out to the front of the property to feed the horses can have consequences.

The Last One

Last week, I had to tell my Mom that her cousin Garnet had died.

Garnet was a little older than Mom and had been one of the "anchors" of the family. She always was there if someone needed her. When my grandparents moved to Phoenix after spending their whole lives in Cleveland, a postcard arrived without fail every week with an update on the news in Cleveland and of the family. Garnet was married to the same man all her life and had 2 daughters. She worked at a department store and called my Grandmother every morning before she left for work, my Grandma Sadie would always say before hanging up,"Go make money."

My Mom was blessed with being a part of a very large family. Her father was one of nine, her mother, one of 8 children. Her life, as were our early years, was filled with extended family: grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. I remember wonderful times at my grandparents (her parents) with Sunday gatherings of barbecues, potato salad,jello molds and watermelon carefully cut to look like a basket. These times are a treasure that most kids don't have today. People live far away from their families, for reasons of work or weather.

Mom's cousins have all passed other than Harold Checel in Los Angeles (on her father's side) and possibly a few others that we don't keep in touch with. Garnet was the cousin who nicknamed Mom "Rena Gadena" and for many years I put that on her birthday cake "Happy Birthday Rena Gadena"; she loved that. Mom's brothers are gone and her cousins now too. When I told her about Garnet, she said with a mixture of sadness and wonder "I must be the last one."

I try to put myself in Mom's place mentally at times like this, so I don't just brush her feelings off. I love my cousins...I love my sister and brother. How would it be to be the "last one"? I can't begin to imagine that. So today: call your cousins, your sisters, your brothers....tell them how much you love them and how important they are. We all make up that part of the puzzle that brings our lives into the finished picture. I love you all.

It can always get worse

Last night I was "toileting" Mom, a nice way of saying that I now help her stand up off the toilet and wipe her. It was a funny feeling, like she used to do that for me, and now I do the same for her. It has been a difficult few weeks since Mom was in severe pain a week ago and had a reaction to her pain meds and then developed a bladder infection. She was actually weakened and confused enough that for the first time ever, her nurse suggested that I call my brother and sister and put them on "alert". However, once the pain med patch was removed and her antibiotics started working on the infection, she once again made a rebound.

It is strange that for most of my adult life I have complained and whined about the difficulty of being me and living my life. At each junction in the last 10 years I became more and more aware of how ridiculous my complaints were. If God truly has a sense of humor, heaven must be lol-ing and rofl-ing at this time!

Two years ago (or it will be 2 years at the end of October) I went to a caregiver support group, I think I only got there once. Each time I tried to go again, Mom had some issue that by the time it was addressed, I was too late. I remember how I felt depressed and trapped THEN. How little did I know.

The sad part is that I am sure my Mom is not pleased with having her daughter dress her, help her from a chair back into a wheelchair to go to the bathroom, where I pull her pants down and then wipe her. I finish off with special cream because she is so bony and her skin so delicate that just sitting causes her skin to be irritated and frequently to break open. It is harder for her than for me I realize. It is hard for both of us. Yet every time we hit one of the really bad patches, I am scared to death of losing her.

The coziness of caregiving.

This morning I got up and wanted to begin working on some new jewelry in preparation for a fall pre-holiday sale. All summer long I have unable to get into any kind of a creative mode. I can put something together but there is no magic in it. I start to work on something and find I have displaced tools, findings or stones. It is so frustrating. I loved being lost in the creative flow,it hasn't happened in awhile.

I remember discussing this with my Aunt a number of months ago. She is primary caregiver for her husband and at the time we spoke was having some trouble getting into her writers mode. She is an accomplished poet. So this morning, I thought I would see how she is doing. My Aunt is probably one of the, if not the most, beloved people in my life, from the time I first met her. I believe I was 5,maybe 6.

She said that "yes, she had been writing a lot" She finds coziness in the routine of care giving a loved one. A peace in the hours that her husband sleeps and she can write.

It makes me think of the days here. There is a definite repetitiveness of the days, but I never thought of them as comforting, so maybe I need to revisit that. I guess I can accept that my alone time is before Mom wakes and just be in it, instead of worrying if I have enough time to............ and I know that while certain programs are on, I have freedom. I sit with Mom and either nap or read while she dozes through the afternoon. Maybe I need to rethink things and get into coziness instead of concern? As always, thanks Aunt Bonnie for your positive outlook and loving attitude.

Turn about IS fair play....mwah ha ha

Something interesting occurred to me recently, but I just have not had time to write lately.(more on this another time.) Some of these thoughts floated in while we were getting ready for our San Antonio trip. As you may remember, Mom decided she couldn't stay with the caregiver. The woman makes her crazy,or so she said...and I had this huge flashback (not drug related) of my grandfather, her father, and his caregiver. His caregiver was nothing like Mom's. Mom's is healthy, trim, well groomed and just plain fun. My grandfather just did not want his caregiver at all and Mom just had him suck it up. Mom knew she needed that time to herself.

Another memory: the little photo of the Hummel figure that I posted:Mom lived with her parents when my father died. She cared for her Mom and then cared for her Dad, who was not infirmed, but needed to be driven,cooked for.She shopped, cleaned and so on. When Mom met her 2nd husband, Grandpa and Mom broke up housekeeping. Grandpa moved to assisted living (which he complained mightily about) and Mom moved in with her own husband. Grandpa's caregiver suggested that THEY get married and stay in his house. Grandpa had thought Mom and her husband would live in the house with him.

My Grandfather had purchased a Hummel collection for our Grandmother. They were fairly expensive and she had a large number of them, as he would purchase one each time a new one came out. One day, after the house had been sold, Mom came home and all the Hummels were gone. A neighbor said she liked them and Grandpa sold her the collection and the special shelves for $350.00. My Mom was furious. He had never asked her if she or anyone else in the family wanted them.She was shocked and angry.

Flash forward to years ahead when my brother and I were helping Mom and Dad move out of their home. They were moving into assisted living and Mom was not happy about that. After hours of packing, my brother and I decided to take a break and go out for a bite to eat. While we were out for a little more than an hour, an antiques dealer came in. We knew he was supposed to come, but we had thought we would be there. Imagine our surprise to come home and find Dad's grandfather clock (actually given to him by his grandfather), some antique shelves,knick knacks, and an oil painting that had belonged to my grandmother. These pieces had been verbally promised to Dad's daughter and my sister, although there were other family members that would also have liked them. Just like the Hummels......they were gone!

Observations of Orderliness

I don't know if Orderliness is an actual word, but I know I was raised with it. My Mom and her Mom and all down the line always had things in order, which was probably why my birth father's polio/spinal meningitis was such a monkey wrench in life. No one ever really knew how to deal with that one.

My Mom makes me somewhat crazy each night, and I wrote about this before,with her making sure everything is in exactly the correct place before she can go to bed. I mean, there cannot be a wrinkle in her bed sheets, bed pad and so on. All bureau drawers must closed tightly, nothing ajar. Since Mom doesn't want to go to bed much before 11-11:30, I have long run out patience.

When I think of my own children and how this influenced me, I feel sad. When my daughter was born, my Mom said "don't ever take a baby out to a restaurant, they will bother the other people. If you want to go out, call me and I will take care of her." I was always uptight taking the kids out after that. I was also resentful when I couldn't go.(I am amazed and delighted at all the young parents who bring their children with them today. I wish I had the courage to have done that.) Although my house was child proofed, it was also important to have things tidy and put away. Not much of a creative atmosphere for a child.

I guess I am aware of this lately because I am not all that tidy anymore. Since I am always on call for whatever is needed, doing laundry, prepping meals, when and if I start a piece of jewelry or a painting, I often leave it to return to later. I could work in my studio, but then I would be out of the house. If Mom needed me, I wouldn't know.

So it kind of rankles me, when I wheel her into the living room and she remarks as we pass the dining room table, "Ugh, that looks terrible, you need to clean that up." That, being the way I used to make some money. I think that is what made me remember how long this has been drummed into me.

There is certainly the part that I played in younger days: for a person that was such a defiant child,why was I so afraid to lose Mom's approval when I grew up? The answer: who knows? Therapy anyone?

Now where have I been?????????????

It has been a long month for sure. I have had lots of commitments to complete, so I have not had the time to sit and think about things to write about. I have certainly had alot of topics in mind lately and will do a bit more writing this month,or at least I plan to.

So much of our life is centered around our 12 Step programs. They are pretty much who I am and how I live, so it takes up alot of my daily life. I wouldn't change that for anything. Last year we had decided to attend the AA International convention in San Antonio. It celebrated 75 years of AA. I knew it was going to be B-I-G and I thought it would be great to be there. These are held only every 5 years and it takes that long to plan for the 55,000 plus who attend.

I had made the arrangements a year ago and registered as soon as I could. At that time, since Mom was self sufficient in dressing, showering and toileting, my brother was going to come out and be her caregiver. Now these things require another's person's aid. I had lined up our regular caregiver to stay for the 4 and 1/2 days that we would be gone (this included travel time). My brother would come out to visit later in the month.

Mom decided a few weeks before we were leaving that she did not like or want the caregiver that we have had for close to a year...and began to complain about her clothes being shrunk, being forced to eat too much, not liking the food she was given and so on. The beauty of Hospice of the Valley is that we can call for a visit from Mom's social worker to talk over the necessity of our having a life. Mom got teary when she said we had not left her for this long before. She said she would rather be in the hospital then left at home: the social worker assured her that she would not really like that. So did the Chaplain later in the week....and the nurse.... and her Hospice visitor. As Mom talked more and more about how she would rather be in the hospital, she managed to end up with a fever and an infection. My siblings, the social worker, the nurse and my friends all told me that if I pulled out of the trip I would never go away again. Even so, Arnie and weighed the financial losses of not going. I wasn't sleeping; Mom wasn't talking. It was a horrible week.

The turning point was Mom getting better and so,we decided to go. It is hard to believe that we will be 75 (Arnie) and 68 (me) before we get another chance to go to an International.So it did seem important to go now. The anger and resentment I felt over the emotional upheavals of the prior to going were probably not good for any of us. I am grateful to have gone, grateful to all who helped while we were gone and determined to take back a little more of my life. Did I feel guilty? Do I feel guilty? More to follow.