I found a touching blog post on a lovely blog, Dementia Days.
There is a video there, at http://www.dementiadays.com/2010/07/a-video-worth-watching/, of a lovely example of Validation Therapy, working with an advanced Alzheimer's patient. It was so touching.
Though my mother doesn't have Alzheimer's, it is a great example of respecting an elders' boundaries, while still using their 'vocabulary' and being present for their reactions, even when their apparent cognitive abilities have disappeared.
Beautiful. Please explore the other posts in the blog. It's lovely.
Saturday, January 14, 2012
Disappearing ... both of us?
Mom, disappearing ... the theme of this blog. I would like to revisit this theme, if you don't mind.
Instead, I feel a thousand pounds lighter. I feel like I can sprout wings and fly. Free of obligation to sit at the Altar of Ancestors, holding onto their things. Soon, we will be down to our two suitcases, flying to Peru, awaiting an unparalleled adventure.
Since my mother will be moving to my brother's in a few months, I am conscious of the need to clean out some detritus, especially in organizing, clarifying and purging old business papers. And when she moves, she will not have her bed or other equipment that belong to hospice here, and will receive same down in New Mexico when she arrives, from their hospice service. She has said she doesn't need the television ("I can't see it!") or much of other furniture. Her footprint, her presence, shrinks even more, as she awaits death with hunger.
Yet, with my own move to Peru on the approaching horizon, I am finding my own life-footprint has dramatically reduced. Instead of my 5-level 4-bedroom 3-bath house, I am in a small apartment (and LOVING it). Instead of an office overflowing with paperwork, we are constrained to a few plastic tubs, and trying to scan ourselves down to almost nothing. Instead of a cherry dining room table seating 10-12, we eat on a card table. And we are LOVING it!
We have divested ourselves of most of our family heirlooms, either by giving them to willing descendants or where none exists, to friends who will treasure them and the stories we've shared about the pieces. When we actually leave the apartment, what remains will go the way of the other ones. We have given away sterling silver flatware, serving dishes. Limoges china. Antique hand-painted teacups. Linens. Rocking chairs and china cabinets. Photographs. Recipe boxes from long ago. Damask tablecloths and handmade aprons. A thousand little treasures that I enjoyed seeing, touching, to a point ... but that I rarely used, and that buried me under the weight of other people's lives.
Ten, twenty years ago, I treasured these things. Now they choke me. I drown in their shadows.
In a sense, yes, I might be said to also be disappearing, in the sense of the detritus attached to us is dropping away. We are less 'significant' in the sense of our perceived stability, or our being Owners of Important Stuff in this world.
Instead, I feel a thousand pounds lighter. I feel like I can sprout wings and fly. Free of obligation to sit at the Altar of Ancestors, holding onto their things. Soon, we will be down to our two suitcases, flying to Peru, awaiting an unparalleled adventure.
Even if we have to come back to the USA, eventually I don't think we'll miss all the stuff. Meantime, I will look forward to growing old in the Andes, overlooking an unimaginably beautiful vista, helping others and growing old in peace with incredible richness of life.
My mother's slow disappearance is inevitable. Mine is more abrupt, more by choice, and I am utterly thrilled.
Monday, January 9, 2012
The big family meeting, and a future move
I've dreaded posting. We have been going through a tremendous change here, and I have struggled repeatedly how to share it. I have several drafts started. I wonder if I'll even post this. Well, I need to start somewhere, eh? So, let's go...
I wrote here in November that my husband and I want to move to Peru, to retire next summer. When I started caring for my mother here almost five years ago, I didn't dream it would last so long, and hadn't anticipated this day. Still, it arrived.
My brother and sister came here over the holidays, and we had a family meeting, with Mom. I told her I am leaving early summer for Peru. She had about ten seconds where she looked shocked and a tiny bit emotional, then quietly listened. My brother held her hand as he talked about what he offered - to have her live in his home with him and his wife. My sister talked about how she would like to have Mom in an assisted living home there, though her own health (advanced rheumatoid arthritis) and job and climate make it less than ideal. We said my daughter offered to have her in Wisconsin. So, as of the end of the meeting, she was - shockingly! - accepting of moving to the Southwest with my brother.
I was flabbergasted. When I expect graciousness, she is negative. When I expect ugliness and pleading and negativity, like with this move, she is lovely and accepting. Wow.
She has continued to be (mostly) OK in our visits since then. Since I had been talking about Peru, she knew it was a deep desire of ours, and a strong intention - she just now learned the "when". I am still dumbfounded that she hasn't begged or pushed back yet.
She is anxious about little things. Getting on the plane - that is, physically stepping onto the plane from the jetway. Will she get lost in my brother's house. Who will dress her in the mornings. OK, those aren't really little things - but they show she is thinking through her life, how it will be, and I think that is excellent.
We've had some vacillations, though. My brother called one day to tell me he was having "second thoughts". This was extremely frustrating, since Mom was now counting on this option. It is understandable that he would be concerned about the impact on his family - but BOY do I wish he had thought about that PRIOR to making this offer (and being the big hero of the family meeting). (I think he has come back on track to offer to have her there with/near him.) Also, Mom has had some time when she thought maybe she could just stay in the assisted living home where she lives - but we talked about the extreme loneliness and the importance of having a health-care advocate who is local (among other things).
It has raised some family issues, however. I am the one with Power of Attorney for legal matters, as well as the co-trustee, which means I have the purse strings. I will need to make financial arrangements to ensure my brother has funds to care for Mom - but he strongly strongly wants to have the controls passed to him. Unfortunately (?), we can't make changes now, since Mom has a diagnosis of dementia. He feels belittled and out of control, which I guess I understand, but he needs to learn to trust that it will be OK. We will devise some strategies to make sure he is very well funded to handle her needs.
I am deeply grateful for the willingness of him and his wife to do this. It's a huge deal - whether she is in the house especially, or even to have her in a nearby facility.
I am also tremendously relieved that I have an end-date in sight, so we can start this new chapter in our lives.
Of course, Mom finishes each chat with comments about how this may not even happen, that she eagerly hopes she dies before this comes to pass. She continues to be ready and hoping for her life to end, the sooner the better. And I say, yes, Mom, that's true. Let's see.
I wrote here in November that my husband and I want to move to Peru, to retire next summer. When I started caring for my mother here almost five years ago, I didn't dream it would last so long, and hadn't anticipated this day. Still, it arrived.
My brother and sister came here over the holidays, and we had a family meeting, with Mom. I told her I am leaving early summer for Peru. She had about ten seconds where she looked shocked and a tiny bit emotional, then quietly listened. My brother held her hand as he talked about what he offered - to have her live in his home with him and his wife. My sister talked about how she would like to have Mom in an assisted living home there, though her own health (advanced rheumatoid arthritis) and job and climate make it less than ideal. We said my daughter offered to have her in Wisconsin. So, as of the end of the meeting, she was - shockingly! - accepting of moving to the Southwest with my brother.
I was flabbergasted. When I expect graciousness, she is negative. When I expect ugliness and pleading and negativity, like with this move, she is lovely and accepting. Wow.
She has continued to be (mostly) OK in our visits since then. Since I had been talking about Peru, she knew it was a deep desire of ours, and a strong intention - she just now learned the "when". I am still dumbfounded that she hasn't begged or pushed back yet.
She is anxious about little things. Getting on the plane - that is, physically stepping onto the plane from the jetway. Will she get lost in my brother's house. Who will dress her in the mornings. OK, those aren't really little things - but they show she is thinking through her life, how it will be, and I think that is excellent.
We've had some vacillations, though. My brother called one day to tell me he was having "second thoughts". This was extremely frustrating, since Mom was now counting on this option. It is understandable that he would be concerned about the impact on his family - but BOY do I wish he had thought about that PRIOR to making this offer (and being the big hero of the family meeting). (I think he has come back on track to offer to have her there with/near him.) Also, Mom has had some time when she thought maybe she could just stay in the assisted living home where she lives - but we talked about the extreme loneliness and the importance of having a health-care advocate who is local (among other things).
It has raised some family issues, however. I am the one with Power of Attorney for legal matters, as well as the co-trustee, which means I have the purse strings. I will need to make financial arrangements to ensure my brother has funds to care for Mom - but he strongly strongly wants to have the controls passed to him. Unfortunately (?), we can't make changes now, since Mom has a diagnosis of dementia. He feels belittled and out of control, which I guess I understand, but he needs to learn to trust that it will be OK. We will devise some strategies to make sure he is very well funded to handle her needs.
I am deeply grateful for the willingness of him and his wife to do this. It's a huge deal - whether she is in the house especially, or even to have her in a nearby facility.
I am also tremendously relieved that I have an end-date in sight, so we can start this new chapter in our lives.
Of course, Mom finishes each chat with comments about how this may not even happen, that she eagerly hopes she dies before this comes to pass. She continues to be ready and hoping for her life to end, the sooner the better. And I say, yes, Mom, that's true. Let's see.
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