Morning Rounds

6:40 a.m.       

The bladder won’t wait.  I quietly get up in the dark, hoping I won’t wake Mom, and am back to bed in a minute.

7:25 a.m.       

I must have dozed a bit.  The bathroom light is on.  The cat is nudging me.  I decide to get up.   As I start down the hallway, I hear Mom:  “Jan?”  I go into her room.  She is propped up on her elbow in bed, saying, “I feel awful.”

            “Do you want to get up and have some coffee?”

            “That would be wonderful.  Why do I feel so bad?”

            “You’ve been off your feed for a few weeks.”

            “Where are my slippers?”

            I bend down and pull her slippers into view from under the bed.  “Here they are.”  She slides her feet in and stands.  I hand her bathrobe to her.  She follows me down the hallway.  I go into the kitchen.  She heads to her recliner.

            “This is awful, feeling so bad when I wake up.  What’s wrong?”

            “You haven’t been feeling well for a few weeks.  You usually start feeling better as the day goes on.”

            “Have we been to the doctor?”

            “Yes.”

            “What does he say?”

            I take a deep breath.  (Her doctor is a she.)  “You lost your appetite a few weeks ago and have lost weight, so you are weak.  Your memory has gotten worse, too.”

            “That’s not good.  I’m sorry to get you up.”

            “It’s okay, Mom.  Let me get your coffee heated up.”

            I bring Mom her hot cup of Starbucks Frappuccino and a small glass of tonic water.  Then I bring out a mini-cinnamon roll on a saucer.   She thanks me profusely. 

            “What month is it?”

            “February.”

            “No wonder.  Have I been feeling bad for a while?”

            “Yes, a few weeks.”

            “That’s not right.  Does the doctor say anything?”

            “Just that we need to encourage you to eat.”

            “I’m not even interested in my roll.  But this coffee is like manna.”

            I turn back to the kitchen to start my brewed coffee and make my morning protein shake. 

            “Ah.  This coffee is like manna.  I’m sorry to get you up.”

            After getting my brew started and protein shake made, I sit at the kitchen table to drink the shake and take my morning medications. 

            “I hate waking up feeling so awful.  This isn’t right.  I never used to feel so awful when I got up.”

            I am tempted to say that I have felt awful many mornings for over a decade and that she is lucky to have been so healthy for over 80 years,  but I manage to say something nicer instead: “It must not be any fun.”

            “This coffee is wonderful.”

            “Do you need more?  Let me get you a refill.”  I pour the other half bottle of the Starbucks into her cup and place it in the microwave.  Ah.  My coffee is ready, so I pour myself a steamy cup of Millstone Pumpkin Spice with a little Silk French Vanilla Creamer.

            I deliver her cup and ask if she would like to have her music on. 

“That was the farthest thing from my mind, but it sounds perfectly         delightful,” she says.

I turn on the TV to one of the classical music stations.

“Mom, I’m going to take my coffee back to my room to wake up at my computer.”

“Different strokes for different folks!” she says cheerily.  “This coffee is wonderful.”

8:25 a.m.       

I’ve been at my computer since 7:50 a.m. attempting to recreate the first hour of our day, though I’m quite sure I’ve missed several exchanges concerning morning malaise, doctor, and coffee.  It’s time to go refill my coffee and reheat hers.

                       

                       

Saturday's Pace

            I walked too fast today.

            As my brother John and I headed down the driveway with the dogs, my legs started to feel like rubber.  They ached just like my body sometimes does after a massage.  I imagine toxins being squeezed out of my cells, leaving their poisonous trail of pain behind.

            I told myself it was good for me, this picked-up-pace, even as I knew it was not.  It seemed too trivial, too silly to say I needed to slow down.   As a result, I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening with the feverish ache of fibromyalgia.  A pill gave me partial relief.  Soon it will be time for another pill.

            This morning I knew I would not be in top form because I did not sleep well last night.  Besides the 3:30 a.m. awakening that lasted until 5:30, my sleep was troubled.  I’ve started to dream each night about my mother’s dementia.  The settings and people vary, but always the theme is the same:  I am trying so hard to take care of her and not succeeding.

            Maybe the ache in my soul is manifesting itself through the ache in my body.  My legs, my arms, even my fingers feel weighed down and heavy and sore.  My shoulders are tied in knots. 

            Meanwhile, the pace of care quickens.  Though we are simply sitting in the living room, I am weary of Mom’s continuous and cyclical commentary but aware that she needs my presence.  The marathon, though, is almost over.  I will be able to take a slower pace when I am visiting Mom instead of living with her. 

Shadow or Sunshine

            Earlier this week, I stepped from the shade into the sunshine.

            Our long, pine-lined driveway never ends.  With its single entrance to the road, it proceeds to a fork of decision:  curve left and you reach my brother’s house and the cougar cages; stay right and you go past the large shop to Mom’s house.   The driveway loops and connects back at the fork.

            Walking back from getting the mail, I continued to ponder, lost in the prickly undergrowth of indecision.  When I stepped into the clearing, my mind cleared.  Yes, I saw our neglected garden, thick with February weeds.  Yes, I saw the steepled roof of my brother’s house reaching into the blue sky.  And, yes, I saw the choice before me:  shadow or sunshine.

            Many times in my life I took the shadowed lane, and God sustained me.  But as I trod the path of duty alone, I got lost in the woods.   Trudging on, I struggled to keep my footing, eventually enveloped in despair and no longer able to help the ones I loved.

            God used the rare February sunshine to open my inner vision.  All the prickly details remained, tugging on my cuffs.  But I understood that choosing the sunshine would allow me to be a more useful bearer of light.  The underbrush, it turns out, is a dark tangle of guilt and pride:  guilt over things beyond my control and pride that I should control them anyway.

            I surrendered to the knowledge that God is with me in sunshine and in shadow.  I understood that He will love me no matter my choice.  This time I choose sunshine. 

           

Approximation of a Conversation

            With a worried look, Mom asks, “Do I go over to John’s in the evening?”

            “You used to,” I say, eyes never leaving my book.

            “When did I stop doing that?”

            “In December.”

            “Why?”

            “First, he was really sick for a few weeks; then, there was the snowstorm; and now you haven’t been feeling well.”

            “You’ll have to keep track of that for me.  I should start going over there again.”

            That approximation of a conversation starts at 7:15—I abandon my book at 7:30--and continues until 9:00.   Sitting in the living room with Mom, I browse through the latest Smithsonian and fiddle around on the Internet (favorite current subject:  living room furniture) while the sequence repeats itself every couple minutes. 

            At 9:20, Mom takes herself off to bed, but I know better than to pick up my book yet.  It is now 9:36 p.m.  She has come back out to the living room twice.  Her questions precede her:  “I want something to suck on.  What do I usually bring to bed?”

“A square of chocolate.”  (Really, it’s true, a habit she established long before I arrived on the scene three and a half years ago.)

“Where is it?”

“On the top shelf there next to the pantry.” 

She fumbles around, groping in the cupboard, and asks, “Is it round?”

“Here, let me help you find it,” I say, getting up.  I hand her a milk chocolate

square broken off the big bar, and she plods back toward her bedroom to finish changing into her pajamas.

            A few minutes later, I hear her voice down the hallway.  “I need a Kleenex.  Where do I have a Kleenex?”

            Oops.  I need to put a new box of tissues in her room.  “Out here next to your chair,” I say.  I direct her to the Kleenex box, and she takes one, saying, “I don’t know why I need this.”

            She heads back to bed.

            It is now 9:50 p.m.  I hear her cough.  I’m pretty sure the next foray down the hall will be in search for her favorite cold beverage:  tonic water.

            Mom’s repeated trips down the hallway are, actually, a good sign:  this is the most and best I’ve seen her walk in days.  It’s probably because she ate some supper:  a tablespoon of yogurt with fresh pear, a couple small bites of salad, a few noodles, and half a meatball.  And I gave her an ice cream bar sometime between 7:30 and 9 p.m.

            But I think I will deliver the tonic water to her bedside before I turn in.  It is 10:06, and I am getting sleepy.  My book will have to wait.