Writer's Remorse

         The moment I hit the “POST” button on my blog yesterday, I began to feel a deep sense of regret and guilt.  (And yes, I do know that I could have instantly taken it down, and I chose not to.) After working on the piece for a couple of days, satisfied enough—or at least as satisfied as I was going to be for a while-- I took that writer’s leap of faith and posted it. Instantly, that faith failed me replaced by the haunting feeling that my words were totally inadequate, self-centered and indulgent.  All I had told is my little story of some months with my mom when there are so very many others living with more dramatic, painful, loving stories. While theirs are reminiscent of being sucked up in a tornado and spinning for days, mine was like being caught in a thunderstorm on a steamy summer afternoon.

         After all, for years others have lived with situations far more heroically and harrowing than anything I have known. There is my friend Bonnie, and her husband, Dave year after year faithfully attending the needs of their respective parents who suffered with dementia. Merianne spending week after week away from home, finally moving her mother closer to attend to her more fully. Ruth Anne, flying monthly from Pittsburg to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, taking two flights and a long car ride to visit her mom. Marty’s parents dying only a few months apart. Sam, taking countless trips to Kentucky to be with her mom when things got tough. And the men, dad’s in their own right, like my husband, Chris, who for years flew to D.C., picked up his mom to fly her to Boston for visits, accompanied her back to D.C. before returning home. As the list grew, so did my discomfort.

         Feeling miserable and self-centered, faces rolled around in my head all day.  My only solace came in reminding myself that I cannot tell their stories, any more than they can tell mine. Yet I wish I had. I wish I had the talent and tenacity to do that. I have felt this before and ultimately my only consolation has been in discovering that by writing a bit of my life, I feel more connected. I see the world and those I encounter differently; maybe even once in a while have an inkling of what it is like to walk in someone else’s shoes. While helping me figure out my own life, writing also makes me more open and vulnerable and receptive to others .

         So today I did the only thing I could think to do. Letting go of remorse, I prayed.  Letting faces float around me, giving thanks that we are all joined in some strange illusive way that means connection—moms, dads, sisters, brothers, friends--I lingered with the little bit I know of the ache of our collective lives. And it helped. It helped me see how our stories are our own and yet, they blend, yours and mine, and somehow that helps. It just helps.

Always a Mom--Part 2

      For the last thirty-five years, being a mom has been just part of my identity.Unlike some, I did not feel that miraculously at the birth of my first child. Actually, it took some getting used to, but now motherhood is in my blood as surely as some bit of my DNA is in Justin and Melanie. The awareness of their happiness, or lack of it, is always there—as surely as the nagging feeling that somehow I am “responsible” for fixing things that have gone awry in their lives--things far beyond my control. (Hello cancer—why can I not wish, pray, or exorcise you from my daughter’s body?)

         Yet over the years, as they married making families of their own, it has gotten easier. Maybe it is their physical distance from me, or simply because I no longer know the details of their day in, day out lives. I have come to assume all is well unless told otherwise. While sometimes I miss the intimate involvement, even though my extremely grown-up evolved self (as opposed to my clingy immature mom self) realizes this is the way it is supposed to be and I am glad.

         Relaxing some of my mom vigilance that I probably held onto far longer than necessary, has become more my norm and probably one of the reasons I have written less on this blog recently. But suddenly this spring, all those old feelings came crashing back—a crisis that required protective thoughtful hands-on mom care. Only this time, I found myself needing to mom my own mom.

         I suppose I should not have been quite so shocked since over the past few years these parental emergencies have cropped up more and more frequently with so many of my friends. While checking in about the respective well being of each other’s children and grandchildren has been part of our conversations, now, my friends and I compare notes on aging parents as well. The news of falls, breaks, joint replacements, and the need for more help in their homes is a constant refrain. Will their money last or will we need to pitch in and help?  Several years ago, we went through it all with my mother-in-law, but then it was my husband who bore the brunt of the worry.  With my widowed mother living a fairly independent life in a retirement community surrounded by friends from childhood and a special gentleman friend downstairs, for the most part, I have sympathized from the sideline.  

         Last April though, the nightmares I had heard so much about became mine. My mom got sick and my life changed course--again.  She was wasn’t feeling well for a few weeks and seeing a new doctor (hers on vacation) who took her at her word that her congestion and cough were simply seasonal allergies.  With no change in her symptoms, a week later, he was still not concerned simply changing her over the counter antihistamine. It wasn’t until she said admitted that she was not “really” getting out of bed, that I packed my bags for a few day’s visit to N.C. to see for myself what was going. Before I got there, she was already hospitalized.

         Thus began a saga far too long, scary, and complicated to recount.  I will not bore you with details except to say that she ended up in 2 different hospitals, with 9 room changes, a week at a rehab hospital before being moved to nursing care in her own retirement community. Along with ever-changing diagnoses, and misdiagnoses and doctors unable to agree on the cause of her symptoms and best course of action, she was passed between specialists like a hot potato. As days blended into nights doctors came and went at erratic hours, and my brother flew in for four days to help make decisions. Finally a last ditch referral brought in Fabulous Surgeon who, while resisting surgery because of the many complications, took charge suggesting a less invasive procedure probably saving her life.

         Having packed for fours days, there I was stuck in hospital hell for three weeks, the sixty-four year old daughter (and health care proxy) forced to make decisions that parents usually make for their children.

While dealing with doctors proved exasperating, managing my mom became even more of a challenge to my frayed nerves. .” In her weakened, often frightened state, she became resistant to any suggestion from me.   “Mother, you MUST eat something or you will never get out of here.” Only to hear, “But nothing tastes good.” Just as when I had failed to provide good nutrition thirty years earlier when vegetables were an anathema around the dinner table, I resorted to cranky nag mom. (With basically the same non-results.) “The doctor says it is important for you to get up, let’s go down the hall.” “Justin, we are on a walk NOT a carry.”

         Fears and anxieties, echoing one particularly awful hospitalization for Melanie pulsed through my veins, “I am going to stand here right by this nurses station until someone gets my mom (my daughter) her meds.” There were days I thought I would crumble, but that was not an option any more than it was when both the kids and I had particularly awful stomach flu while Chris was out of town. Some days you just get through. Period.

         And if you are lucky, and I was, it gets better. Slowly my mom began to improve; after a month, I was able to come home. Today, she is back to her retirement community, only now in in assisted living. As an avid walker before all this happened, her physical health bounced back remarkably quickly, but the long hospitalization has left her mind less resilient. They call is diminished cognitive functioning. She is getting along fine, happy to be back with her friends, her sense of humor coming out, but has moments of confusion. Life feels more complicated to her. We talk every day and now my visits are more frequent. From a distance, I run interference with doctors, staff, and insurance companies, pay bills and fall at the knees of my cousin who picks up the loose ends regularly.

          Life seems to be reversing itself. Daily conversations revolve around gossip about the other ladies at her meal table, the latest musical offering down the hall, the failing health of her gentleman friend. Like my friends, I wake wondering if my mom is ok.  Is she is afraid in the night? Is life too hard?  It is care taking at a distance, not perfect but the best I can do.

         It all feels so familiar. I know how to do this and yet, part of me rebels, not wanting to go back in time. But, like so many others, back I go, because she is my mom. It is what we do. It is part of who I am--always will be. Always.