Category Archives: Memories

August 8, 2012 · 5:13 pm

The grandpa I never knew

I never had the opportunity to meet any of my grandparents. On my mom’s side, they were both deceased before I was born, with my mom’s mother dying exactly two months before I was born.

On Dad’s side of the family, his father and mother died within months of each other, so my first year on earth was definitely a mixture of happiness and grief for my father.

Dad worshipped his mother but was tight-lipped about his father. I think they had a distant relationship at best. Maybe that’s why it became tougher for Dad to know how to be a father as I graduated out of the baby/little girl stage and grew up. I don’t think his own father was around that much when he was growing up, so he was heavily influenced by his mother and sisters.

I came across this prayer card recently, with one of the only photos I’ve ever seen of my grandfather. I wish I knew more about him, and had learned more about his own background and any family stories that he was a part of. But instead, all I have is the image of a smiling man, who apparently did not make Dad smile the few times I remember him talking about his father. Those dark secrets, those troubled times remain locked behind that smile.

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August 7, 2012 · 8:49 pm

Dad dodges the draft

It’s interesting the pieces of a parent’s history you come across after they pass. I found Dad’s draft status card recently. Dad always claimed his flat feet (those fallen arches) kept him out of the military. I’m not sure about that, as the code on his card, 5A, means, “Registrant who is over either the age of liability (26) or (where applicable) the previous deferment age of liability (35).” The card is dated April 11, 1958, a day after Dad would have turned 26.

I don’t see Dad as being a military kind of guy, though he did love his adopted country dearly. His long blue-collar work history sums up the typical American worker nicely. It also reflects kindly on immigration, as my dad contributed to the American workforce and stayed out of trouble while he lived in this country. As I’ve said before, Dad was equally proud of being an Irishman and an American.

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August 6, 2012 · 10:21 pm

Dad and his pal on the town

I found this dashing photo of Dad and one of his buddies back in the day. What a couple of ladykillers these two had to be!

Dad and his pal enjoy a night on the town.

Unfortunately, I know nothing else of the photo, other than it appears to be taken in a photo booth, which was common back then. I don’t know if this was from my Dad’s Big Apple period, or when he spent a bit of time in the Big Easy or when he finally ended up in L.A.

At any rate, it’s a great snapshot in time, and it allows me to imagine the day/night this photo was taken. Maybe they were on their way to meet their dates? Or maybe they were single boys on the prowl, ha. I have no idea who the other man in the photo is, but I wonder if he’s still alive and how his life turned out.

I love old photographs, especially ones of my father looking so handsome!

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August 5, 2012 · 6:49 pm

Finding comfort in the nursing home

If there is one way I know Mom is at least on the road to recovery, it’s her obsession with makeup. Today her personal tragedy was that her eyebrow pencil was almost all used up! Mom carries her little pink makeup bag with her everywhere. She places it on her lap as she wheels herself in her wheelchair to and from the dining room. I think there’s a comforting ritual there, the “touching up” of her face after eating a meal, and “putting on her face” in the morning. She may be sporting a colostomy bag in this new phase of her life, but she’s going to make sure her lipstick is on!

With Dad, food was the comforting thing he held onto for as long as possible, until he lost the ability to swallow. He would eat everything in sight at the nursing home, and would enjoy the treats Mom would bring him on her weekly visits more than the visit itself. (Because at a certain point he didn’t remember Mom as his wife, just as this woman that would bring him diet Sprite and cookies or candy.)

I think it’s instinct to try to find some comfort, physically or mentally, even when you are really ill. Some people turn to medication for a chemical form of comfort. Games and hobbies are a great diversion in this setting. I saw one woman at the nursing home today clutching her word search book as she was ushered to the dining room. One of the therapists said the residents sometimes refuse to go to therapy because it interferes with their Bingo game!

It’s interesting to stop and think what truly bring you comfort in life, the people, pets or objects that make you feel calm and whole. Sadly, when one ends up in a nursing home, one is often cruelly separated from those most cherished comforts, so one finds peace wherever they can. If a tube of lipstick brightens my mom’s spirit as much as her face, so be it.

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August 4, 2012 · 8:01 pm

Letting our elderly generation down

Today I went to visit Mom in the nursing home. She had her hospital gown bunched up above her stomach. I asked if she was hot. Instead, she said that her colostomy bag had leaked. There was dried feces caked to her gown. She had rolled it up so the feces would not be against her skin. I could see a smear of feces on the sheet next to her head. I also could see feces smears on the waistband of her diaper.

It’s hard to put on a happy face when you see your own mother suffering in her own excrement. Mom is aware enough to be embarrassed as well. There was little I could do, as there were no gloves around. I rang her nurses bell repeatedly.

Almost an hour passed before a harried nurse popped her head in. She changed my mom’s colostomy bag, but left the clean-up for an assistant to take care of.

While I stepped out of the room, I met two dementia patients who are on my mom’s wing. The nurse had just gotten through venting to us about how the one dementia patient was driving her crazy. “I was short to her, and I’m normally not like that. Then I go home and lie awake at night feeling bad about being rude to the patients,” the nurse sighed.

I certainly don’t blame the staff. They are extremely understaffed and work themselves to the bone. It’s easy to imagine having compassion burnout when a dementia patient comes up to the nurses’ station every five minutes asking the same question over and over.

Theresa is one of the dementia patients. She rolls around in a white walker all day, up and down the hallway. She wanders into other patient’s rooms, because she cannot remember which room is hers. I’ve seen her try desperately to open locked doors. Today she saw me and said, “Do you have a room here?”

I smiled and said I was just visiting.

She said, “It’s so hard to find a room around here, they are all empty!” With that, she took off down the hallway. I’ve been to the nursing home enough now to know which room she’s in, and I help guide her there if she asks. After my mom had finally been cleaned up (she had been like that all morning and now it was almost lunchtime), Theresa popped into my mom’s room.

“Have you been into that room over there?” Theresa pointed across the hallway. We shook our heads “no” and she continued: “Well, I went in there and set down on a stool and I got all wet.”

She turned around to show us and it was clear she had wet herself. I directed her back down the hallway towards a nurse who could change her.

But as I sit here and think about the day’s events, I can’t help but feel we are letting the elderly down. They deserve better than this.

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August 3, 2012 · 7:46 pm

Elderly drug-pushers

I’ve posted before about how my dad became a zombie on the cocktail of medications the nursing home gave him. It’s common practice to sedate patients so they don’t become problematic for staff members. The drugs that the nursing home gave to Dad didn’t stop him from wandering about, they just left him without any ability to show emotions.

The nursing home my mom is in right now doesn’t seem to be overmedicating. In fact, Mom has had trouble getting the medications she is supposed to be taking on time. Last night, she never got her pain meds (just Tylenol PM) at all, despite the fact that she was recovering from a procedure on the veins in her leg.

Her roommate has a host of issues, both mental (bipolar) and physical (bulging disk in back.) She told my mom, in her permanently slurred speech, “You should ask for narcotics, like Percocet or Morphine. You won’t get hooked.”

Mom is managing her pain fine with Tylenol PM, and from the looks of her roommate, I’d say she’s indeed hooked. She sleeps most of the day, and even when she’s awake, she’s barely able to maintain a conversation. She has this permanent “doped up” expression on her face. It’s clear she’s trying to escape from her pain, and not just the physical kind.

And really, who can blame the elderly for wanting to escape into a drug-induced haze when they find themselves living in a nursing home?

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August 2, 2012 · 9:02 pm

Time warp at the hospital

Hospitals are pretty much the same all over. I spent a week hovering over Dad at a big hospital in Albuquerque, and I’ve spent much more time hovering over Mom in a small town hospital in Roswell. To sum it up: understaffed, long waits, crappy food, the constant beeping of machines and tense people in waiting rooms awaiting word if their loved one made it or not.

Today was no different. The doctor that did my mom’s blood clot removal procedure yesterday came in at 8:40 a.m., said she looked great and that she was ready for discharge … once the hospitalist came in and gave the discharge order.

The hospitalist did not arrive until 4 p.m.

Grrrr. Make that double grrrr.

Once the hospitalist finally arrived, she stayed less than a minute, and then Mom’s discharge process began in earnest. But what a waste of a day, and Mom was eager to start back up rehab. The doctor that did her vein procedure said she was to get up and walk multiple times today, but that didn’t happen, and now she’s behind a day. I understand that the sickest patients have to be tended to first, but Mom occupied a bed for several hours that could have been used by someone that was really sick. (She was in ICU under observation for the night.)

Mom and I had plenty of time to talk and Mom wanted to discuss memories of Dad which was nice, but still, it’s so frustrating sitting around waiting for a doctor to pop in and give the thumbs up so that the patient can be discharged.

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August 1, 2012 · 10:50 pm

What makes one give up?

With my dad, Alzheimer’s robbed him of the will to fight back. I watched my dad pitifully try to hang on to his personality, only to return a few months later and see a drugged-up zombie in his place. It was heartbreaking, but I’m not sure if those with dementia realize when they are crossing over to the dark side, so to speak.

With my mom, her personality has survived the major surgery, the setbacks and the recovery, and even the nursing home stay. But I know that Mom often puts on a cheery front for the medical staff. They all compliment her on what a great patient she is. And that is true, she’s very good about following orders and not complaining.

But with me, the tears come readily.

I went to visit her local bank the other day to let the manager know about Mom. The manager had helped my mom with a lot of financial issues, and she was sad to hear about Mom. She said that she wondered if at some point, my mom would just give up. “She misses your dad so much, and she’s so lonely.”

Mom already tells me just about every day about how sorry she is for being such a burden and that it would be better if she just let go.

And the honest truth is, it might be.

But then again, the nurse that tended to my mom through a special procedure today said she can tell what kind of spirits patients have just by working with them for a few minutes. She said, “I can tell your mom is a great person.”

And that’s the honest truth as well.

So that makes things really tricky. I don’t want my good-hearted mom to suffer needlessly, but the world could use a bit of her sweet spirit for as long as possible.

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July 31, 2012 · 11:08 pm

Dad at Disneyland … without us

I found this photo recently of Dad with his sister Peggy at Disneyland, and it made me think about all the family drama surrounding her visit.

I was about 10 or so when my aunt Peggy and her family came from Australia to visit America. They made a stop in L.A. to see Dad.

You would think Mom and I would have joined Dad and had a good old family gathering. But that was not meant to be.

Mom was still very bitter over how two of Dad’s other sisters had treated her when they came to visit Dad from Ireland. If her version of events is correct, I don’t blame her, though Peggy had not been part of that earlier visit. Still, as a kid, I was prone to take Mom’s side so I said I would stay with Mom instead of going to meet my aunt Peggy.

I guess I have some regrets about that now, as I have never met her personally and one of us will probably die before that happens. I’ve been communicating with her (and Dad’s other sisters) via letters and they all seem very kind. Whatever bad blood there was before (if there was any to begin with) no longer exists.

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July 30, 2012 · 8:28 pm

Taking charge of a parent’s life

Today, Mom filled out the power of attorney forms. I’m now in charge of the important decisions concerning her life. If there is a bright side, it’s that Mom knows it’s necessary and trusts me completely. I know for many families, it can be a real struggle. Who wants to admit that they can’t manage their own lives anymore?

Mom did ask if the power of attorney could be reversed if a miracle happened and she becomes like she was before. She was assured that she could revoke it at any time. I joked with her, “Sure, if you really want to start dealing with all of those bills again.”

I’m sure Mom would like nothing more than to return to her own boring, routine life. (I know I would love to return to mine.)

Still, at least we are taking the proper steps now, unlike we did with Dad. No will, no power of attorney with Dad. There’s so much red tape, and so many hoops that you have to jump through when you don’t fill out simple paperwork before you get sick. His bank accounts are still sitting there in limbo, and we certainly could use those funds now, as Mom is entering her last week of rehab that’s covered by Medicare.

The future … that remains a question mark.

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