Transitions

My dad's pain has become increasingly worse. He's now on a lot more pain meds. I'm so grateful to the people of Hospice of San Joaquin for helping my dad have a more comfortable existence in his last days. He's finally in a hospital bed. Mom finally agreed that she needed help 24 hours a day, help that was a lot more effective than she, my sister and I can give. Visiting Angels has provided two really awesome people to help us, Anna and Eddie. And there have been additional angels in our lives who have acted on my parents' and my behalf, loving family and friends, wise counselors, additional caretakers.

It's the waiting game now. Not sure when it's going to happen, but all the signs are there. No one really tells you what it looks like as someone who's been sick for a long time approaches death. It's so hard to watch and not know what to do about it while we wait. I'm busying myself with the crossing of T's and dotting of I's. Trying to help my mother take care of herself. At least she can sleep more now that we've got the overnight care. Hoping to take her out in the sunshine later this week. It would be great if she let me schedule a massage for her. With all the right help in place, she's calmed down a lot. We've had a good talk and she seems to accept, just a little more, that she's not going to have Dad around much longer. She still wants to die first. But I'm not letting her do that.

I'm sticking to exercise, eating right, getting better sleep. I could use one of those massages too! I'm keeping up with writing the blogs, because it feels good to chronicle all this. Someday, my kids may go back and read all this and have some perspective on this period of time in our lives.

It's really hard to learn to remain at peace through this transition. Plenty of time later to go tearing around getting things done. I need to keep still and learn to accept the next stage, where I'll still be taking care of a parent, but we'll have to make more changes to her life, and quite possibly mine as well. It's hard to find a way to let my dad go when I haven't had the relationship I wanted with him. And he can't play along any more either. It's hard to bring my sons to see him when he's not even close to being the grandfather they once knew. They're frightened. My youngest is scared of seeing him die. My oldest is emotionally distant about the whole thing. It's just how he's dealing with it all. But both the boys are keeping their own lives moving forward.

I'm trying to find moments of joy in every day. The sun's out today. It's still cold (for Lodi), but there are no clouds, blue skies all around. My sweet little puppy is curled up on the bed, taking advantage of the two-square-feet of sunlight shining through my bedroom window that warms my comforter. My son Rhyan is enthusiastically killing zombies with online friends on the XBox in the living room. It's fun to listen to him interact with his friends through a headset.

I'm going to take a nap now to save up a little rest. I'm staying with Mom tonight. She needs family with her in case Dad passes tonight.