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.

The "Difficult" Elderly Parent

It's so sad that I am not alone in the dilemma of the difficult elderly parent...I had a rough evening. Trying to help my parents and take care of my kids. My parents have a team of people caring for them. My kids have only me. And so I picked my kids, because the team was in place. And still, I'm the bad child.

So I came home, drank wine, cried a little, did laundry, and surfed the Internet looking for answers. Instead, I found this: mind.expressions: The "Difficult" Elderly Parent. The amazing thing is that the post was written three years ago, but people are still leaving comments about the difficulties they face in caring for their difficult elderly parents.

I hope to be done with the laundry soon. And then I'm going to sleep, I hope.

How I'm taking care of myself

Okay, I was raised by a Class One Martyr. Class One Martyrs don't know how to teach their children how to care for themselves. They care for themselves in secret, so as not to mar the martyr-like illusions. Or they guilt others into caring for them. Or they take steps to care for themselves when "pressured" by well-meaning people.

So I never cultivated the whole regular-trip-to-the-salon-for-a-manicure thing. And I didn't develop my save-yourself-so-you-can-save-your-kids thing either. Not until I had a good bit of therapy. While all the other mommies were off on spa/shopping/lunch dates with friends, I was...not taking care of my kids...because at the time I had maids for that. I was in my room having a big cry over how lamentable my situation was, what with the unfaithful spouse, and being stuck in the expatriate fishbowl of life, and nothing meaningful to focus on other than bridge and quilting (hate them both!!!!!), and not trusting that I had the resources to leave with my kids and survive on my own.

Eventually the aroma of my misery stew started to really stink up my life, enough so that I understood that no one was going to care for me or anticipate my needs like I could (and this lesson was really a loooooong time coming - because I can be soooooooooo dense!). Plus, my one really dear friend, who was going through a divorce whilst holding together her professional life and raising her autistic son on her own, was looking so damn good! Why wasn't she falling apart?! Well, she was, but she was taking care of herself. Ohhhhhhhhh! Maybe those spa days she was always proposing were really worth the money...

When I was living in Indonesia, I started to indulge myself with a cream bath. It's an Indonesian thing, a deep-moisturizing hair treatment and scalp, neck and shoulder massage. Oh, I miss those so much! Everyone should get one! If the Palestinians and Israelis got these on a regular basis, they'd have worked things out a long time ago! Instead of neutral zones, there should be cream bath zones! Really, they're that good. Having the monthly cream bath convinced me to have the weekly massages. Granted, massages can be expensive, but while I lived in Indonesia, Ibu Upik would only charge me $5 for an hour massage. And it wasn't a fake little massage, it was a good therapeutic one.

When I eventually came back to California, permanently, at the start of the divorce process, I remembered how great the regular massages were. I started going to the spa up the street on a weekly basis for a massage. A damn site more than the $5, but I was worth it. Because I understood that when I cared for myself properly, I could make wiser decisions about how to run my life, my household and raise my sons with more love and compassion than my mother could ever muster for me. My health started to improve, caring for myself spilled into eating better, exercising regularly, getting adequate sleep. And I committed to going back to therapy, participated in an EBT group (I highly recommend this as well for effective self-care) and re-focused on my education. I shed the martyr mantle that Mom was trying to hand me and actively moved on with my life.

I don't get weekly massages any longer. I've stretched them out to monthly, but I've added the mani/pedi and the facial on other weeks. And when I get my hair cut/colored, my stylist gives me a lovely little scalp, neck and shoulder massage. Not quite up to par with the Indonesian version, but wonderful nonetheless. I'm due for a massage this week. Going to see either Joanne or Stephanie at Perfect Balance Day Spa a few blocks from me. Joanne does this really awesome Thai stretch massage, and Stephanie gives a marvelous deep-tissue Swedish massage. I've been working extra hard at Pilates and weight training this week, so by Saturday, a massage is going to feel really good!

And while I'm getting my massage, the Class One Martyr is going to call and leave me a message, wondering where I am, and would I please call her back because she's lonely and has nobody to talk to but me (because she didn't talk to the team of people that cater to her and Dad everyday). And when I call her back, she's going to ask me where I was, and I'll tell her how much I was enjoying my massage, and then she'll say she wishes she could leave Dad for an hour and get a massage, and I'll offer to make arrangements so that someone can stay with Dad and I can take her for a massage at the spa, and she'll say it's too expensive and that I should know that she can't leave Dad for even one minute, not even to take a shower, and I ask what her team does all day that she can't go take a shower...

Damn! I gotta go! Pilates starts in 15 minutes!

Reading

I wish I had time to read some fiction, but at the moment, life is providing all the drama, comedy and pathos I can handle. Instead, my list of books on my to-read list include all sorts of self-help and advice.

Boundaries, by Dr's Henry Cloud and John Townsend, was assigned to me by my therapist. I haven't finished it yet. Actually, I only just got through Chapter 1: "A day in a Boundaryless Life". That alone was tough. I identified with it so much! Parts of it made me cry. I saw behaviors and decisions I've made due to not being able to keep appropriate boundaries up with family and friends. I was heartened because I'm certainly not as bad as I once was. And I was angry because some people, for whom I had been "supportive" and "dependable" and "faithful" decided they no longer needed me in their life the moment I started creating balance for myself and told them "no" a few times. I'm still healing from that. I'm hoping reading this book will help with any further estrangements caused by my "selfishly" creating more balance in my life, and I'll be able to connect in true intimacy with old and new friends and family in more appropriate ways.

I'll write more about this book later, once I've read it, and share how it's impacting me.

All quiet on the homefront

Quinn's all better now. He had strep since last week, and we finally went to the urgent care clinic and got a prescription last Saturday. The drugs started working pretty quickly, but it took him all week to get well enough to leave the house. Today he managed to clean the living room, where he's been camping out for the last three days. I have my bedroom back, and now the living room and dining room (I did his laundry, but he left the clean clothes on the dining table all week).

Quinn lost between 10 and 15 pounds while he was sick. All his pants are hanging rather unattractively between his crotch and his knees. He has no ass! I sent him to the mall in Stockton today to buy a few pairs of jeans to wear to school. I'm sure he'll be stopping by the Barnes and Noble to see his girlfriend. She's "studying".

You know, I went to the same community college. I too had a boyfriend while I was enrolled there. I even took "night classes".

I am laying low today. I have a lot of file boxes to go through, things to sort and put away in my bedroom, somewhere. Pandora is playing Vivaldi right now. Love it! Mournful strings. I loves me some good cello!

Rhyan is on the XBox today. He did his laundry this morning, then helped me make him some healthy burritos for the freezer, then did the dishes. He walked Chloe. Practiced bass. I'm cool with the XBox today.

Epilogue

Oh, I spoke too soon! I'm beginning to see that my mother's the one in control of under-medicating my dad. She is so busted! My sister and I are headed to speak with Hospice people tomorrow. I don't know what this means for us, but we may be finally putting Dad into Hospice House. And Mom may need to go into an elder care facility. There is nothing that my mother reports to us about Dad's condition and his care that we can take seriously. She fabricates conversations, manipulates everyone, just so she can keep Dad at home so she can feed him.

The boys and I are going to checkout for a couple hours. With the Green Hornet.

Taking an ADD break

(Not taking a break from ADD. Taking a break because I have ADD.)

The sun is shining today! It's so gorgeous outside. I know, normal people think, "Hey, the sun is shining...I know what let's do! Go outside!" But not me. I'm weird that way. I'm cleaning my bedroom.

I let things go for the past few weeks, since Christmas. And then I started squeezing my office into my bedroom because Quinn decided to abandon the studio behind our house (it was damn cold in there!) and moved into the room I was using as my office. Ishsh...I really had my heart set on keeping that as my office/sewing room. Instead, the sewing machines are stacked by my closet, the new business computer and desk are squeezed into the bedroom corner. And I just moved the bookcase (and my substantial library) next to my bed. Time to do some deeper dusting (the stuff that the Merry Maids like to miss) and vacuuming in the corners. And then there's all those electrical cords I need to tuck away somehow.

The boys are hiding from me, because they know I'm about to start making demands of them. So I thought I'd put Pandora on mix-mode, to keep us motivated with the right music, and sit down to do a little writing. Because writing distracts me. Actually, my thoughts distract me, and writing helps me to collect them all, make a plan and get to work.

"I'm movin' to the country, gonna eat a lot of peaches," by The Presidents of the United States. See, it's practically spring!

(Do you think they're actually singing about peaches? I'm singing out loud and the boys have quizzical looks on their faces. I may start singing about bananas.)

The waiting game

Once more, my parents flirted with the idea to have Dad move to Hospice House. Once more, the idea was abandoned for a free but ineffective solution. I know health care costs money, a lot of money, but is all the pain, drama and trauma worth it?

Dad called me yesterday to tell me it was probably the last time we were ever going to speak. So I collected the boys and we went over to the house to have this final conversation face to face. He was in a lot of pain...A LOT of pain. I don't understand why he isn't getting more pain medication. I don't know if it's my dad's choice to not remain so medicated that he can't feel anything, or if my mom's not giving him enough just so she can feed him (because she lives to feed), or if Hospice isn't leaving enough meds. I don't know because no one is answering any of my direct questions about this. And I don't know what to do about this. Obviously, someone wants to be in more control of this situation, so I'll let them have all the control.

I was at my EBT class in Folsom earlier in the week and we talked a little about guilt. Guilt was described as the emotion we feel when we don't do something the way we wish we could have done it. That helped me to realize some things about my relationship with my parents and my role as a part-time caregiver.

1. I shouldn't feel guilty about how my relationship with my parents has turned out. They had expectations about what the relationship would be, but they've done nothing that supports that level of closeness. I am only responsible for my side of the relationship.
2. It is inappropriate for me to step in to care for them to a degree that abandons my children and myself, or costs me money, especially if they can afford to pay for extra help for themselves.
3. I am not my mother's therapist. And I can't fix her, or choose how she is going to live her life after Dad is gone.
4. My parents are difficult people, despite their good hearts and religious beliefs.

I really am unable to help them without letting go of my sons and myself right now. Do I wish I could do more? I don't know. Yes and no. I wish I could find out exactly what was going on so that I could make sure my dad's pain-relief needs were met. I wish I could get inside my mother's head and straighten things out in there. I don't want to neglect my sons, because I'm their only involved parent and I need to be at home, in their lives, actually parenting them. I don't want to be so caught up in the stress of this whole situation because I can't sleep, I overeat from the stress, I've got constant headaches, I miss Pilates class and other opportunities to exercise and care for myself.

And I feel guilty that is seems like we're all just waiting around for Dad to die. There has to be a balance, between actively living my life and honoring my father at the end of his life. I can accept that this is a difficult time, and the emotional roller coaster will remain in play for some time. I know there are expectations of me, because they hover, unvoiced but menacing, whenever I go to my parents' house. Sometimes I can handle it, other times, not so much.

I'm grateful to the local Hospice people. All the volunteers and the entire organization do so much for the patients and their families. We're donating a car this month, and later, I'll be donating money. They really do great works!