Thursday, April 22, 2004
Ooh...this morning. I'm wincing.
Not a good morning, courtesy of me. Mom and I awoke at the same time due to me not actually retiring 'last night' until close to 0200 and she retiring at 2030. At 0700 we were both awake. I heard her coughing. She heard me flushing my toilet.
"Gail, did you just get up?!?"
"Mom, are you already up?!? I mean, are you planning on getting to your feet?" By the time I'd finished this query I'd arrived at her bedroom door. She was on her belly, resting on her elbows, looking at me wide-eyed. I'm sure I looked bleary eyed. I was certainly unpleasantly surprised and probably not masking it very well.
I need a couple of hours to myself in the morning preceding the slam bang intensity of the care she receives when she awakens and arises; at the very least one and a half hours, which is what I schedule in by using an alarm clock to awaken me if I have to get Mom up really early, like 0600 or 0700. Even if I need to get her up at 0500 I'll set the alarm for 0330 no matter how late I retire. I need to begin my day long before her day begins. This allows me to be present to myself so that I can be present for her without drifting back into myself (which can happen, anyway, if I'm funking). I need to anticipate myself before I anticipate her. In an emergency I can perform an autonomic, background self-anticipation and have, with great success, but on a normal morning, even a very active normal morning, if I don't stretch out into the day without anyone hampering me I tend to bind myself against others rather than reaching out to them.
When I saw her looking as though she was ready to begin her day I was devastated. I was foggy anyway, I was feeling a bit out of sorts and realized while peeing that I'd forgotten to take Black Cohosh last night so I was in a hurry to make coffee, down pills, roll around on the floor to loosen up, bring up the garbage cans, water the roses and mourn the walk I wouldn't be taking because I retired late and awoke late.
When I realized I was going to be ushering Mom through her morning I physically balked at her door. I mumbled something that I hoped sounded like, "Are you getting up up? I mean, breakfast and everything."
"Are you eating something?" she asked.
"No. It's just the first thing I said this morning. Are you ready to get up and bathe and eat breakfast?"
She looked suspicious and sounded a little indignant. "Yes, I think so."
My mind spun and my heart sank into the vortex. "Oh. OK. Well, nothing's set up. Stay in bed for a few minutes. I'd better take your blood sugar. It'll be a couple of minutes before everything's ready. You can lie there and contemplate getting up."
"Oh, don't worry about any of that. I'll just get up."
"No! Mom!" I was fairly shouting my desperation. "Please! You'll get pee all over the place! If you're going to get up let's do this right." I was close to crying.
Mom looked at me quizzically. "Are you all right?!?"
I stopped. And sighed. "Yes. It's just that I just got up. I usually have a couple of hours to work into all the stuff I do when you get up. This morning, I'm not even sure where I am yet and you're ready to get up. I haven't even had coffee."
"Oh. Well, you don't have to do all that for me."
Close to tears again. God damn it, I need my pills! "Yes, Mom, I do. And it's not just for you. It's for me. If we don't go through this morning routine of cleaning you and your bed first thing it's not healthy and there's a lot more cleanup to do later. Look. If you want to get technical, I do it for me more than for you. I'm just not quite ready for you yet." Appealing to her sense of self interest by stressing one's own self-interest usually works on Mom.
I walked out of the bedroom, not wanting to face whatever expression was forming on her face. The extenuating circumstance is this: She doesn't remember from day to day the meticulous, extended routine that brings her forward into the day. She doesn't remember it because she neither directs it nor performs most of the movements involved in the routine. She does not, usually, even initiate starting or timing the routine.
In a few minutes I was back. I'd gathered the blood sugar measuring stuff, thrown the four washcloths and towels we use into the bathroom toward their approximate optimum marks. I slapped the bacon in the skillet and started the electric water boiler. I'd also calculated how I could extend the set-up part of the routine by a few more minutes so I could quickly harmonize with The Tenor of the Day and feel remotely like myself. By this time, though, Mom's head was back on her pillow, dozing.
"Give me an arm. Any arm," I said. Her right arm lolled over the edge of the bed. Her eyes remained at half mast. I took her blood sugar. A background screech began. "Hold on," I said, and dashed to the kitchen to unplug the water pot.
When I returned her eyes were fully closed. Her body was completely slack. "Mom," I whispered, leaning over her, "are you getting up?"
She batted her eyes sleepily. "No," she said, "It's too early. I looked at the time."
I won't know, I suppose, whether I influenced her decision to abandon the surge of energy she was feeling or whether she, indeed, has an internal rule that, exceptional circumstances not withstanding, 0700 is an indecently early hour for activity of any kind other than sub- and unconscious.
I am uncomfortable with what happened this morning, but I'm not feeling guilty. I slurped at the extra time I was granted as though it were shaved ice with extra cherry syrup. I needed it. I did not let the discomfort of my disgruntled sway over both my mother's and my mornings get in the way of taking advantage of the time I was granted.
She rose again just before 1000. By that time we were both ready for her morning to begin. Although she seemed lively enough at breakfast, after breakfast she refused all my out and in activity offers and finally interrupted my attempts to fill in the day by telling me, "I just want to sit and stare."
I understood, asked after any pain or stiffness she might be having, to which she replied in the negative. I wandered about the house finishing up some chores, starting others. She read a bit in her book, drank all the fluids offered her, did, indeed, stare out the window and noticed, with great pleasure, the leaves on "her" rose, the Passionate. She didn't want to view it from the first row, though.
I just tucked her back in bed. "Just let me sleep, today," she requested.
"Fine," I said. "We've got a movie to watch this evening, or your forensics shows might be on, tonight."
"Maybe both," she said.
Ah, good. She's thinking in terms of waking up, staying up for awhile. Good sign. As additional confirmation, because she seems so tired and it's hard, every day after FT, for me to believe that it is simply her body rest-incorporating the work into her system, I responded, "Do me a favor. I don't care if you die in your sleep, but not today. I've got plans."
She grinned, almost devilishly. "Not today. I won't."
I swear, the reason she can be a scamp about death, and allow me to participate, as well, is because she doesn't believe in it. Which, if you think about it, makes sense. Since it is an event in which one doesn't need to believe, why waste time and mood approaching it from the standpoint of belief?
I've been noticing lately how quickly the angle of the sun on the floor through our front pseudo-cathedral windows changes. One day I have to move something heat-sensitive out of its path. The next day I don't. The cats follow the sun across the carpet in approximately 10 minute increments. They finally give up in disgust and find a warm place for burrowing into an uninterrupted nap.
This spring, because it is so evident in this house, Mom is noticing the changes of light from one season to the next. Lately, as the sun moves further north, for a half hour prior to sunset our living room carpet is glitter-dappled by the sunlight shining through the pyracantha leaves sheltering our west facing pseudo-floor-to-ceiling window. The light play is so animated that we stop whatever we're doing, watch it and comment on it as though it is one in a serial of Fantasia. A few days ago Mom said, "You just don't see this in Mesa."
"No, you don't," I agreed.
Later.
"Gail, did you just get up?!?"
"Mom, are you already up?!? I mean, are you planning on getting to your feet?" By the time I'd finished this query I'd arrived at her bedroom door. She was on her belly, resting on her elbows, looking at me wide-eyed. I'm sure I looked bleary eyed. I was certainly unpleasantly surprised and probably not masking it very well.
I need a couple of hours to myself in the morning preceding the slam bang intensity of the care she receives when she awakens and arises; at the very least one and a half hours, which is what I schedule in by using an alarm clock to awaken me if I have to get Mom up really early, like 0600 or 0700. Even if I need to get her up at 0500 I'll set the alarm for 0330 no matter how late I retire. I need to begin my day long before her day begins. This allows me to be present to myself so that I can be present for her without drifting back into myself (which can happen, anyway, if I'm funking). I need to anticipate myself before I anticipate her. In an emergency I can perform an autonomic, background self-anticipation and have, with great success, but on a normal morning, even a very active normal morning, if I don't stretch out into the day without anyone hampering me I tend to bind myself against others rather than reaching out to them.
When I saw her looking as though she was ready to begin her day I was devastated. I was foggy anyway, I was feeling a bit out of sorts and realized while peeing that I'd forgotten to take Black Cohosh last night so I was in a hurry to make coffee, down pills, roll around on the floor to loosen up, bring up the garbage cans, water the roses and mourn the walk I wouldn't be taking because I retired late and awoke late.
When I realized I was going to be ushering Mom through her morning I physically balked at her door. I mumbled something that I hoped sounded like, "Are you getting up up? I mean, breakfast and everything."
"Are you eating something?" she asked.
"No. It's just the first thing I said this morning. Are you ready to get up and bathe and eat breakfast?"
She looked suspicious and sounded a little indignant. "Yes, I think so."
My mind spun and my heart sank into the vortex. "Oh. OK. Well, nothing's set up. Stay in bed for a few minutes. I'd better take your blood sugar. It'll be a couple of minutes before everything's ready. You can lie there and contemplate getting up."
"Oh, don't worry about any of that. I'll just get up."
"No! Mom!" I was fairly shouting my desperation. "Please! You'll get pee all over the place! If you're going to get up let's do this right." I was close to crying.
Mom looked at me quizzically. "Are you all right?!?"
I stopped. And sighed. "Yes. It's just that I just got up. I usually have a couple of hours to work into all the stuff I do when you get up. This morning, I'm not even sure where I am yet and you're ready to get up. I haven't even had coffee."
"Oh. Well, you don't have to do all that for me."
Close to tears again. God damn it, I need my pills! "Yes, Mom, I do. And it's not just for you. It's for me. If we don't go through this morning routine of cleaning you and your bed first thing it's not healthy and there's a lot more cleanup to do later. Look. If you want to get technical, I do it for me more than for you. I'm just not quite ready for you yet." Appealing to her sense of self interest by stressing one's own self-interest usually works on Mom.
I walked out of the bedroom, not wanting to face whatever expression was forming on her face. The extenuating circumstance is this: She doesn't remember from day to day the meticulous, extended routine that brings her forward into the day. She doesn't remember it because she neither directs it nor performs most of the movements involved in the routine. She does not, usually, even initiate starting or timing the routine.
In a few minutes I was back. I'd gathered the blood sugar measuring stuff, thrown the four washcloths and towels we use into the bathroom toward their approximate optimum marks. I slapped the bacon in the skillet and started the electric water boiler. I'd also calculated how I could extend the set-up part of the routine by a few more minutes so I could quickly harmonize with The Tenor of the Day and feel remotely like myself. By this time, though, Mom's head was back on her pillow, dozing.
"Give me an arm. Any arm," I said. Her right arm lolled over the edge of the bed. Her eyes remained at half mast. I took her blood sugar. A background screech began. "Hold on," I said, and dashed to the kitchen to unplug the water pot.
When I returned her eyes were fully closed. Her body was completely slack. "Mom," I whispered, leaning over her, "are you getting up?"
She batted her eyes sleepily. "No," she said, "It's too early. I looked at the time."
I won't know, I suppose, whether I influenced her decision to abandon the surge of energy she was feeling or whether she, indeed, has an internal rule that, exceptional circumstances not withstanding, 0700 is an indecently early hour for activity of any kind other than sub- and unconscious.
I am uncomfortable with what happened this morning, but I'm not feeling guilty. I slurped at the extra time I was granted as though it were shaved ice with extra cherry syrup. I needed it. I did not let the discomfort of my disgruntled sway over both my mother's and my mornings get in the way of taking advantage of the time I was granted.
She rose again just before 1000. By that time we were both ready for her morning to begin. Although she seemed lively enough at breakfast, after breakfast she refused all my out and in activity offers and finally interrupted my attempts to fill in the day by telling me, "I just want to sit and stare."
I understood, asked after any pain or stiffness she might be having, to which she replied in the negative. I wandered about the house finishing up some chores, starting others. She read a bit in her book, drank all the fluids offered her, did, indeed, stare out the window and noticed, with great pleasure, the leaves on "her" rose, the Passionate. She didn't want to view it from the first row, though.
I just tucked her back in bed. "Just let me sleep, today," she requested.
"Fine," I said. "We've got a movie to watch this evening, or your forensics shows might be on, tonight."
"Maybe both," she said.
Ah, good. She's thinking in terms of waking up, staying up for awhile. Good sign. As additional confirmation, because she seems so tired and it's hard, every day after FT, for me to believe that it is simply her body rest-incorporating the work into her system, I responded, "Do me a favor. I don't care if you die in your sleep, but not today. I've got plans."
She grinned, almost devilishly. "Not today. I won't."
I swear, the reason she can be a scamp about death, and allow me to participate, as well, is because she doesn't believe in it. Which, if you think about it, makes sense. Since it is an event in which one doesn't need to believe, why waste time and mood approaching it from the standpoint of belief?
I've been noticing lately how quickly the angle of the sun on the floor through our front pseudo-cathedral windows changes. One day I have to move something heat-sensitive out of its path. The next day I don't. The cats follow the sun across the carpet in approximately 10 minute increments. They finally give up in disgust and find a warm place for burrowing into an uninterrupted nap.
This spring, because it is so evident in this house, Mom is noticing the changes of light from one season to the next. Lately, as the sun moves further north, for a half hour prior to sunset our living room carpet is glitter-dappled by the sunlight shining through the pyracantha leaves sheltering our west facing pseudo-floor-to-ceiling window. The light play is so animated that we stop whatever we're doing, watch it and comment on it as though it is one in a serial of Fantasia. A few days ago Mom said, "You just don't see this in Mesa."
"No, you don't," I agreed.
Later.
