Mom & Me Two Archive

    I was surprised to hear President Bush, during the debates last night, suggest that not only should those invulnerable populations not seek flu shots at this time, but healthy seniors, as well, should put off being vaccinated. I thought this was interesting, considering that I'd already decided to forego having my mother wait in the interminably long, interminably uncomfortable lines continuing to form at those few facilities still offering the injections. Luckily, my mother is not challenged in the area of immune system health. As I determined last week, she would fall into the "healthy" category (see yesterday's post if your curious as to why I made this determination). I suspect, though, that a lot more "unhealthy" seniors (i.e., pulmonarily challenged seniors who can ill afford to "catch" something that might lead to pneumatic lungs) than "healthy" seniors will be refusing to submit themselves to the conditions one is required to negotiate at this time in order to be vaccinated. In the meantime, I have yet to hear of any other industrialized countries in the northern hemisphere experiencing the same shortage. Maybe they aren't. Maybe I simply haven't had the time required to seek out the information.

    Last night, as I was talking to MPS one last time before she and her daughter arrive today for a much and happily anticipated four day visit with us, without listing all the circumstances that have kept me busy and overwhelmed over the last almost-a-month (all of which she is aware), during a discussion of my need to hit Costco while they are here in order to pick up laundry softener, I mentioned that we are completely out and I had to use the small packet of softener that came with the new washer we were forced to purchase when our old washer finally gave up the ghost at the most inopportune time, while The Big Girl was in the middle of her mortal illness, spewing bodily fluids all over the place, and my mother was reacting to our every-other-day trips to Mesa to close out the sale of the mobile home by shedding water so profusely during the night and her naps that I was doing at least two loads of laundry every day, sometimes three.
    "I think you need a few more challenges," MPS joked.
    That's what I love about my sisters, they always have exactly the right perspective on situations, always know what to say to lift me out of my temporary-but-seemingly-permanent frenzies and put my circumstantial celebrations into perspective. All three of my sisters have a knack for this. It's the most valuable and appreciated support I receive.

    "I need a vacation," I blurted a couple of nights ago to my mother when the tension of the last few weeks hit fever pitch before beginning to subside.
    Bless my mother, without flinching she said, "Well then, take one. The Little Girl and I will be fine."
    I briefly considered agreeing and letting the matter disappear into the depths of her dementia. Those depths, though, assured that I could seek some small, expressive relief by telling the truth and count on the truth disappearing, as well. "I can't," I said. "Even if I took just a day off, really off, if I left you with someone I'd wonder, the whole time I was gone, if you were being ignored the way you were the last couple of times I stole a few hours to run some errands. I certainly couldn't leave you alone. I'd return to you and much of the house soaked in your urine, you wouldn't have bathed, or you might have decided to bathe in the tub and then been unable to get out, you wouldn't have tested yourself to monitor your medications, you wouldn't even remember to take your medications, The Little Girl wouldn't be given fresh food and water, chances are you wouldn't eat properly, you wouldn't use oxygen when you need it, at some point you'd forget what I was doing and become frantic wondering where I was and I'd return to twice as much work and chaos as I normally deal with."
    My mother didn't respond. By the time I finished my distressed litany I think she'd stopped listening. That's where I left it.
    The issue of "respite", as the emerging caregiver industry likes to sanitarily label it right now, isn't as simple as scolding caregivers to overcome their guilt and go for it regardless of the consequences. It isn't as simple as putting the oxygen mask over yourself before you put it over your child. It isn't, as I discovered, even as simple as meticulously interviewing and checking the references of potential substitutes. When will the bulk of our society figure out that if we want our caregivers to enjoy and benefit from worry free respite we have to be closely involved with the caregiver, his/her tasks and responsibilities and the nature of his/her charge from day one; we have to take a hand in doing the groundwork to make that "respite" both possible and worry-free; and we have to stop blaming the caregiver for not handling, both emotionally and circumstantially the matter of "respite" on their own?????

    For the past couple of months I've been winking at and trading wits with a man I frequently meet as I perform my out-of-home errands, both with and without my mother. Yesterday, through an undercurrent of excitement, we both acknowledged what we've been doing.
    "Are you flirting with me?" he playfully challenged.
    "It's mutual," I said. We both grinned. Then, without thinking, I added, "You don't need to worry, though. I'm so overwhelmed with the care of my mother and our life that I can't even imagine where I'd find the time or the physical, emotional and mental space to be anymore involved with you than I am, right now."
    Oops. His eyes widened. His eyebrows shot up. We suffered a moment of awkward silence. I was lucky. He recovered almost immediately. His entire aspect softened and he said, "You never know. Maybe we could work something out."
    Since both of us were unsure of ourselves and I was on a strict time schedule, we left it at that.
    Maybe. Maybe my luck will change in this area. Maybe I've bumped into one of the few men who doesn't feel that the bulk of relationship nurturing is the woman's domain and won't be overwhelmed by my commitment to my mother. I'd like to think so.
    I also enjoy imagining that pigs, do, indeed, have wings.

    Late last week (can't remember for sure which day) my mother and I, after debating whether to try, at this point, to seek out a flu vaccine for her, heard that one of the usual fall flu shot destinations up here (which shall remain nameless) was advertising that it had gotten its hands on a "limited amount" of flu vaccine,after having previously advertised that it would be canceling its flu shot program until further notice. The "vulnerable populations" were urged to show up the following morning when the shots would be available, beginning at 0900. It was estimated that the available vaccine would be completely distributed by or before noon, so early attendance was urged.
    "I suppose we'd better go," my mother said.
    "There'll probably be a long line, a long wait. Are you up for that?"
    "I don't see that I have a choice."
    "Okay," I agreed, "I'll get you up early, get you ready and we'll go."
    As those of you who read this regularly know, preparing my mother for the day takes a good couple of hours. I factored this in. I awoke her at 0600 to her protests, which I muffled by reminding her that we were going for a flu shot. By 0830 we were out the door with my mother's walker, wheelchair (upon which I insisted, telling her that there was no way I could see that she was going to be able to stand for a couple of hours), oxygen (in case the cold caused shallow breathing) and her bundled against the early morning fall mountain cold.
    We arrived at the store a bit more than 15 minutes before the shot start time. The line for shots was already out the door and along the front of the store. We were close to the western corner of the front of the store. By 0900 the line had formed around that corner and about halfway down the northwestern wall. The line consisted of mostly elderly, with a sprinkling of mothers with babies and toddlers in tow. Although the news story the previous night had noted that at another store volunteers had set up shop to provide free water, coffee, doughnuts and sandwiches for those in line, as well as "some chairs" for those who were not capable of standing for long periods of time, there were no such volunteers or amenities at this location.
    We waited. And waited. And waited. The line didn't move. At about 0945 an employee of the store's pharmacy department, clad in a white coat, moved down the line to inform us that the promised vaccine hadn't yet arrived but was on its way. By this, time, out of curiosity, I left my mother in line talking to our immediate neighbors and went around the store to see where it ended. I'd already noticed that people were parking not only along the street but across it in a parking lot owned by another business. The line, by that time, had formed around the back of the store.
    By 1015 we still hadn't moved. Some people in line had already left, but apparently not anyone before us. The mood was not exactly upbeat, but neither was it dour. Seniors are a psychologically hardy bunch.
    Maybe 15 minutes later I noticed a familiar smell coming from my mother. She'd had a bowel movement while sitting in the wheel chair. I leaned over, informed her of this, told her I'd brought supplies for this contingency and asked our immediate queue neighbors if they'd save our place in line if we left so I could clean her. They agreed. On a hunch, though, I decided to leave her in place while I searched out the store bathrooms, figuring that there might be a slight wait there, as well, to secure a stall. It was easy to spot the bathrooms. Both the men's and the women's had lines that snaked along the merchandise racks and around a corner. Some of the people standing in line were in clear distress. One man had wet his pants.
    I did some quick figuring. At this rate, it would be a good half hour, if we were lucky, before I would be able to even begin cleaning my mother. I could get her home in 10 minutes. I trotted through the store to where the vaccination line began and noticed that although there was a table set up and a few white coated employees shuffling the forms that are required to document the administration of the shots, still, no shots were being given. No, I decided, I'm taking her home. Sitting in her shit for a good half hour or more then waiting for who knows how many hours for a vaccination was not a viable option. I packed my mother, her walker and oxygen (which she wasn't, at the moment, using) and our supplies up told my mother I was taking her home to clean her up.
    "Good," she said. "If I get the flu this year it will probably be easier to handle than this." She wasn't referring to her bowel accident, with which she was comfortable, but her discomfort, which included the chill she'd caught despite me bundling her so thoroughly that she looked like an Arctic nomad.
    In the evening we heard that most of the people who had arrived at the location were still waiting in line well after noon for a shot. Finally, as well, there was not enough vaccine to distribute to all who had come. If we'd stayed my mother probably would have been vaccinated, since we were fairly close to the entrance of the store, but we probably also would have been there all day. She would have missed most of her medications and at least one balanced meal, including her critical antibiotic for yet another UTI which she contracted early last week. And, she would have shivered for hours.
    If she contracts the flu this year it probably won't be as easy as she thinks. But, now that she's no longer a smoker her chances of complications are less, at least. As well, she doesn't come into contact with that many people, lessening her chances of infection, as well. Over the last four years all her illnesses have been traceable to her injuries, anemia and physical conditions unrelated to airborne viruses and bacteria. I'm gambling that she'll be okay.
    I have a call into her doctor in Mesa. The office has promised to let us know if and when flu vaccine becomes available to them. In the meantime I've called the veteran's hospital up here and continue to get the run around from them which involves my mother's ineligibility for any kind of treatment since she hasn't been seen in a veteran's facility since 1996. My mother continues, each time the evening news mentions the shortage of flu vaccine, to mention that she needs a flu shot. I remind her of the debacle we experienced last week and she says, "We'll wait until it's easier." This, of course, is my intention.
    I keep up with the information on this flu vaccine problem this year. The truth is, I find it awfully convenient that yet another reason for general panic has been orchestrated just before an election in which the incumbent president's profile becomes more and more questionable by the day, his desperation for reelection is so pronounced one can smell it and, without continuing to attempt to instill a variety of amorphous, often unfounded fears within the general U. S. populace he probably wouldn't have even been nominated by his party, this year. Does his administration really believe that it is going to help his case if he endangers the health and lives of his constituents?
    I have absolutely no solid basis for my suspicions. Certainly, nothing in the media reportage leads me to believe that this national health problem is a result of devious administrative manufacturing rather than faulty health product manufacturing. But, you know, it all just seems so typical of the years we've spent under the Bush administration. What if this crisis is either "solved" by the Bush administration just before the election, or, what if the Bush administration decides to use it to convince the electorate that a change in administration would, at this time, be foolhardy? Will this work? Actually, I don't think so. I think, and hope, that it's a little too late in the game for Bush, that most of us are tired of attempts at making us fearful of unidentifiable bogeymen and life, in general. But, you never know.
    In the meantime, I wonder how many other caregivers of the elderly, as well as those elderly taking care of themselves, are running into the same problems negotiating receiving the flu vaccine this year that my mother and I are having. I'm not afraid, I'm angry. I feel as though my mother and I are being duped at the behest of a desperate administration. So, we'll tough it out. And I'll vote for a new administration this year.
    It all seems so convenient...

    From 1995 - 1996 I worked for the U.S. Interim Census effort as an administrative assistant, which meant I largely stayed in the office fielding calls, organizing the dispatch of field workers and participating in the initial compilation of the statistics being collected in the huge tablets used by the door-to-door Census takers. Because the door-to-door job was the type that attracted a certain type of personality, absenteeism was a rare occurrence. One day, though, one of our star field workers called in sick, saying that she'd had to put down her beloved dog the day before and needed a day to "register the loss". I reported her absence to her supervisor, a no-nonsense woman from a stalwart truck-farming family in the southeast valley. She scoffed. Being one of two heads of a family with a variety of working and family pets, all of whom she insisted were beloved, she felt the woman was "going overboard" in her reaction to her pet's death and was probably using it as an excuse for an extra day off. The Director of the Arizona Interim Census effort disagreed, luckily, and disallowed the supervisor from firing her. "Give her the day," I remember him saying. "It'll take her longer than that to come to terms with her dog's death. She's doing us a favor by taking off only one day. She doesn't need to be harassed about it."
    My reaction, at the time, was reserved. The truth is, I could see the supervisor's point, having been raised by a woman whose spirit was much like hers: Pets die. People die. The rest of us continue until we die. Get over it and move on or life will leave you behind. I could also hear the extreme sadness choking the census taker's voice and knew that she wasn't "faking it". I had not, though, ever experienced the loss or death of a pet that had temporarily paralyzed me, so I was glad I was not in the position to make a determination about whether to keep an employee based on her reaction to the death of a pet.
    Now, I understand what that field worker was experiencing. Within 24 hours of my optimistic pronouncement, here, that I was taking The Big Girl's death well, sadness began slamming me square across the chest repeatedly and unpredictably. It has affected everything in my life including the way I've ordered our days since last Tuesday, my attitude toward everything that comes across my path, the way I relate to everyone in my life, including my mother. I have been caught completely by surprise by my reactions to this sweet, shy cat's death. It has been especially difficult for me to "process" (as MFASRF puts it) The Big Girl's death, since I live with a woman who is not prone to grief and is at a stage in her life when the past disappears as quickly as a minute, the future is non-existent and the present and what it contains is the only reality. Still, I find that I'm not at all bound to apologize to anyone for the way this death is affecting me. I made the decision, last Thursday, not to push myself, even though my loss of energy and sense of emotional isolation have ordered our small(er) family's days since then. I have, for instance, allowed my mother to sleep as much as she wants and continued the temporary cancellation of her therapy exercises which began when I realized that, between our every-other-day trips to Mesa and negotiating The Big Girl's sudden and extreme illness and care I needed to steal time, here and there, from what had previously been daily routines to deep breathe myself back to a shaky sense of competence over those routines that were absolutely necessary. The many activities that suffered were also the taking of my mother's stats (pretty much taken twice rather than three times a day), the bubbly encouragement and attention usually paid to my mother and my frequent reporting on my mother and me in the variety of journals I've set up here for that purpose.
    The only circumstance that seems not to have flagged, that has, in fact, developed at a soul enhancing rate, is a sense that we are now, finally, at home, at our only home. "Environmental Peace" is what I called it in a recent e to a business associate in the Valley with whom I've had to negotiate the return of pulmonary equipment since our switch for convenience, 4 weeks ago, to a local provider. A couple of days ago, while applying myself without resistance to a need to reset and reorder this Prescott house, I realized, with much internal satisfaction, that I am finally "making a home" for us and seeing to it that we settle in.
    Previous to our sale of the Mesa home, despite my life long belief that "home" is a spiritual quality, not a physical place, homemaking for my mother, our cats and me was undermined by a constant need to keep the one home and our eventual move to it on my mental back burner while negotiating our living in the other. As soon as we touched base in one area, I'd begin cataloging all the items and circumstances that would, in six months or so, need to be once again transferred and handling life in the one to make sure the upcoming, inevitable move went as smoothly as possible. I don't have to do this, anymore. The relief is beyond what I experienced during the consolidation. I am a newly reinitiated homemaker and head of household, positions I realized I haven't held for 10 years. I am infused with a sense of power over our lives which is making it both easy and satisfying for me to finally direct our home and my mother's care and affairs with a startling confidence I never thought would be available to me.
    I continue to be very sad that The Big Girl isn't here to reap the benefits of my newfound ownership over our life. I know she would have appreciated it, especially since, having been the very sick cat that she was (post mortem results to follow) she suffered the most from the month long upheaval that was necessary to complete the consolidation. But, even in the depths of my continued sadness over her death and absence, I'm confident that the environmental peace quickly descending upon our household bodes nothing but good things for us in the future.
    Every time, over the past 10 years, we moved from one home to another, at the end of the move my mother would make a sturdy pronouncement in which I have been unable to share until now: "It feels good to be home."
    Yes it does, finally, yes, it feels wonderful for me. I know that it will feel wonderful to our home, too, for us to be here with a sense of place, peace and permanence that have eluded me, and, thus, in one way or another, my immediate family for much too long.

The Big Girl's Post Mortem (for those of you who are as familiar with the furry members of our household as you are with my mother and me)
    Our vet asked, just prior to The Big Girl's euthanasia, to be allowed to "respectfully" do a post mortem on her, to which I enthusiastically agreed. The results were sobering. The Big Girl's pancreas was so shriveled and dissolute as to be non-existent. Her liver was not nearly as fatty as the vet suspected but definitely and most likely permanently inflamed. The only treatment for a non-functioning pancreas and a challenged liver is prednizone, which, in a diabetic, whether cat or human, is extremely problematic. My decision, our vet confirmed, to euthanize The Big Girl, was a wise one. There was very little hope that she would have been able, even with treatment, to withstand her illness for very much longer. As well, considering how quickly she died from the overdose of anesthetic administered to activate her death, it was almost certain that she would not have survived the operation to insert the feeding tube. The Big Girl was much, much closer to death than either the vet or I suspected.
    My immediate reaction to this news, knowing that "stress" is one of the causes of pancreatitis in cats, was that The Big Girl had, throughout her life, literally stressed herself to death. The vet immediately disavowed me of this notion. The origin, she said, of this type of pancreatitis in cats is of unknown origin but not attributable to chronic stress. The Big Girl did absolutely live with this condition throughout her life. When I told the vet that, even so, I wish I had taken The Big Girl's vomiting more seriously earlier, she told me that, considering that The Big Girl's heart and lungs were fine at the time of her death and all other significators (her appetite, her sense of thirst, her energy level, the condition of her teeth, her diet, her ability to negotiate life in our home, her shyness and sense of disruption every time we had a visitors and, as well, her vomiting, which, despite its frequency always contained hairballs and was well within the range of a cat who exhibits stress vomiting) were normal. Thus, until she exhibited exactly the symptoms which signaled to me that she immediately needed intensive medical treatment, even the vet would not have recommended anything more (a blood panel, for instance, which would have alerted us to her physical problems but which is not normal procedure) during her "well cat" vet visits.
    I did, however, immediately take The Little Girl in for a complete blood panel to discover whether she is harboring any silent condition that could develop mortal problems later. I have no reason to suspect this is true but, well, once burned twice shy. We have not yet received the results. I expect, tomorrow, to learn that The Little Girl is in fine shape and will be with us for a long time to come. In the meantime, The Little Girl is reveling in her position as undisputed Queen of the Household, with deference to the Senior Honorary Cat Queen Mother, Mom.

    I am planning on reinstating my mother's exercise therapy sessions either today or tomorrow, depending on the trajectory of her recovery from yet another urinary tract infection (more on that later). I broke a bone in one of my toes the night before last jamming it accidentally into one of the pieces of furniture I was moving, but I seem to not be experiencing any debilitation and only a little pain when I insist on wiggling my toes. We are all looking forward to a visit with MPS and her daughter beginning later this week and extending through the weekend. The Big Girl remains a blessing presence in our household, I'm still experiencing waves of sadness, alone among the members of our family, and, overall, life here is beginning to straighten from the severe twists we recently experienced. To those of you who count on my regular, almost daily reports to keep you informed of how my mother and the rest of us are doing, I apologize for the break, but expect everything to settle into a new, energetically peaceful normal shortly.
    Sooner than later.