I'm going to draft this post, for a change, without referring to a former journal entry or widget of a dream snippet and simply talk about what's been going on around me this week. For it's been a week of daughterhood and care taking my mother who generally needs very little oversight. Daughterhood, something that should roll off my fingers, yes, after being the oldest daughter for, dare I say it, 59 years. These days I'm more sister, mother, and wife. But, my mother had a surgery at the beginning of this week from which she will indeed need to recover, slowly.
If you knew my mother you would grok that she is not an easy one to bring to a full stop. In fact, don't even try. She is the opposite of Queen for a Day; she is a workaholic through and through. Her mother used to say "She's just like her father; she just can't say no!". And then there is always someone else in need that she's gathering time for - she's the girl scout in my circle, always on ready, rarely asking for help because she can handle it all. Even planning for this surgery was going to be a great imposition because she has a fundraising event to manage. I tried to tell her this would be an opportunity to let others take charge.
But regarding the present...suffice to say that when we asked my mom if she recalled anything about being anesthetized - particularly as her coming free of that temporary blank slate took nearly twice as long as the doctor had anticipated - she did seem to remember people around her in the drug fog urging her to wake up. But, she said, she was preoccupied with drafting an email in her "sleep" and exclaimed that it was truly annoying that whomever was whispering to her to come around was interrupting this small work detail. She could not remember the body of the tiny letter nor to whom it was being written, she just knew she had to continue to start it over again every time she heard the voices calling her back to consciousness.
Similarly, she did not elect to stay a second night in the hospital but rather we wheeled her home the day following her procedure. In the elevator the nurse handling the wheelchair in which my mother sat said that for this particular surgery she notices it's women "of my mother's generation" that opt to leave the hospital sooner while younger women would hold to their ship of an adaptable bed for several days. I suspect that latter observation would describe me. But my mother is indeed a product of the depression years. Boot straps and pennies to get into heaven and all that (wonderful) jazz. This is no little old lady, no siree, this is the gal who when she retired, began her own non-profit as I was urging her to simply be a grandmother to my daughter who wasn't yet 5, if I'm remembering correctly. But my mother had been bitten by an idea to start a foundation and wanted to pursue that essentially single handedly, and here I sit in her cave of a home office jotting these thoughts down like hard candy, knowledge I must now roll around in my mouth that perhaps I am dependent on her always being upright in this very chair. But she's going to be in bed for a little while. She'll heal and go back to sending emails, but I suppose I'm witnessing that mortality chorus that we all look at sideways now and then, and then find coming at us like an intoxicated driver going the wrong way on a one way street.
For the time being she's been knocked off of her game. We imagined she would immediately insist we bring her her laptop so she could get back to work, five foot one inch sailor redirecting the course to get her tall ship back to sea. But instead she stands slowly now and winces; she leans back in bed and her face becomes a small shrunken apple face doll in a purple knee-length gown with turquoise hospital socks with non-skid bumps on the bottom. I lower her down. I chart the accounting of what pills were taken when. Lots and lots and lots of friends call. My own daughter calls to check in, worried.Of course there's nothing more that I can do but soothe them both and remember nights of being up all night with my newborn, anticipating the best and the worst, finally falling asleep next to my husband. I witness my mother who, while weary, resorts to that heroic biting of the lip to soldier on. I get it. I'm a soldier too.
(with a special wish for promise in sorrow for Terry W who lost her mom this past week)
But regarding the present...suffice to say that when we asked my mom if she recalled anything about being anesthetized - particularly as her coming free of that temporary blank slate took nearly twice as long as the doctor had anticipated - she did seem to remember people around her in the drug fog urging her to wake up. But, she said, she was preoccupied with drafting an email in her "sleep" and exclaimed that it was truly annoying that whomever was whispering to her to come around was interrupting this small work detail. She could not remember the body of the tiny letter nor to whom it was being written, she just knew she had to continue to start it over again every time she heard the voices calling her back to consciousness.
Similarly, she did not elect to stay a second night in the hospital but rather we wheeled her home the day following her procedure. In the elevator the nurse handling the wheelchair in which my mother sat said that for this particular surgery she notices it's women "of my mother's generation" that opt to leave the hospital sooner while younger women would hold to their ship of an adaptable bed for several days. I suspect that latter observation would describe me. But my mother is indeed a product of the depression years. Boot straps and pennies to get into heaven and all that (wonderful) jazz. This is no little old lady, no siree, this is the gal who when she retired, began her own non-profit as I was urging her to simply be a grandmother to my daughter who wasn't yet 5, if I'm remembering correctly. But my mother had been bitten by an idea to start a foundation and wanted to pursue that essentially single handedly, and here I sit in her cave of a home office jotting these thoughts down like hard candy, knowledge I must now roll around in my mouth that perhaps I am dependent on her always being upright in this very chair. But she's going to be in bed for a little while. She'll heal and go back to sending emails, but I suppose I'm witnessing that mortality chorus that we all look at sideways now and then, and then find coming at us like an intoxicated driver going the wrong way on a one way street.
For the time being she's been knocked off of her game. We imagined she would immediately insist we bring her her laptop so she could get back to work, five foot one inch sailor redirecting the course to get her tall ship back to sea. But instead she stands slowly now and winces; she leans back in bed and her face becomes a small shrunken apple face doll in a purple knee-length gown with turquoise hospital socks with non-skid bumps on the bottom. I lower her down. I chart the accounting of what pills were taken when. Lots and lots and lots of friends call. My own daughter calls to check in, worried.Of course there's nothing more that I can do but soothe them both and remember nights of being up all night with my newborn, anticipating the best and the worst, finally falling asleep next to my husband. I witness my mother who, while weary, resorts to that heroic biting of the lip to soldier on. I get it. I'm a soldier too.
(with a special wish for promise in sorrow for Terry W who lost her mom this past week)
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