Counting down. One last full day for Mom at Northwoods. I'm not sure she realizes she is going home tomorrow morning, but my brother and I are very aware of it. Yesterday I spent several hours shopping for the food and other items we will need to give her good care at home. I still don't have the bath bench, but found out by accident that the cost of it could be reimbursed by the Caregiver Center in Silverdale, through Kitsap County Aging and Long Term Care Services. After visiting Mom on Monday, and delivering a piece of Boston Cream Pie to her, I agreed to go to a NAARF meeting with my husband. NAARF is the National Association of Active and Retired Federal workers--they meet once a month at the West Sound Improvement Club down in Navy Yard City. Each month they have a speaker. This time it was Janet Larson from the Caregiver Center. She happened to mention in her presentation that certain home care appliances could be bought with the $250 fund per caregiver that the center can spend. I wasn't aware of this at all. Either I wasn't paying attention to that part of Janet's explanation to me a year ago, or she forgot to mention it. So that's one big expense we may be able to avoid. Even though I know a lot more about resources than I did a year ago there are still many things to learn.
After I bought the protein whey, applesauce, apple juice, peanut butter and jam at Costco, and the instant gravy and other instant foods at Safeway, and the laundry basket at Target, I schlepped it all down to my Mom's house. My brother wasn't there--it was his day to visit Mom and they wanted to give him more catheter training--so I hauled all the stuff into the house. The first thing I saw when I went into the kitchen was what looked like cat food all over the kitchen counter, along with the expected dirty dishes, utensils and mugs and pieces of cellophane and cardboard from opened packages of food sitting on top of sticky ice cream and jam leavings. The second thing I saw was cat barf on the floor. It looked like two-day old vomit, not fresh. If I'd had my blood pressure monitor with me I could have verified that my BP rose along with my anger. How the hell can my brother take care of Mom's catheter needs when he can't even notice and clean up cat vomit in the kitchen? I stomped around, cursing and putting things away, putting garbage where it belonged and noticing that the little bits of brown on the counter and floor weren't cat food, but Cocoa Puffs. Had he had a breakfast accident? Had he been using it for confetti to celebrate that his Mom was coming home? Was he doing performance art? How to explain that it was all over the counter and on the floor, too.....
About 10 minutes after I got to Mom's, my brother showed up to the back door with a coffee and a bag of magazines from Barnes and Noble. It's his first week of the month ritual--magazines and a coffee--when his SSI check comes. He'd also bought a few groceries, mostly pastries and some milk and TV dinners. The minute he got in the door I asked him to clean up the cat barf. He was going to use the Scotchbrite pad I use when I do dishes there and I said, "Please don't use that, it's for dishes. Use a paper towel." No common sense. But he cleaned it up, struggling to get down on his knees, huffing and staggering when he got back up. I was still mad at him and sullen, but later I asked how his training had been. "They worked me hard," he said, "and Mom was impatient with me. The OT wasn't, but Mom kept saying 'hurry up!' " In an attempt to make amends with me he showed me that he'd bought a special edition magazine about the Royal Wedding, ostensibly for Mom, but my brother loves that stuff, too, as do I.
Before I left I made him a list of 4 things I wanted him to do before I got there today to clean house.
1. Put your pot away. (a pipe and a baggy were on the couch)
2. Empty the dishwasher and fill it again, including the 4 dirty coffee mugs sitting in various places in the living room.
3. Empty the living room waste basket that was overflowing.
4. And sweep up the Cocoa Puffs on the kitchen floor.
After this week, a caregiver will be coming and tidying as needed. I will be at the house 2 or 3 times a week, keeping things picked up. There will be SP, OT, PT (the Tees, as I call them) going in and out at odd intervals and a nurse, too. I told Stanley his pot was to be on the lowest level possible. This means no one should be able to smell it and nobody should ever see it. All we need is for someone to blow the whistle on him and have him end up in jail. 2 years ago when Mom broke her shoulder and cracked her knee cap, we had Abiding Care serving her for a couple of weeks. Stanley got nice and comfortable with the young woman who was taking such good care of Mom. He smoked weed in front of her. She ended her services immediately. The manager of Abiding Care called me to tell me what had happened and told me they had decided not to report him. I don't think I have ever in my life been so angry with anyone as I was with my brother that day.
I know that the catheter emptying will not be the major contribution my brother makes to my Mom's care. It will be his presence that is most important. My Mom and Stanley have a symbiotic relationship. She lives for him and he lives because of her. She has told me hundreds of times how important he is to her, what a good companion. I witnessed what they have together when he and I were still visiting Mom together, during the hospital stay and the first weeks at Northwoods. She would light up when he came into the room. She laughed at his odd behavior, his strange riffs on hospital or nursing home routines. She was making a joke one day when he was there and he said, "Oh, Mom, you're so cute". It was said with deep and genuine love. I know his love has lots to do with his own security, but it's still love. Who among us doesn't have one or two of our own selfish reasons for loving someone and wanting to keep them with us?
One of the things that has happened to me in these weeks since April 4th, is that I have discovered a deeper love for my mother. The time at Northwoods has been good for me. I know that Mom is well cared for and that she is safe. When I go up to see her I often don't have anything to do except be with her in the most fundamental sense. I can listen to what she has to say, ask her important questions, like what she believes comes after death, talk to her about her lost friends and family, hold her hand, stroke her head. The surroundings are quiet and pleasant, there is no work for me to do. When she is back home I will be noticing the Cocoa Puffs on the floor, the dirty towels that need to be washed, my brother's messes. I would like to be able to let go of all that, to concentrate only on Mom and her well-being in these last months of her life.
No comments:
Post a Comment