RATS

"You dirty rat!"

All through the month of April, Minnie will help me explore the people, places and things that WE call creepy, strange and downright weird. To be honest, Minnie finds almost everything creepy and strange so having the entire alphabet at our disposal is going to be a challenge. You might find what we discover delightful, or you may agree with us. Please share your opinions either way. Have fun road-tripping the Alphabet by visiting others doing the challenge as well. To find out more on the A-Z blogging challenge follow the link.

There are rats in my brain. They are pretty creepy, strange, and very weird! You are probably wondering how they got there, right? Rats are scavengers and they seem to have found their way into my brain, nesting comfortably and scavenging for thoughts on how to cope with these past few days. My thoughts have turned into rats. Therefore, rats in my brain. Unless you love rats it is a terrible thought isn't? No I am not crazy….Not yet.

My mother was born in the year of the rat and it is my thoughts of her that occupy my brain. I am scavenging for answers that must be made once she comes home from the hospital. This Easter she fell once again on her way from the bathroom to her bed. Lucky for her I was home from work and close by. After a few strange sounds from her bedroom, I checked on her and then found myself rescuing her from the floor. She could not breathe, she was in pain and had no idea how she ended up on the floor. An ambulance drove her away in the middle of the night with a broken rib, a broken vertebrae and a rapid pulse. Now she has developed pneumonia as well.

She cannot take care of herself anymore and the rats in my brain are scavenging for another solution to the one that seems to be the most clear, constant care in a nursing home. I know she needs more help than I can give her, so why does that make me feel like I am rating her out?

Sorry I have not getting around to all my friends. Between my crazy work schedule, Banzaicon and my mother...the RATS have been keeping me busy. I promise to catch up with all of you soon!
I hope YOUR week is void of RATS!

Thank God For Batman!

Sometimes the easiest way to deal with unfortunate situations is by maintaining a sense of humor. After my mother recovered from her initial embarrassment from falling off the stool in her shower, which resulted in a couple of broken ribs and two black eyes, she hobbled out of her bat cave the next day wearing her newly acquired mask. She made a grand gesture as she opened her shawl, and my eyes quickly glanced over the marmalade stains on her nightshirt and focused on her childish grin.

“I look like batman,” she giggled and then winced, grabbing her side.

I couldn’t stop myself from bursting out in laughter, even though I was angry at her for not asking for help. Her stubborn nature has become the villain she faces every day.

“Next time you want to play super hero--- mom, please wait for your side kick to show up!”

A week later, the mask is fading...

Who am I kidding? She is NEVER going to ask for help. I don’t much like having a mother who thinks she has to be a super hero, especially when she goes to such lengths to look the part.

The past few months I have been trapped in some kind of bizarre alternate reality which consists of diapers for both the young and the old, as well as toothless grins and gurgles among other things. Soon my mother and granddaughter will be equally equipped to face the challenges of being fed with a spoon. 

Like I said earlier, sometimes the easiest way to deal with unfortunate situations is to keep a sense of humor. I am doing the best to keep mine and although my inspiration for anything remotely creative has been lacking for quite some time I am hoping that I can kick start my writing engine through the A-Z challenge this year. My theme will be creepy, scary and just plain weird. Are any of you joining the challenge this year, and do you have a theme? I know that I have a lot of catching up to do with my blogging friends and I am sorry about that. Thank god for Batman and a good laugh. Sometimes the strangest thing will put everything else back in place.

Hope everyone enjoys the rest of their week! I will back to share some creepiness with you on April 1^st.

Wheels of Time

My mother and me in Central Park, NY  1959

Certain moments in my life have instantly snapped like a rubber band and I knew at that very instant no matter how hard I tried to fight it, that everything was about to change. It was like that the first time my mother gazed off in the distance, as she sat in her chair, and said to me in a childish voice, “Can you drive me home now? I want to go home but I don’t have any shoes so I can’t walk there.” 

My mother was home. She has been living with me and my family for the past 10 years. Snap goes the rubber band and I knew it was time to quite fooling myself. I had taken her to the doctor even though she had said she was perfectly fine. I was worried about the dosage of her medicine and forced her out of the house to see her doctor. His diagnosis was suspected dementia or another mild stroke. She seemed fine enough at the time but I was kidding myself, letting myself be deceived. Tell me, what child does not want to believe their mother? The rubber band snapped and in an instant I became the parent, my mother the child. My brother and sisters are in the states, so I am a so called single parent. I make the hard decisions alone with the support of my family here because they know firsthand the situation. I keep my sisters and brother informed as best I can, but as one of my sisters said, “What can I do?” She does the best she can by giving me emotional support and that is all I can ask for.

Yesterday after my husband and I checked my mother into a medical facility, where over the course of 3- 4 weeks she will be physically and mentally tested for disease, I felt relieved yet saddened. Relieved knowing that she will get the medical attention she needs yet has fought against. Saddened because I know this proud woman does not like to be where she is but has accepted the fact that she needs the kind of help that I cannot give her. Kissing her on the cheek and leaving her in the care of others reminded me of the first time I left my child in daycare. Strange how the wheels of time can turn and how the snap of a moment can change your life.

Be kind to the people you love because one day when you least expect it that rubber band will snap, and hopefully as your life is changed you will make the right choices.

Happy New Year my friends! I hope the choices you make this year bring you success and happiness!

Stop Asking

Sometimes we are forced to put our niceties on the shelf and resort to a more forceful approach to getting what we want. If you are used to telling people what to do, that may not be a problem, but when it comes to one’s own parent that is another story.

My mother 23 years ago with my son

It should come as no surprise that the transition between doing what your parents tell you to do and telling them what to do is a difficult one, especially when that parent is incapable of making their own decisions. In my case that would be my mother, who I just recently forced out of the house and to her new doctor’s office for the first time in three years. Her doctor had been renewing her prescription without ever even seeing her once. As many of you know, my mother suffered a stroke fifteen years ago and after she lost her partner my family and I moved in with her so that she would not be alone.

It took a long time for me to stop believing my mother’s lies. Despite what she was telling me, she was not fine. More and more she started closing herself off. She stopped talking to her friends and family, stopped going out, stopped washing her clothes, stopped cleaning her apartment and most importantly stopped asking for help. So now I have stopped asking her if she needs it. Now I am just doing for her the things that I always took for granted that she could do herself.

Life is a strange thing. Our parents eventually become our children and when you are finally forced to face that day and except it, I hope you have a solid pair of rubber gloves. Today’s mission: cleaning out my mother’s kitchen cupboard. Yes, banana peels can turn into black stone.

Do you have a story to share about your “Parenting” struggles? I would love to hear it. Come back tomorrow for some Minnie Gibberish fun, a game unlike any game you have ever played before.

My Mother's Shoes

My mother always used to lay out her clothes the night before she went to the doctor so I was not surprised to see her planned outfit hanging neatly from her closet door. I looked carefully over her choices; a long moss green skirt with matching jacket, and a short-sleeved beige summer blouse.  It has been cold and raining here so I was satisfied with her slightly autumn choices and thought nothing more of it. Big mistake! 

My mother 30 years ago

Now you are probably going to think it was a beautiful hot summer day when I took her to the doctor. Wrong, it was cold and raining yesterday which was slightly disturbing. It was going to be hard enough navigating her around. Remember she hasn’t been out of the house for years, the left side of her body has never fully recovered after her stroke and she walks with a cane. What was disturbing was the fact that she was waiting for me fully dressed, but had no shoes on her feet. I had forgotten about her feet, and I should have known better. I mean let’s face it; shoes have not been a big priority for someone who never leaves the house. Her loafers have not fit her for a long time so she only wears slippers.

We were already running a little late and none of my shoes fit her. Since I don’t have a closet (haven’t had one for years, yep…renovations…sigh,) I scurried around the house trying to locate my scattered shoes and then I tried them on my mom’s feet as if she were Cinderella. Finally I caught a glimpse of my bright blue trusty crocs under the coffee table. Thank god, they saved the day.

 

We did eventually get to the doctor and my mother, bless her soul, blamed having to borrow her daughter’s shoes for her wobbly walk. I will write more on this series of coping with dementia later.

This week-end my husband is dressing up like one of the Beatles characters from Serg. Pepper’s Lonely Heart Clubs Band, and he is preforming with the choir for their yearly summer concert. Maybe I will be able to get you some video of that. So what are your plans for the week-end? Whatever they are I hope you have fun doing them!

Tearing it all Down: Death and Dying

This is post number 400 and this one I am about to share with you is difficult for me so I need to tell it slowly.

Poison can seep inside you like a lusty spider crawling into your ear while you are asleep. At first you only get a hint or two of something being wrong. You ignore those until the poison is so obvious that you have to get medicine or die. 

Yep, that's me 1962

My mother has become that spider. She is slowly sucking the life out of me with her poison and no matter how hard I try to find medicine for my condition I keep finding an empty pharmacy. You would think that by now there would be a medicine that would prevent a person from having to suffer through the decay of a parent.  Maybe there is but I have not found it. Alzheimer’s is a hard thing for anyone to swallow, especially when it affects the person you love the most, your mother and your best friend.

She has been the center of my universe for as long as I can remember. A mother usually is. With the looks and charms of Grace Kelly this Norwegian beauty could have had any man but when she found out that she was pregnant with me she desperately grabbed her chance at a better life far away from Norway. She married a charming American, one that was not my father, but one that she had been dating and more importantly, one that was available. You have to remember that in 1957 moral conduct was viewed differently. A woman in Norway did not just get an abortion or raise a child on her own.

For the first time in three years since my mother had her stroke I am going to take her for a drive, the first time she has gone any further than her front door. As I am writing this I still wonder if I will get her out of the door and into the car. I have finally made a stand and it was not an easy thing to do. 

“Either you go to the doctor or you go to a nursing home because I cannot do this alone anymore.”

Many words were shouted and tears fell in secret, as they still do. There are other members in this “household” but they turn their head and say, “Deal with your mother on your own. “ I really can’t blame them because she has alienated everyone in her family. I am the only one she ever talks to anymore. She has made it clear that she wants nothing to do with her children, her grandchildren or anyone else. She has no friends, no hobbies except the television and daily newspaper. This is not the woman I remember.

The worst part is that we are living in the same house. Every single day my husband, my son and I have to share the same space with a woman that has changed from something beautiful into a troll. My mother has turned the walls of this household into deadly mold and everyone within these walls is breathing it in. I really hope that I can get her out of the door and into the doctor’s office and that he will be like the Wizard of Oz and give her some magic pills that will return her into the world of the living. If not, maybe he can give me some pills to deal with this.

I will keep you posted. If you have any words of advice on how to deal with a parent who is forgetting your name I would love to hear it! More of this story to come...........