The Right Place at the Right Time doing the Right Thing

Earlier this month in our 31 Day Challenge, we were privileged to "meet" Phyllis Greene and listen as she shared her perspective on being the "Cared-For."  She admitted her struggles and frustrations with aging and coping with a terminal illness, yet her story was one of uplifting encouragement as she graciously blessed her daughter for the gift of being her Caregiver.

Today I would love to share her Daughter's Perspective:

I am the Caregiver

by D.G. Fulford

 

The other day, I was thinking about William Butler Yeats, which was a shock because I'm usually thinking about The Real Housewives of Orange County.  A line from his poem "Easter 1916" kept running through my head:

 

 "All changed, changed utterly:

A terrible beauty is born."

 

All has changed utterly in the past 12 years for my mother, my daughter and me.  What a terrible, beautiful limbo we're in, this intimate and temporary time, glimmering between Before and After.

 

For years, I lived in California, then in a ghost town in Nevada.  Twelve years ago, I picked up my life and moved it back to Ohio, leaving my daughter, Maggie, who was well on her own, way out west.  I became my mother's compatriot, then caregiver after my father died.

 

At first, I didn't understand what my mother meant when she called and said she needed me during Dad's illness.  If you needed help around the house, the last person you'd call would be me.  I am more bohemian than bountiful; not a cooker, not a cleaner.  "Why would she possibly need me?"  I asked a friend.  "Fresh air," my friend said.

 

Being a writer allowed me to stay with my parents during the long winter of Dad's death.  When it came time to leave, I didn't want to.  By then, I needed Mom as much as she needed me.  Having been through a divorce, a failed business and the usual frenetic life of a single working mother, being home felt safe and right.

 

Mom's health was fine for the first few years, but time took its toll.  By her side, I steadied an arm as we went to lunch and brunch and errands.  Slowly our outings turned into a mash-up of waiting rooms, doctors' appointments and hospitals.  Soon we were picking out canes, then a walker, and finally a folding wheelchair.  Now Mom is bedridden.  She suffers from congestive heart failure and her legs don't work like they did.  She is a hospice patient.

 

In her pink bed, in her pink bedroom, you'd swear that if she had a suit on instead of a nightgown, she could be presiding over a meeting with the Franklin University Board of Trustees.  When you see her hunched over her walker, though, attempting to wheel to the bathroom, the truth cannot be denied.  "I hate being an old woman," she says.  And who can blame her?

 

We keep up our routine, Mom and I.  I call her every morning at 9:30, then run out to her house to start the day.  She has 24-hour care now, which eases my hyper-vigilance.  Most of the time, we are free to just sit and talk.  Even at this hardest time, we have had a blast.  We laugh more than we cry as we face the unfaceable together.

 

She is ready.

 

I am not.

 

Over the past 12 years, I have not had a thought that did not contain my mother.  Her life so fills my own that I cannot even think about other relationships.  I doubt that this is healthy, and sometimes weigh the wisdom of my decision.  But as the years go by, I am more and more convinced that I have been at the right place at the right time doing the right thing.  How often in a life do we get to acknowledge that?

 

My friends keep me sane - and I am surrounded by great ones.  They hear when my voice sounds crazy and come to my rescue.  We meet and we laugh, and I feel my dark clouds dissipate.  I spend a lot of time alone, too, which soothes and sustains me.  At night, I put myself away for the day, nesting with my cuddly dog, a bunch of books, my laptop and good old Mr. Television.  The next morning when I speak to Mom, I am ready to go again.

 

In the years that I have been here, my daughter has gotten married and had two glorious sons - Zachary,6, and Nate, 3.  I cannot visit them as often as I like, which is hard - the push and pull of going and staying.  I am always conscious of what could happen, while never believing in a million years that it will.

 

For 12 years, like an anticipatory survivalist, I have been steeping in my mother's sun, absorbing all the light I can.  When our last day together comes, I will be lonely; I will be rocked and knocked to me knees.  When I am ready, I will get up.  My mother's light will guide me.  The terrible part will come to an end.  The beautiful will live on within.

 

 

 

D.G. Fulford and her mom, Phyllis Greene, have written a book about their experiences.

It is called Designated Daughter: The Bonus Years