Up Close and Personal - Caring for an Aging Parent

The usual subjects of my Coming of Age: Delaware articles are strangers to me, live in Delaware, and devote much of their time and energy to giving back to the community.  The subject of this article lives much further away, but is much nearer to my heart.  Unlike my other interview subjects, I have benefited directly from this subject’s devotion.  She is my mother.

 

I write this article not from the office of my light, airy Rehoboth Beach home, but from the dark chilly basement in my mother’s home in Ohio.  I am here because, despite her 5-day-a-week gym habit, regular walking and moderate eating, my mother recently had surgery to remove a major blockage from her carotid artery.  I am here to be her moral support, her taxi service, whatever is needed.

 

Since many Baby Boomers are now (or have, or will be) taking care of an aging parent, I thought that writing about my own experience may be helpful.  Unlike many Boomers, I’m fortunate that my mother is still quite healthy (despite the clogged arteries), still lives alone hundreds of miles from any of her children, and still values her ability to be independent—fiercely independent at that!

 

For as long as I can remember, my mother has been strong.  Not just stiff-upper-lip strong, but steel girder strong.  For the nearly 40 years that I’ve been away from home, she has often kept mum on her medical issues; she’s had surgeries that I didn’t even know about until after the fact.  So, when she not only told me about this surgery beforehand but accepted my offer to come to Ohio and help with her recovery, I knew she must be scared.  It was then that I realized that we were forging a new era in our sometimes tense mother-daughter relationship—one where I am allowed to help.

 

My mother had led me to believe that this surgery would be a piece of cake—she’d be out of the hospital the next day and would be up and around, she said, but wouldn’t be able to drive for two weeks.  I knew (being an independent sort myself) that two weeks sitting around the house would drive her nuts, so I packed my bags (and my dog) and drove to Ohio, arriving the day before her surgery.  The last time I’d spent two weeks with my mother, I was 12.  This would be an experience, for sure.

 

As it turns out, the surgery wasn’t such a piece of cake.  When I walked into the CVS (cardiovascular surgery) ICU as she was coming out of anesthesia, I saw my mother helpless for the first time in my life.  That alone was a shock.  Then there were the tubes coming out of everywhere, her shockingly ashen complexion and her weak, gravelly voice.  As I fed my mother ice chips from a plastic spoon, it was as if I was peering down from above, taking in the scene—not really a part of it.  I was caring for my mother and she was letting me.  It was frightening.  It was powerful.  It was surreal.

 

Once home, Mom wore her favorite nightgown, sat in her favorite recliner covered in soft blankets, and watched TV, drifting in and out.  I sat nearby, in case she needed anything.  Except for a visit to the emergency room several days after the surgery, it was just over a week before my mother got dressed and left the house.  Once she made that first foray, she started to turn a corner in her recovery.  She was still not anywhere close to being back to 100%, which frustrated her mightily, but she was getting better.  She couldn’t see any reason why she didn’t snap right back after this surgery.  Being age 76 and having been cut and scraped from earlobe to clavicle wasn’t reason enough, it seemed.

 

It’s been two weeks since I left my home in Delaware—the time has flown.  Mom is up and around, getting closer to being her old self.  The time for needing me is past.  The time for me to go home has come.  As I prepare to leave, she tells me how much she appreciated me being there.  Such emotions often go unspoken in our family, so it was especially nice to hear it said.  As we hug goodbye, I feel something I’ve never felt from my mother before—I feel needed.  It feels different…and nice.

 

I pull out of the driveway thankful—that she survived the surgery, that she is recovering well, that she allowed me to help, and that we may have just turned a corner of our own.  I smile and wave.