Mornings are so much fun around here. Mom gets a night of sleep and is feeling spunky in the morning, by contrast my father is still feeling tired and weak and coughing a lot. This tends to lead to little arguments. This mornings arguments turned into a something more and as dad went to take a shower and get ready to go to the gym my mother and I had a conversation. She shared with me her frustrations about my father’s situation and about her situation.
We talked about how she is frustrated that she cannot do anything to help my father. Frustrated that all the doctors say there isn’t anything physically wrong, that each person responds to chemo/radiation treatments differently and that it will just take time. She is frustrated that she may not have that kind of time. She is frustrated that while she is still feeling relatively good, she wants to enjoy time with my father and can’t because he just doesn’t feel good. She is upset that he can’t take care of her like she did for him. She expressed that she wants him to hug her and tell her things will be ok when she isn’t feeling good. She is wanting some things that I cannot give her. That just sucks. We talked about how dad’s condition may be more mental than physical right now. That he is also going through a rough time mentally and grieving for the life changes going on.
It is a shame, that in this particular time, their ways of communicating and expressing emotions are so different. My father has never expressed emotion in a way that the people around him needed him to. We had to learn to live with that. It is just difficult for my mother right now because she need the extra attention and support. I suppose in a way, she still wants to be the care giver as well and just can’t. Although she expressed that she has hit a wall where she has given up wanting to care for him. I can certainly understand her wanting to be a bit selfish at the moment.
There is also an aspect of this that is her grieving process as well. She is scared for the people she will be leaving behind. She is having a tough time imagining what their lives will be like. Will they miss her? Will they still love her? All normal emotions in this process I suspect. I need to do a better job with her of just listening to her, reassuring her that all this is ok and stop wanting to fix her. That is tough though. I very much want to fix my mom. I don’t want to lose her.
I hugged her and comforted her. She asked how I was doing with all this. I will write more about this particular topic in a random thoughts post soon, but I told her as much as I don’t like what is happening, I knew that this is how things are and I just have to make the best of it. I told her that taking care of them has actually been good for me in a way. It has given me some purpose, something to do, something to feel good about. She told me that I have more worth than I think. I replied that I actually know I have worth and that I just haven’t had a way to exercise and show it in a long time now (being out of work and all). So being a caretaker gives me ways to show my worth and makes me feel good.
Plans for the gym today are up in the air. It is cold and rainy here today so Mom, with her new wig, doesn’t want to go out in the rain. I thought it would just be my dad and I going to the gym, however after he got out of the bathroom and got dressed he is having a rough time controlling his shakes. He had to sit down to shave and brush his teeth because his back was hurting, probably from being so weak. I got out a portable heater and set it up in front of his chair. I talked with him a bit, in a hypnosy (ya made up word) sort of way to help him relax and squelch the shivers. Mom made him a piece of toast and I told her to put some honey on it for a little boost of energy. He started feeling better.
I told him that he should forego the gym today and that I would take him over to the pulmonary specialist’s office to talk to someone in person. He called them up earlier in the week and they have not called back with any appointment information. I hope the pulmonary guy can give him some sort of inhaler (even if its pretty much placebo) to get him to think there is some treatment for his cough. I am sure that he is expending so much energy coughing that it keeps him too tired to want to do anything.
Mom had another brain fart this morning that added the frustration level. Dad was talking about the pulmonary doctor and mom got a bit confused on the doctor’s names. Dad’s response came off sounding more condescending than I’m sure he expected and mom got mad and said something about her stupid mouth not working. I told them both to relax, that mixing up doctors was not a big deal. I do a lot of little mediation like that.
All this going on before 10 am. Fun times. I will probably have more to write about later tonight, so there may end up being two posts for today 🙂