Mom & Me Four Archive

    Yes, that's tongue in cheek. But, I'm wondering, where do I begin explaining how this particular title came about?
    Night before last. That's when it started. Mom and I were talking about family...nothing and no one in particular, just reminiscing, I was catching her up (stuff about which she'd already been informed but forgotten), we were having a good time recalling past family incidents that defined endearing quirks of character inherent within individual family members...you know the type of conversation I'm talking about. Somehow, Mom worked around to "wondering out loud" why we hadn't seen "anyone" for so long, meaning, of course, anyone in our family.
    I follow two policies in regards to responding to these particular wonderings of hers. The first is that if I have anything to do with us not having seen family I own up to it. The second is that I make no excuses for family members' lack of visiting. If I don't have anything meaningful or true to say in response, I express a combination of "I don't know" and/or "Why don't you call them and find out why they haven't visited, lately?" We've finally gotten to a place where Mom doesn't question why we don't do the long distance traveling that would be required to visit two arms of our family (she's not interested in it, anymore) and why I've cut our short distance visiting to Phoenix down to a minimum (these trips are exhausting for both her and me and require double, and even triple duty of me in regards to caregiving), so those concerns don't usually come up anymore.
    So, needless to say, I didn't respond much to her out loud wonderings. Usually, this closes out these sections of conversation pretty quickly. Night before last, though, Mom decided to expand upon my non-responsiveness. "Well," she said, "they have their husbands and children. And their careers. Those are important."
    I can't explain why it happened on this particular night, but, for some reason, this response bothered me, so I decided to explore it. "Well, yes, Mom. But, listen to what you're saying. From an objective, the-world-as-standard point of view, you're saying that since there are no husbands or children here, and since neither of us is pursuing a 'career' in the standard sense, what we're doing here isn't important."
    I expected her to take slight offense, correct herself and insist that, of course what she and I are doing here is important. She didn't, though. "Well, it's not important," is what she said.
    I choked. I stuttered. It took me a few minutes to catch my breath, regain my ability to speak. In the meantime I thought I detected something that made me even more uncomfortable. Not being, anymore, the kind of person to leave squirming dogs alone, I said, "You're saying that, in comparison to [her other daughter's] lives, our lives aren't important."
    She thought about this for some seconds. "Yes. That's right."
    "Because there aren't husbands, and children, and careers going on in this household."
    She became impatient. She looked at me squarely. "Yes," she said.
    "Well then, Mrs. Hudson, you shouldn't wonder why we get no visitors. You've successfully taught you're children that we're not important enough to visit!"
    Now she was sputtering and gasping. "No. No, that's not what I meant."
    "Well," I said, ready for a confrontation, "the truth is, this is the message we all clearly got while we were being raised, Mom. The gods only knows why I didn't pay attention to it, and, frankly, I thank the gods that I didn't, but, you know, now some things are becoming clear to me. Considering that I didn't, and don't, have a husband and children, what do you think I've been doing with my life all these years?!? What do you think I was doing in Seattle, when you called and asked me to come live with you for the rest of your life?!?"
    She was clearly surprised but had no trouble answering, "Nothing important." Mom sat in her rocker, self-satisfied, looking at me as though there was absolutely nothing wrong with what she'd said.
    "Arrrgh! I can't believe this!" My mind reeled. My heart felt like it had been bludgeoned. Not only, I thought, did my entire family think, underneath all the guilty thank-yous, that I am simply maintaining a pre-death holding pattern for Mom, Mom obviously is thinking that I'm wasting my time here with her. I didn't take this well. I got angry. Really, really angry. "Okay. Well, if that's how you feel, guess what. For as long as I can stand it, I'm going to take care of you as though what I'm doing for you isn't the least bit important. Let's just see how that works."
    She, having absolutely no idea what this could possibly mean, agreed.
    In order to keep her in the zone I'd established, I explained ahead of time how considering everything I do and everything about her life unimportant was going to affect every act I took on her behalf, or mine. I started that night. The last thing necessary before she retired was rubbing her legs down. This is always a relaxing time for her and I lavish both lotion and care on her, during which we have winding-down conversations to ensure a pleasant retirement. Instead, night before last, I hurried through rubbing her legs down, which wasn't hard, I was angry. I rebuffed all her attempts at conversation. As a coup de grace, I did something that she used to do, that always annoyed me, when she would massage us as children; I delivered a light slap to each leg when I was done. She tensed up at each slap, just like I used to do, completely spoiling the effect of the massage.
    I rounded her up for bed as though I was rounding up a herd of cattle. Push, push, push, nipping at her heels, putting her through the paces. Once she was sitting on the edge of her bed I put her oxygen on as though I was hooking a robot up to a power source. "No good night kiss," I said, "you're not important enough for expressions of love, and neither is what I'm doing for you." I left her, flabbergasted, staring at me, as I abruptly walked out of her room.
    Truth be told, this was very difficult for me and felt awful, but I was so angry and hurt that I was determined to make sure she understood.
    Yesterday, all day until a little before midnight, I continued. Although we performed all the mechanics of her day, I was determined to make sure everything she experienced was more than matter-of-fact; I went out of my way to imbue everything with an air of unimportance. I kept myself from making eye contact with her. I didn't bother to explain anything. I hurried. I pushed. I ordered. I feigned impatience when she was too slow for me or balking. I reminded her over and over and over that our life together "wasn't important", thus, there was no reason not to be perfunctory about everything.
    Interestingly, I've never received so many expressions of gratitude from her as I did yesterday and, believe me, saying thank-you is automatic for her, anyway. So, after breakfast I decided to make yet another point. I presented her with a notebook and pen. "Mom," I said, "every time you feel you want to thank me for something, I want you to write down the 'thank you' in this notebook and indicate which of your other daughters you want to thank for leading very important lives in the light of which our unimportant lives are allowed to be persevered as afterthoughts."
    She stared back at me in disbelief. She was beginning to get the point. Finally, after a served-like-it-meant-nothing supper during which I ate in the kitchen because, you know, it isn't necessary for us to eat together, where I eat in relation to her is unimportant, she relented. As I was removing her plate and utensils from her TV table in the living room she said, "Sit down, child."
    I sat.
    "I'm sorry," she began. "You're absolutely right. What you do for me is important. It's important to me that you're here. The way you do things is important. The fact that you're here is important. You're important. To me."
    Needless to say, by the time she finished I was in tears. "You forgot one thing, Mom. You're important, too. That's why I'm here. I'm not saying that you're more important to me than my life in Seattle was. That's not the point. That's not why I'm here. I tried to have us be together in Seattle but you were too miserable there and I knew that you were too important to me to make you suffer the weather just so I could be where I liked, and I knew, too, that I was much more comfortable in Arizona than you would ever be in Seattle. I didn't 'abandon' my life there. I didn't think it wasn't important. It still is important to me. My heart is still there, and my heart is still completely invested in my solitary life."
    "I know," she said, a little watery eyed, herself. "I knew that then. I didn't ask you to live with me because I didn't think you weren't doing anything important. I'm sorry it looked that way."
    "Mom, the thing is," I said, trying, more, to explain this to myself than to her, "we live in time and place, here, as humans, and at some points we have to arrange things in time and place so that we can fit in all the things and people that are important to us. I haven't stopped doing what I did in Seattle. I haven't stopped surviving on my terms, and developing, and exploring, and seeking solitude in order to do that in my own special way. I haven't even left Seattle, really."
    "I know. I see that in you every day."
    "In Seattle, Mom, I was with you, even as you were here. We kept up with each other. Your weekly calls were as important to me as they were to you. It was important to me, when you needed me here, to be here for you. Not more important."
    "As important," she suggested.
    "Yes," I confirmed, "exactly. So, I rearranged things in time and place a little, because it was possible for me to do that. And, when it becomes possible again, I'll rearrange things again."
    That was pretty much where our confrontation, much lengthier than what I wrote but I hit the high points, ended. By that time it was getting on toward midnight. Mom wasn't at all interested in retiring. I found a perfect distraction, a midnight showing of Jesus Christ Superstar. I knew it would intrigue Mom and I was curious to see it again. I was right. We rebonded over the movie...spent a good 20 minutes discussing it afterward.
    The reason I say, a few paragraphs previous, that this was "pretty much" the end of our confrontation is that it came up again when I roused her today (she was already awake) at 1400, the twelve hour mark.
    She'd remembered yesterday clearly. "Are we squared away about yesterday?" she asked.
    I laughed. Then, I sobered. "Yeah, we are. But, Mom, one way or another, I'm going to continue to remind you that husbands and children and careers and busy-busy lives do not necessarily make 'more important' lives. Beleive me, I had to learn this the hard way after coming here to take care of you. I spent the first several years constantly downplaying the importance of your and my lives to everyone, not just family, but everyone. I finally realized I was not only being unfair to you and me but was belittling and hurting both of us. So, I'm not going to go easy on you, anymore, when you slip into that 'we're not important' area. Look, I know that it is impossible for you not to consider your other daughter's lives important, and I don't want you to resent them, or anything like that. I want you to continue to hold them all in high esteem. But, I'm not going to let you belittle us, anymore, either. And I'm certainly not going to let you belittle me, or you. Your life is not unimportant. Neither is mine. I didn't respond to your desire to have me with you because I thought my life was unimportant. I did it because I wanted to expand my very important life to include yours the way you wanted me to. You were, and are, important to me, too. And, if I am ever again hurt by any attempts by you to belittle me, or you, or what I'm doing here, or what you're doing, I'm going to fight back, again, until you get it, again."
    "Good," she said. "Do that. Sometimes I need to be reminded of things like that. I'm glad you're here."
    "That's why I'm here, Mom. That's why I'm here."

    There is a moral to this story. Don't be afraid of Dementia-Lite when it comes to asserting such things as necessary amounts of self-esteem and self-importance. Don't assume that Dementia-Lite stands in the way of your loved one understanding and dealing successfully with your legitimate expressions of anger and hurt. Don't assume that Dementia-Lite will keep your loved one from reevaluating the importance of her own life or the importance of yours, especially as it relates to hers. Don't assume anything about Dementia-Lite until you've had it proven to you through experience. You might be surprised at how flexible the state of Dementia-Lite can be.