Mom & Me Four Archive

    As it turns out, regarding most aspects, I am. I'm having one huge related problem, though, through which I need to work and I'm not sure how to do it. The thought of having to approach this problem yet again, is making me so crazy I actually cried when I was contemplating it, last night.
    I ran across a great article at Medscape last night, The Last Hours of Living: Practical Advice for Clinicians. The link will take you to the outline of the article. You will need to register for Medscape usage if you want to access the entire article. If you're a caregiver to an Ancient or Infirm one and expect to be with that person for the rest of their life, it would be a good idea of you registered. It is a CME article, which means it is designed to help physicians prepare for regular certification exams, thus, my guess is that you need to register as a physician or other type of clinician. Don't freak. At the time I registered, official proof that you're a certified medical professional wasn't necessary, you just claimed it for yourself. I assume this continues to be true.
    The article contains information about the processes of "normal" death, both the "usual road" and the "difficult road". It lays out detailed descriptions of what the dying one goes through, how it looks to observers, what is happening internally, explains most of the medical terminology used to describe the processes, gives advice on procedures and treatments that will comfort the dying one and counsels medical professionals on how to react to the dying one and the dying one's caregivers, who are expected to be present during the process, as well as what attitudes to expect, negotiate and encourage in onlookers and in oneself as a medical professional. As well, it gives a great deal of miscellaneous information about the definition of "normal death", such as, for instance, that less than 10% of us die "unexpectedly". Most of us experience gradual deterioration leading up to the what the article calls "the active dying phase". It also cautions medical professionals that "there is no second chance to get it right."
    I had no problem with the detailed, illustrated (with videos, tables, graphs and pictures) article. As I read through it, though, I realized that it would, indeed, be a good idea for me to seek a PCP for Mom here in the Prescott area, since this is most likely where she will die. This is what caused my anxiety. It brought forward the overwhelmingly negative, frustrating experiences I've had since I naively realized that I needed to become my mother's medical advocate several years ago and timidly slipped, toes first, into the cold, turbulent waters of caregiver medical management.
    There are times, like last night, when I wish I had never thought to question how Medicine deals with my mother. It would have been so much easier if I'd simply backed off and and said, "Yes, yes, yes," to anything and everything Medicine wanted to believe about my mother and wanted to do to my mother. Of course, she'd probably be dead, now, but I doubt that I'd have any guilt over this, as, ignorance is bliss. As well, if she was still alive, we'd have a physician up here and I'd have copacetic relationships with all medical facilities and people with whom she came into contact. Of course, knowing my mother's attitude toward Medicine, she would have fought many of the treatments, procedures, diagnoses and prognoses like a she-demon, but Medicine and I would have chalked this up to her dementia and, one way or another, either by arguing her into compliance or legally overruling her through health care proxy, Medicine, and I as its accomplice, would be having our way with her. Any anxiety I would have experienced during the process of overruling her would quickly dissipate in the repeated Medical Mantra offered to me at every point along the way, "We know what's best."
    This isn't what happened, though. Now, I am caught naked in the the glare of my harrowing experiences of managing her medical experiences, which include several unsuccessful attempts to secure adequate, gentle, understanding, cooperative medical care for her in Prescott. I can clearly see that I need to reinitiate this process and I am so overwhelmed by the possibility that all I can do, at the moment, is shiver and wail, which I'm allowing to happen, in the hopes that I'll move through this phase with the optimistic fortitude to apply myself assiduously to what now needs to be done.
    As I've mentioned previously in both the journals and the essays compiled in this collection of sites, I never meant to be here. Going into this, my resolve was that I would leave Medicine to Medicine and simply be Mom's medical chauffeur. I didn't know much about Medicine and I didn't want to. Damn, my observant, analytical brain and my sympathetic heart, that I wasn't able to allow this to happen. Now, I see, we're in a hell of a fix, Mom and me, and I'm not sure how to ignore the awful taste Medicine has left at the back of my throat and negotiate a fresh, promising relationship.
    Despite my anxiety, and my discouragement, and my low hopes for the renewal of this process, I am, of course, determined to work my way through this dilemma. I know better, now, though, than to think that one's experience, at least in the Medical arena, mirrors one's expectations. I never, ever expected what we've been through. I never, ever could have. I've even, throughout the last several years of Medicine's increasing encroachment into my mother's life, tried to repeatedly (and unreasonably, considering our numerous, absurd experiences) reestablish guileless trust in Medicine. Almost all my attempts have been betrayed.
    Time to face it all once more.
    Shaking head. Closing eyes. Trying to swallow lump in throat. Sobbing under my breath.
    Time to awaken the Mom. I'll label this post...
    ...later.