Quest of the Goose

The days following my mother's death have been turbulent. I have struggled to keep my balance; it has not been easy and I've failed miserably sometimes.

But such is the way of it. Grief knows no bounds, it is very like the waves of Ocean that crash to the beach. Some waves are bigger than others, and they must be ridden out. During the first few days, the waves are usually large, dark and stormy, full of debris.

As time goes on, those waves grow slower, gentler...more accepting. And here is where I find some serenity, when my heart has ridden out those destructive first waves of grief.

Early this morning, before Sun had risen over the treetops, Goose flew over, at the head of a long V formation. Wings tipped with gold, from Sun that had not yet shown his face to the rest of us, Grandmother Goose led the flock to the West...the place of rebirth on the Medicine Wheel. The West direction tells me of my responsibility to all things...and to each other. West is the direction of Wisdom.

It is a week since my mother died. As I sat on my stoop, in the early Morning stillness, I sent blessings with Goose...and thanked her for her message.

Grandmother Goose teaches how to navigate great turbulence in life. She tells me it is time for an inner quest, one where I learn, once again, that I can change nothing in others, only in myself. It is a difficult lesson for me to learn, seemingly, since I am caught up in it consistently.

She tells me of loyalty and how sometimes, loyalty can blind me to the true facts. She's also telling me this is all part of the journey of life; that I have the tools and abilities to make it through.

And suddenly, my intuition tells me I do.

It is a blinding realization.

Have I ever entered any traumatic situation as well-balanced and with as many tools as I have been given in this one? Recognizable tools?

I think I am making progress. I think my studies of messages given from the Universe are bearing fruit. Fruit that is still in the ripening stage, granted; however, I have faced family disruption these last few days with relative calm.

Families that lose the last surviving parent can go into free fall, I was told by a nurse last week. Instead of pulling together, siblings tear each other apart. That is the situation that occurred in my family last week. But it was not just my mother's death that brought about the strife, which is not new...it has always been thus.

Will that last unfortunate blowout be the end of it? I don't think so. I think each member of my family still wants to be heard, wants to be validated. I think each sibling is still clamouring for Mom's attention. And I think my mother wanted it that way, during her convoluted life.

My mother and I grew close, during the last couple of years. We grew close because I would not get involved in the strife that fueled my Mom and her daughters; I would change the subject, talk about other things. In that way, I made a conscious decision to ignore the bad and embrace the good about my mother.

My mother gradually realized the error of her ways, when she entered the Care Residence. She then had contact with others who did not believe in stirring strife in family members, for attention and diversion. But for my mother, that epiphany came too late...after a lifetime of pushing painful buttons in each daughter, only distrust met her overtures of love and apology.

And it seems only distrust remains.

But it is early days yet. My eternal flame of optimism lets me fantasize that her daughters will see that Mom tried, towards the end of her life, to walk a loving, gentle path, instead of the torturous, mountainous route she had chosen most of her life. Unfortunately, she made a Will, in an angry state, that continues to fuel the fray...one that controls generations not yet born. One that pits children against parents, one that will continue to remind her family of a mother that used control and anger and manipulation to bring her daughters in line.

Hours before her death, she asked me to write a book about her...Make them understand, she said. It is an enormous request, one that will take me on a journey that will follow my mother's life, one that will take me into a tortured mind.

And at the end of it, perhaps I will understand.

Grandmother Goose, with her message of the great quest to come, tells me I will.

Digging Up the Back Forty

Every once in awhile, the only way I can deal with anxiety is to dig. When I comment that I am going outside to "dig the back forty" people who know me are aware that I am hugely overwhelmed.

I can't dig as well or as long as I used to. Aches and pains get in the way. Besides which, the back lawn, which now takes the place of the "back forty", is covered in six inches of snow at the moment, or it is raining outside or there is a wind chill of many minus degrees. So I pace.

I have worn a path in the floor in the living room from trying to expend excess negative energy that stems from trying to make nurses, careworkers and government officials see united sense about my mother's care.

During these many bouts of pacing, I find once I've found a solution, I can put that particular problem to rest. But during the last while, once one dilemma is solved, another crops up...and then, sometimes there are so many complications, I don't know which one to choose to unravel.

I attempt to still my mind, to find my centre. To take each convoluted thought and painstakingly smooth out its path...

My mother's care is the biggest conundrum. There are so many people involved in her care, each one having a different view of the reality involved.

She can't walk.

She doesn't know how to use her powered wheelchair, with an oxygen tube attached to her nostrils.

She can't stand for long enough to transfer herself from chair to chair.

She is confused, falling further and further into senile dementia.

Any activity of any kind tires her to where she has trouble speaking. She has one infection after another. And yet, she has managed to convince others who have power that she knows of what she speaks...leaving no prisoners in her quest to go home.

So the family begins a kind of dance.

The prognosis by her doctor for my mom to live at home, largely by herself, is not good. Each person, her daughters included, after having spoken with Mom, comes out of her room feeling differently than the other...

All this makes for much discussion amongst the professionals and Mom's family. I think about many different viewpoints, as I pace.

And what is my hope for Mom? I see her, through my admittedly only 55 year old rose- coloured glasses, being cared for, in a room with the morning sun streaming in. I see her sitting in her favourite recliner, in a room where there are many aids to health and help within easy reach. I see her living her remaining time in reflection, without the incessant fear that has plagued her all her life. I see her sitting in her chair, watching the gardens flower...the gardens that surround a care home.

My viewpoint is admittedly selfish. I no longer want to receive telephone calls from my Mom, where she begs me to find help for her. I no longer want to feel so helpless, from those breathless calls. I no longer want my body to tense each time the telephone rings, especially if it is at night. I live at least 3/4 of an hour away from my Mom.

I have no experience with picking up a body that becomes limp and unresponsive. Even if my body allowed me to. When she falls, I have the most horrendously helpless feeling...this is my Mother that is lying at my feet. So I will push my body to its limits, trying to help her up. This has happened to me a couple of times...it has occurred many different times, with others. But Mom expects the help, and always manages to convince the helper to do it.

And Mom expects to go home. She has the right to live at risk, I tell myself. I would leave her be, to do as she likes, if she could only do it. Mom's spirit is willing; her body is failing. And she is afraid of recognizing it, of accepting it, as so many of us are, when we reach the last mile or so on the path of life.

Mom recognizes too, that her memory is failing, that one day is blending into the next. She counts, does my mother. She counts the days on her calendar; she counts the hours on the clock. She asks which day it is, over and over. She struggles to grasp and remember the day and sometimes, she's successful. But, increasingly, she's not.

But she has not forgotten that she wants to go home...she just does not remember the horrible times she had just so very recently, when she was home. And since this memory is not allowed to surface, she chooses, instead, to remember a time when she was able.

This is the memory that urges her to go home.

But the other memory...that is the one that makes me pace.

Power of Attorney

Sometimes, in the middle of crisis, my thinking, logical side... never very developed ...shuts down completely. My emotional body takes over and I have difficulty remaining balanced.

At times like these, I am thankful for my friends...I need the thinking minds, unclouded by the emotional storm of my personal life, to give me directions.

Dirty Butter, Chris, Shaman Maggie and so many others have given me that direction in many different areas. But the one item that I forgot has me stymied...but it is only a setback.

Not one of us has full Power of Attorney or Representation Agreement for health care for my mother. The reason things went relatively smoothly with my father-in-law is because we had that particular document. I am a former legal secretary; I know how important this document is. It is ingrained in me.

I allowed my mother to continually tell me that this would be too "invasive" for her. She could not make up her mind; she would not agree, saying she didn't require it, even after the information was explained to her in a very simple way. The times weren't dire; she was managing...and time went on. I still could not convince her. And here I am.

The medical people aren't required to speak to me...or anyone else, other than my mother. The fact that she's confused makes no difference. Without that document protecting her, my mother makes decisions that are potentially dangerous. And even if I do get an appointment with her doctor, unless Mom gives express permission...he does not have to divulge full information.

I remember well how many times the Power of Attorney document was used with my aged and confused father-in-law. I was given proxy, in my ex-husband's absence, and I made many decisions with Specialists, Nurses and Home Care regarding his care. They all spoke with me, the information that was given was detailed and easily couched in layman's terms.

But I forgot, in the raging river rapids I found myself in with my mother, that I had that all-important paper, when I dealt with my father-in-law.

It is an important lesson.

This is what can happen to me, when I let unbalanced bodies full reign. I realized, quite early on in my care of my mother, that I would have to research the laws on Power of Attorney. The laws changed shortly after I left the legal field. But I let the opportunity pass, lulled by week after week of no problems arising.

With Wind howling outside at 90 km, my thinking is becoming clearer...not so awash with watery emotion. I needed to have silence; I needed the calm that meditation induces within me...the balance. This brings the peace, the quiet within the storm. And within this peace, I connect with all the energies available to me...I contact the Source.

There is no way that I can tell you how strength to fight on rebuilds within me, easily overtaking the rampant emotional body, and taking control...smoothing the raging waters.

I have many more tools, now, than before I encount- ered this Storm. I have learned an important lesson, with the help of my guides and my friends. Without my friends, the quietly whispered words that were echoing in my mind...the words Power of Attorney...would not have surfaced.

And my mother, in Canada, has " the right to live at risk". So she may or may not agree, to my desire to help her.

I have to accept either of her choices.

Discharged!

I sit and write this at 5:30 am; after a sleepless night, tossing and turning, and it feels good to finally be up.

My mother was discharged yesterday afternoon. A Nurse called me; the Doctor said there was nothing more to be done...Mom may as well go home. But she would have to be on oxygen, and would be set up with a tank.

I asked the Nurse...how could this be? What was wrong with Mom? She halted in her litany of instructions for Mom's care...and said...Nobody has spoken with you? I said, No. She said that was bizarre.

When Graham and I visited her two days ago, Mom wanted to go home. We assured her that we would take her, when the time came. Mom was still on a catheter, and on oxygen. I tried to find her Nurse; she was unavailable. But I spoke with another, who said she did not know anything about my mother, since she had just arrived on the Ward, but that she would send Mom's Nurse to me when she returned.

Gray and I waited; it became obvious Mom was tiring. Once more I wandered the halls in search of her nurse, once more I had no luck.

My mother seemed slightly better, the swelling in her face had receded a bit; she seemed mostly lucid...but it is hard to tell. Mom's very, very good at hiding her confusion; she presents herself as knowing exactly what she is saying, and she uses manipulation with great success. This is survival to her; she has learned this manner of behavior very well.

As we left, we told her that if she waited until Saturday or Sunday, Graham and I would take her home, if indeed she could be discharged, never believing that she actually would be. But we wanted to give her hope, we did not want to take that away from her, we wanted to leave her with something to look forward to.

As I spoke with her Nurse on the telephone, my mind became blank and my body stilled. I felt nothing...it was as if a flat line was running through my mind. I have felt this way, before, at times. I think it is shock.

Without any notice of any kind to the family of this aged, ill person, my mother arranged for this particular Nurse, when her shift was complete, to return to the hospital and drive her home. The Nurse had arranged Home Care to be there, and Mom had called a neighbour to turn the heat up in her home. Mom refused to let the Nurse call any member of the family, she would not give the telephone number of two other sisters who might have been able to help. The Nurse said she had to beg her for my telephone number.

She had already called my sister...the one who had her number down as contact person. This sister has been battling the flu; she was in bed with a migraine and sore throat. Mom had spread her demented poison well; she used what had worked before...nobody cared and nobody would help. My sister was not even able to take the call; her husband, who at the age of seventy-five and wracked with arthritis, was asked to set up the oxygen tank. He refused, knowing Graham and I had already said we would take her home on the weekend. He believed, as we all did, that the hospital would not discharge my Mom until family members could be there to take her home.

Especially when she was discharged with an oxygen tank, when she lived alone and only received care three times a day, for four or so hours spread over the three visits.

I had the presence of mind to ask...what about food? There was no food in the house...the fridge had been cleaned out. The Nurse paused and said she hadn't thought about that. Would there be a can of soup or something similar that she could eat until I could get there?

I stammered, I was not thinking straight or at all.

The Nurse assured me it was no trouble; Mom wanted to go home and she could not place her in a Taxi, with an oxygen tank. So she would drive her home, set up the tank, and leave her. I was to pick up iron pills, she would give her enough for the weekend. Mom was still in pain, she said, and Mom could no longer live without the oxygen. But Mom had managed to get out of bed by herself, and was as ambulatory as when she had entered hospital. I was to call the Doctor on Monday, if I needed more inform- ation.

I was being rail- roaded and there is no way to tell you how helpless I felt, how lost and without direction.

I asked...But how could my mother manage, how would she be able to maneuver herself when she was attached to an oxygen tank? The Nurse asked if we had thought of care homes. I said...Many, many times, but Mom refused and we cannot place her anywhere without her consent. The Nurse, becoming irritated with the huge complications of what she had assumed to be a simple thing, said...well, if she falls again, she will be back in hospital and then she would have to wait for a long term care bed.

What transpired between the Doctor and my mother? How did she manage to convince him that she was perfectly able to take care of herself? How?

Mom will use any tool...lies, charm and laughter, and careful monitoring of her confused state, to achieve her goal...and her goal was to return home right that minute, no matter what chaos she might cause by doing so. But how can a Doctor not see through this behavior...why did he not ever call us? There is no answer I can see, other than Mom's manipulation of the mind of an educated Physician.

One sister, who had not been called by the hospital, called my mother last night. She was the only one able to talk with gentle sense to my Mom, at this time. I would have called; but my sister called me and told me to take the night off, to rest, to return to the wars tomorrow. I was thankful for this...I did not want to badger my ill mother, and I was afraid I would have, I was afraid I would have lost control through my fear and anxiety for her well-being.

We don't know why she is on oxygen. We don't know anything about her health, other than that the Surgeon did not find anything more than Thrush in her throat. Is she still bleeding internally? Is this why she is on Iron pills?

When my sister called, she said Mom could barely speak, she was so out of breath. She said Mom told her she felt so nauseous and tired. And Mom told her that she was getting tangled in the oxygen lines when she attempted to walk to her wheelchair. My sister tried to tell her she needed twenty- four hour care; Mom refused, saying she knew how to take care of herself...there was no problem.

My sister was right when she told me to distance myself; last night, I had to accept that there was no more I could do to help Mom, if she did not want to help herself and work with us, instead of against us. She has convinced herself we don't care...such a false assumption, I can't even begin to tell you.

My mother, I believe, has finally fallen victim to dementia. Confused before, aged and forgetful, the black cloud of dementia sits on her shoulders now, colouring everything with counterfeit deception.

Once more, I will travel today, once more taking up cudgels on my mother's behalf. Once more, as my mother declines, I will try to convince the caregivers that she is not herself, no matter how well she hides her confusion and illness.

We have decided that we must hire twenty-four hour care for my mother, whether she agrees or not. I will have to make her see, somehow, that she must allow this. She pushes us away, now, in her frightened state. We are suddenly the enemy army.

But I have forged a new relationship, a better one from before, with my mother over the past year. I will use the tools I have in understanding dementia to defuse Mom's protests. I have hope that she will understand, after a night alone, that it is impossible for her to live like this.

But I am left with the questions. What was wrong with Mom in the first place? Did she have a stroke? Why is she suddenly on oxygen? Her breathing was fine before the hospital stay. What happened?

Until the Doctor deigns to speak with us, I have no answers.