“My mom is in the hospital. I feel so lost.”
Those were my thoughts over the last few days. My amazing mother, 95 years old, was hospitalized with an infection. She has dementia so the hospital allowed me to be her support person while she was there. She has been living in a wonderful memory care facility that set up a strict no visitor policy at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak and they have had no positive cases at all. However, I was used to seeing her weekly so I was already worried and stressed. I had not seen her for about 2 1/2 months prior to this. She had recently stopped eating and I feared the day when I got the call that she was gone. I didn’t want her to go without the chance to say goodbye. Silly, I know, since it was really more about how I felt, but I still felt it.
Dad was a Navy officer so we moved every two years for my entire childhood. I went to a different school every year. But I never felt scared in a new place because Mom always made our new house a loving home. When Dad was deployed to Vietnam for a year, she was strong and we felt her strength. She had three of us to care for, register in school, get to activities, cook for, and generally be our support. My oldest brother was a bit of a wild child, my middle brother is a quiet person who can be difficult to read sometimes, and me – the youngest – was blissfully unaware of how hard it must have been for her. I had my ballet lessons, Girl Scouts, and swim team. My mother made it all look easy, but now I can only imagine what it was like.
Despite all of the effort she put into our physical and emotional well-being, my mother has lived an incredible life. She took painting classes, tennis lessons, and swam laps as often as possible. She volunteered for the Red Cross, the local art societies, and the Navy Relief. At 50, she got Scuba certified and dove in some exotic locations. She went to Africa and Belize as a water safety instructor. She occasionally pulled me and a friend out of school to go snorkeling and tide-pooling. She believed in hands-on learning. She was also my Sunday School teacher one year and we learned about life in Biblical times while discussing the philosophy of Jesus. While we lived in Okinawa, mom took Japanese classes and brought my brother and me to India and Nepal for an adventure. My father was transferred to Korea and The Hague later in his career and she embraced each country she entered. After Dad retired they went to China and Russia where they were able to visit among the real people, not just landmarks and museums. The highlight of these adventures was their 21-day sail across the Pacific Ocean in a 42-foot boat. Mom had a full medical kit onboard and I’m pretty sure she could perform open-heart surgery if she had to. Mom kept journals with pen and ink drawings and I have found short stories she wrote for her grandchildren.
This is the mother I remember. When I saw her in the hospital bed, so small and fragile, I was shocked. She looked nothing like herself. Over the days I was there, I combed her hair, trimmed and cleaned her nails, and held her hand. She did know who I was, so that was a relief.
In the hospital, her amazing nurse Caroline could see how close we were, so she cared for me too, in a way. She let me tell her about Mom’s adventures and when I showed her a picture of Mom in New Zealand, Caroline said that was how she would remember my mother. As I got to know Caroline, I wanted to know how she was holding up personally. She told me she worried about bringing illness home to her family, but that her work was comforting to her and she was glad to be of help. This woman, while bearing tremendous concern for her own people, was treating my mother as if she were part of her own family. I don’t know if I would be this brave, and once again, I feel humbled by our front line workers. I hope anyone reading this doesn’t have to experience having a loved one in the hospital, but if you do, please tell the care team how much you appreciate them. We can hashtag and post all day long, but telling someone to their face means more.
Helster777 