Yesterday we got a call from Mom’s distant past. When I was probably 3 to 5 years old we lived in Ithaca, NY while my father got his Master’s Degree from Cornell. I don’t remember a lot from that time, obviously, but I heard stories for all of my life about the wonderful friends my parents made, the fun they shared and what a precious gift my parents had always considered those people and that time in their lives to be.
Yesterday afternoon we got a call from one of those
special people. They had not spoken with my parents in years and their
brilliant Geek Son helped them track my parents down. They didn’t know that my
dad had passed until we talked. They didn’t know that mom has Alzheimer’s until
we talked. They didn’t know that their call would be so magical until we
talked!! After we had chatted a few
minutes I asked them if they would be willing to try and talk to mom. They both
responded delightedly in the positive and I handed over the phone to mom. I
told her who they were as I handed her the phone and she started smiling… she
remembered them!!
I listened to the conversation, but it was watching it
that really touched my heart. I could hear their voices on the phone and then
mom would struggle to find the words to say what she wanted to say. They
listened patiently and, when she paused, they laughed and leapt in with another
tale or comment. Mom’s smile got bigger and more beautiful as the conversation,
one sided as it was, progressed. When she handed the phone back to me about 5
minutes later she was outright giggly! Later, when we went to bed I reminded
her that they had called and she talked about the call for 30 minutes, asking
me over and over again where she knew them from and what was their name… each
time I would tell her, she would pause, smile and say they were always such
wonderful people, just such wonderful
people. After 30 minutes I told her that
I would put her in time out if she didn’t stop giggling and talking so that we
could go to sleep. She giggled again,
and drifted off to sleep with a smile on her face.
The Bad:
This morning, between seeing her throw back her covers on
the monitor and getting down to her room to help her, mom had tried putting on
her house shoes and slipped off the edge of the bed and onto the floor. The bed
is low and the carpet is soft, so she was comfortably stretched out on the
floor when I reached her. I knew I could not get her up by myself and the caregiver was not due to
arrive for a while. I tried calling my very dear neighbor next door who has
helped me before in an emergency, but the answering machine was all I got. So I
tried to get mom up from her back and that didn’t work. I tried rolling her
onto her stomach to get her to her hands and knees, but she couldn’t process
the steps to push up with her hands and get herself onto her knees so she was
trapped on her face. Each time I tried to move her to a different position she
would cry out in panic because she didn’t know what to do for herself and I was
not strong enough to get her up on my own. On the borderline of tears, fearing
that 911 was my only remaining option, I tried my nice neighbor one more time
and when he answered the phone that time, I really did almost cry. He came right over
and, between us, we were able to get her up from a sitting position and onto
her feet, then into her walker chair. Once there, it was easy to tackle the
rest of the day, but getting there was not the way I want to start too many
mornings.
My neighbor stayed until I had mom settled. She took his
hand and chitty chatted with him, laughing and joking while I was trying to
work joints to be sure that she had not hurt herself in sliding off the bed or
rolling on the floor. It’s very difficult to assess the wellbeing of a woman
who is busy flirting with a handsome man at the same time… From which I was
able to determine that she was no worse for the wear after her fall.
Oh… the wonderful man… of course he’s my neighbor. I
cannot say enough about the blessing that all my neighbors have been in the
course of this walk. I really feel like it has become a neighborhood project to
love my mom and help us through this time. I’m glad I’m in a neighborhood
overburdened with loving people!
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