laughing as memory

My mother hardly eats, I eat a lot. Well, maybe not that much, as I haven't noticed my pants getter tighter or my belly exploding over my belt...but "a lot" in comparison to Mom. While Mom's meals come to her every 4-5 hours because I've helped place an order the day before, mine have no such self-propulsion. Instead, I work with an empty refrigerator and no energy to go to the store and shop and then the reality that, even if I made it to the store, I'm not sure I could decide what to eat, what to buy. So, my meals consist of "snacks"--potent little bites of protein and carbohydrates.

There's something about entering Mom's building, the Mirabella, that bleeds my energy level--like when I give my keys to the valet and head for the elevator, chances are that when I reach the second floor, the Medical Center, there's going to be a migraine headache brooding in the base of my skull and a low glucose level that threatens to be debilitating. I've tried to stave this off by bringing little mini-meals with me--things I can easily eat while sitting on the edge of Mom's bed and carrying on a conversation with whoever--Mom's therapists, Mom's caregiver or Mom herself. So miniature egg salad sandwiches come sealed in cellophane and Ziploc bags and wedges of cheddar and Emmentaler cheese are safely stowed for emergency snacking. Reading what I've just written, you'd think I have a fetish about food, but really I'm just trying to find ways to make it through the day with Mom. The hours are long and all this sitting and observing and worrying takes stamina. This I know for sure.

Today was a mixed day--hysteria in the morning and calm good humor in the afternoon. It has been seven days since Mom has had a bowel movement...so the morning is spent trying to encourage this most natural operation to occur. Despite a mixture of prune juice and Milkamagnesia on Saturday (quite a potent cocktail) and Senna tablets on Sunday and Monday, nothing had emerged from Mom's large and small intestines. Scott, Mom's nurse practitioner, reasons that Mom may have what is called a "neurogenic bladder" where the nerves in the small intestine have been damaged by the stroke and hence do not function to encourage the body to dispose of waste. Or, it could just be the pain pills Mom is on--these can cause constipation, I am told. Really, I had no idea how many ways a "wet stroke" (brain bleed due to amyloid angiopathy) could impact the body's functioning. Walking and use of one's hands are just a part of the entire damage.

While Mom is writhing in pain over the plugged intestine, she's entered a world of her own, one where closed eye lids and tears are standard operating procedure. There's nothing reaching Mom--she's not in "good humor" as Lorna relates. By the time lunch comes, however--tuna sandwich on whole wheat--she's calmed down a bit but takes only a few bites. Fortunately, two massive bowel movements over the lunch hour do the trick.

It's an 85 degree day so after lunch I take Mom for a spin around the environs outside of Mirabella. Everything is new, because Mom still has no memory for our Sunday outing. I take her to the park adjacent to the Seattle Times building and today the fountain is on--a fascinating contraption made of rough-chiseled boulders and plunging water--the sound is both deafening and inviting. Around us is early rush hour traffic, cars in a hurry to be somewhere fast. The contrast is inevitable--Mom's inability to go anywhere and these cars that escape to the suburbs within minutes of downtown. We sit here for the longest time--no need to be back until Peggy sees Mom at 5:00. And we do just sit--Mom in her wheelchair and me resting my arms and upper body on the side-rails of her chair, wanting to be close in case Mom should decide to speak. I want the proximity, thinking that face distance apart might be close enough for Mom and me--close enough to keep me here, linked to what is left of my mom. So I cock my neck to the right, exposing my left ear to Mom's speaking self, and hope that I can hear well enough to decipher Mom's needs. We sit here in the quasi-silence, quasi because there is little that is truly silent about the city--trucks snagging their brakes, people hollering across the street, sirens waling off of Denny. Lots of urban noise....but it is a different kind of sound than Mirabella presents--louder but at the same time more vibrant, more reassuring of life. After all, isn't this all "normal"--all the noises that make up an ordinary work-a-day life? So, unlike the time Mom has spent for the last ten days, this glimpse into the "out-of-doors" suggests a life after this, a respite from the grim push and pull of death. Mom must be glad of this.

The longer we sit, the more we are required to gaze at what's really here--the Sumac trees shading the park, the cinder-gravel walkways that attract many a mid-day walker as they make there way between the Seattle Times and the parking across the street. We sit and take this in. I believe in stillness, absence of sound. Silence can be a good thing--forces me to re-orientate. Sitting here, it is impossible to not consider my own body as just a minor cog in the mechanism of life. I wonder then if Mom feels this too. I don't know how to ask her, as the ideas seems to amorphous, ephemeral. So I keep still and just think these thoughts, hoping for some kind of telepathy.

When we finally return to Mirabella, Mom seems ready for therapy--a long ways from where she was earlier this morning. Becky seems ready also, and gets right to the task of lessening Mom's shoulder tilt and the pronounced tone that is bending her neck to her right shoulder. She sits on the left side of Mom and reaches around her right side, placing her palm on the side of Mom's neck and head. I can see Becky's biceps working hard, as the pressure it takes to bend Mom's neck to the left is immense. We do this for at least five minutes....and when Becky releases Mom's neck, the transformation is miraculous: Mom is semi-sitting-up straight. It's the first time I've seen her look relatively "normal' since the stroke. Becky repeats this three times before moving on to the cones: the yellow, red and orange plastic cones that Mom is asked to move from her lap to Becky's hand and then back again. Oddly, when she's first asked, Mom actually uses her hands to reach for the cone. But then, after three repetitions, her "thinking self" reasserts itself. For Mom, her best activity occurs when she is not thinking or concentrating on a particular task and instead lets the instinctual self take over. My understanding is that this is the path of recovery from a strike--reminding the brain of new routes connecting the brain to familiar movements of the body. This seems at odds, in part, to the idea that Mom needs time to focus and concentrate on what she is doing, so I am not sure how to rectify these two extremes. In any event, Mom's intuitive, instinctual self is in tact....it's the other more intentional self who is at odds.

Mom is in good spirit, chatting away with Peggy about family vacations. Becky asks where Mom has traveled and Mom can't remember any of the Italian cities--not even Venice and Rome and Florence. I reveal a family secret to Becky, then--the story of Mom and I eating an entire "Torte della Nonna" on a trip to Florence. Nun's Torte, the English translation, is heavenly--a vanilla cream concoction with Italian pastry crust (all butter) and whole bleached almonds smothering the upper crust of the pie. Our favorite bakery off of the Pont Vechhio doesn't make this everyday, so one has to plan ahead; some days they will not sell us a slice and we are faced with the difficult decision to forgo our treat or immerse ourselves in a caloric OD.

All three of us giggle then, at the mention of this "sin"--an explosive, infectious sound that is hesitant to leave our circle of three. The prickled happy edges of our laughter draw looks from the other tenants in our therapy room--therapy is a serious matter, afterall. Mom's laugh, in particular, is sweetly resonant--hovers her lips as if she hasn't a care in the world, not in a hurry to be anywhere else but here. It lifts up the corners of Mom's mouth, blooming a smile I haven't seen in years.

This is what I want to remember about Mom.

Deeply, a mother's daughter
--this is alifewithmom--


When finally it's time to go, Lorna wheels Mom back to the center-line of her project, afraid that she may not be able to handle Mom by herself.