Am feeling especially blessed right now that John & I were always aware of & grateful for our elderly mothers aging as well as they did. At least, it felt that way to us. What a blessing that both of us felt their need for our attention, their often unpredictable pull on our time & energies, as an honor, rather than onerous.
Was just reading this morning about how challenging it can be for older people to feel outpaced by younger family members, friends, associates. Which got me thinking about when Peter & Mim invited Mom to join them on a visit down to see her grandson, Reynolds, in North Carolina. They were leaving late at night, staying for about a day, then driving back.
It was a lovely invitation. She was honored that they'd asked, but there was no way that she could go. The time dynamics of the trip were totally out of whack with her physical realities.
The invitation gave Mom pause. She wondered out loud, "Why did I feel like it was impossible to go down to see Reynolds, who I'd dearly love to visit, but didn't think anything about going with you all the way to & from Disneyworld last year?"
That was an easy answer. Everything about our 1997 trip to EPCOT & the Magic Kingdom took her realities into account. She'd never realized how much the trip was tailored to minimalizing the effects of her limitations.
It was no mere happenstance that we never left Wilderness Lodge - or the Heritage Inn or Plantation Manor - until 10:00 a.m., never returned until 11:00 p.m. at the earliest, after a nightcap at the Territory Lounge. Sank a small fortune into staying in that glorious "lodge" so Mom could experience Disneyworld just sitting in the lobby, didn't have to venture out to other parks. Ha! She seemed unstoppable!
Afterwards, we spent three or four days with Bob & Lois at their lovely home near Orlando, where Mom could just kick back, utterly relax & be waited on, hand & foot, by three adoring youngers.
We moseyed our way home - up through Central Florida, meeting friends at Atlanta's Buckhead Diner, staying in the Smoky Mountains, meandering around Asheville, heading up to Abingdon VA & the longest stretch - the last - to John waiting for us at Squirrel Haven.
Martha Washington Inn, Abingdon
Neither John nor I thought twice about adjusting our schedules to meet the limitations of our parents. It wasn't any big sacrifice on our parts. It never occurred to us.
Of course, there were things we couldn't do with Mom living with us. First & foremost was never being able to safely distance myself from my siblings, who by 1997 didn't bother concealing how they felt about me. And there was the loss of privacy - neither of us grunted or grumbled when she moved in with us, less than a year after we married. It was the only workable option; she balked at moving to Australia, where Mike & Kerry would have welcomed her with open arms, and had neither the money (the money Dad left was lost due to her executor's poor investing) nor the will to live on her own. Never occurred to me until now that John & I took it in stride & adjusted.
When I think about friends who are brought low trying to figure out how to fit a parent's changing needs within their own established routines & professional and/or personal commitments... Well, I appreciate how much we avoided the 2-edged sword of meeting our needs or theirs. Maybe we expected to be inconvenienced. I guess that's what it comes down to - we weren't put out by the bother, the distractions, the frustrations because for some reason we both expected they might come up.
More & more, it strikes me that the gentlest of the Ten Commandments might be the toughest to follow - honor your father & your mother. Forget the HUGE challenge for those children who have a difficult relationship with one or both parents. What do you do when something that benefits an elderly parent is going to cause inconvenience, even mega problems for you & yours? Is it better for a parent to be easier to manage or children to learn to roll with the distractions? When does silence become silenced? And is that question even an issue?
I feel for my friends dealing with these issues, facing so heart-aching choices in figuring out what's best for a parent facing the challenges of declining physical & mental health, balancing that with what works for them. This is why we need more of a community gathered around our elderly & aged, not that it will ever replace a child's love & attention.
Who knew that honor your father & your mother could turn out to be such a sharply honed 2-edged sword?
No comments:
Post a Comment