Life Altering Changes



Time has flown in this most recent chapter of my life.  Sometimes I feel like a piece of moss in a river, powerlessly swirling and drifting along the current.  Until one day, I snag on a log, and watch helplessly as the rest of the world evolves while I stay immobilized, stuck in one spot.

So much of my daily activities mirror each other, and I vary my time by finding joy in friends, family and doing creative things I love.  But for my mother and daughter, health has brought life altering changes in a way that having the mundane things in life seem like a blessing.

My mother is losing her mind.  She was diagnosed with early onset Dementia with an eighty percent chance of  morphing into Alzheimer disease.  Two months ago, she was living a nice retirement in her beautiful condo with a view in Issaquah.  She had a healthy pension and money in the bank.  Her days were spent exercising, shopping, creating things and visiting with family and friends.  Today she lives in a Memory Care facility.  Its been nine days since she officially moved in and she is distraught, sad and unhappy.  Her confusion also brings high and low mood swings, emotional outbursts and terrified rants.  She is grieving for her once idyllic life and for her future, which is no longer known. Her memory has become elusive and ebbs in and out like waves of an ocean. I watch her fear and sadness and wish there was something I could do to help her.  I am helpless and scared for her. 

My beautiful daughter's life is sitting on the edge of a precipice.  The Melanoma cancer treatments have had tremendous side effects.  She is struggling now to survive in a way I hoped that I would never see.  My pain for her is intense and I sometimes feel that I cannot bear it.  Yet, she smiles and giggles every day through her physical changes, bravely taking on the radiation that scans her brain.  Her tumors are many and all through her brain and lungs. I see her husband's grief as my own and know it all too well.  The worry and fear in her children's eyes breaks my heart moment by moment. She struggles to physically move and talk.  Her life irrevocably changed for now.   It will take a miracle from God for her to persevere.  I am helpless and scared for her.

Still reeling from my husbands and fathers death, I wonder how much the universe will take from me and if life will ever be calm and at peace again.  I struggle to find my balance.  When I am happy, I feel guilty and yet I am exhausted from the overwhelming sadness.  I dredge up an intangible will to remain strong for them both and hope that life will win for even this moment.






Comments

  1. UnknownDecember 19, 2017 at 4:31 PM

    Sending you strong, beautiful white light to help you. I am a nurse. I was the final caregiver for both of my parents, one from cancer, one from Parkinson's dementia. During the process I was often so grateful that I had my professional experience to lend me guidance and confidence. As a nurse, I have seen the tremendous toll that is placed upon the loved ones; the caregivers. As a friend, I have witnessed many times my friends assuming the role of caregiver and health care advocate. It changes your life forever. I am in awe when I watch families and friends take on this responsibility. Not everyone can be that caretaker.

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    Replies
    1. anitrasimmonsDecember 22, 2017 at 10:05 PM

      Thank you Bobbi for your kindness and empathetic words. I was alone in my battle against GBM with my husband. I outline the struggles I encountered in my book coming out January 20th, Embracing Life from Death. I could not rely on our medical system with his terminal disease as they were burying him before he had taken one pill. I was his only advocate. It inspired me to write the book to help other caregivers who are going through the same situation.

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