When We Moved Mom Into A Nursing Home

 I unlocked the door to my father’s apartment and sailed in, carrying plastic tubs of chicken, salad and a carton of creamy vanilla desert.

“Ah,” Dad said, from the kitchen, where he was squeezing orange juice.  “I see the meals on wheels has arrived.”

I laughed, packing the containers into the fridge.    “Ygh!” I sniffed.  “What’s this?  Can’t you smell ?”  Gingerly I opened a container and found a rotten fish-head that had known better days.  “Daddy it’s revolting!  You have to throw out the stuff that’s bad!”

I felt a flash of molten heat, as if a surge of adrenaline had caught fire in me.  I pulled at my sweater by the neck. “Air, there’s no air.  Why do you close all the windows?”  I ran to the kitchen and opened the window. 

“What do you mean, ‘no air,” my father retorted.  “There’s too much air in this place!”  Pushing the sliding verandah door open a crack, he pulled up the little blanket he kept draped over his legs.” 

I helped myself to a glass of Diet Coke and drank fast to quench the fire.  I’d been reading a book about menopause that said the hot flush signified a ‘release of kundalini energy – a cosmic creative energy’ that activated the chakras or energy centers.  “Kundalini energy,” I thought, savoring the words, “chakras!”  I told myself I was a ‘Red Hot Mama’ but it didn’t make the heat any more bearable.

“I don’t remember your mother having hot flushes,” Dad remarked. 

“It wasn’t something she’d have talked about, Daddy.  In her day, women didn’t.”

“Well, I don’t remember anything special about her menopause,” he said.

Madonna was singing “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” on television.   “Your mother loved that show,” Dad said, his face puckering.  He wiped his eyes.

“Now don’t get all upset …”

“She loved it… with her whole soul.”

I patted his hand.  “Oh, Daddy…”

Dad had been living alone since Mom had died. Before this, she’d been in a “Home” for people with dementia. It broke our hearts to put her into care, and three years after her death, we still tortured ourselves over our decision. 

 “When Mommy had her stroke…” I said.

Dad fixed his eyes on the television, but his eyes were red.

“You called just as we were getting ready for bed, to come, quickly, because Mommy had fallen on you and you couldn’t get her up.”

Dad frowned, “But I did get her up.”

“You did?  But I remember Sam and you… I remember how  uncoordinated she was… like a beached whale.  And how we shlepped her —.”

“The three of us.  You, Sam…”

I remembered how Mom had not been able to cooperate.  “Bend your leg,” I said, guiding her with my hand.  But she didn't even seem to know where her leg was. 

“Mommy, you’ve got to help us.  Pull your legs in.  Like this,” I kneeled on the floor and strained.

Dad panted: “She’s so bloody heavy. I can’t —.”

“Sam," I told my husband, "take one arm.  Dad, you take the other.”  Somehow we draped her over an armchair and lifted her onto it.  She was a dead weight.   We stood next to her, gasping.  Sam brought water and I tried to persuade my mother to drink. Between the three of us, we dragged her to her bed.

When we caught our breath, Dad demonstrated how Mom had fallen.  "We were both reaching for the telephone when she slipped and fell practically on top of me!" 

Suddenly we heard a faint call: “Gerry!” We rushed back to her room, to find Mom on the floor again.

“Why did you try to get up?” Dad demanded.

She tried to speak, but her voice was faint.    Dad put his ear to her mouth.  “She needs the toilet.”  We supported her to the bathroom and sat her down; staying with her while she emptied her bladder.  She was crying. Somehow, we got her back to bed.

I called the doctor, who asked pointed questions.  No, she wasn’t unconscious.  A little vague, but that could be from the shock.  Uncoordinated. Could it be a stroke? Should we get her to a hospital? 

The doctor suggested that we let her sleep, and he’d come in the morning.   For the moment, he didn’t think there was anything to be gained from traumatizing her further.

Sam, Gerry and I, rehashed the events of the evening over and over, trying to absorb this new reality.  Pale and trembling, his eyes swimming, Dad shook his head.  “Your mother needs full-time care,” he said.  “She keeps falling and I can't keep picking her up . She's too heavy. This is killing me.”

There was another thump.  "Oy!" Fearfully, we ran to the bedroom where we heard grunting. Mom was on the floor of the bathroom.

“Oh God,” I cried, overwhelmed and exhausted, “Why didn’t you call?”

Mom looked confused.

Dad scratched his head, “I can’t—.”

 “Maybe we should just leave her on the floor?” We looked at each other glumly.  “What do you think?”

Nodding, Dad fetched a duvet and we eased it under Mom's torso.  I squashed a pillow under her head.  Mom, who was worn out from all the pulling and shoving,  didn’t protest.

“At least you won’t fall from here,” I said, wedging her into a secure position.  Anxiety and exhaustion were taking their toll. “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” I said to Sam.

“Sam, you go home now.” I suggested.  “I’ll stay with my mother.” 

But Dad wouldn't have it.  “Go with your husband.  It’s not right that he should be alone.”  He hugged me  “I don’t know what I would do without the two of you.”  His eyes were full again. “I have to get some sleep.” 

By five the next morning, I was back.  I didn’t want the doctor to question how we could leave on the floor overnight! 

 “So, how’s she?” I asked my father.

“Dunno.  She’s not talking.”

“What do you mean, not talking?” I ran to the bathroom.  When I saw my mother, sprawled on the carpet, soaking with urine and smelling of ammonia, I burst into tears.   

“Oh Mommy, I’m sorry, Mommy, I’m so sorry.”   I fetched a scissors from the kitchen, and eyes flooded with tears, I cut the wet nightdress and peeled it off her.  Tenderly, Dad sponged and we toweled her dry.   Dad eased on her panties.   “Bugger the bra,” I said, slipping a loose house-dress over my mother’s head. 

By the time the doctor came, it was obvious that Mom's condition was worse.  She was utterly confused and unable to move.  After an exhausting day of testing, the doctors said she’d had a stroke.  She was as floppy as a rag doll and could neither walk nor talk.  It would take months of therapy before she’d regain the strength to hold her head up without needing to be strapped to the back of the chair. Sometimes she recognized Da and I, but most of the time, she didn't. 

On Dad's income, our choices for Mom's care, were limited.  After a traumatic few weeks visiting one ghastly establishment after another, we settled her into a homey place nearby. For the next two years, Dad, who’d given up driving, walked to the Home every day to feed her lunch.  And in the evenings on my way home from work, I went there to brush her teeth and see her to bed.

Parked in a wheelchair against a white wall, my mother took her place in a line of expressionless people with empty eyes, periodically experiencing further 'little strokes' until, cell by cell, they destroyed her brain and mind.

Sitting together with my father, we ruminated over the events of that night and the months that followed.  Putting Mom into that home had been the worst thing we had ever had to do, and the guilt never left us.  Endlessly, we obsessed over what had happened, each looking to the other for a comforting word that would allay our guilt.

Now, sitting in the lounge, with my father, I said: “I felt Mommy blamed me for putting her in the Home.  Whenever she looked at me, I imagined her saying,‘How could you do this to me? When was I ever cruel to you?’ And then a picture comes into my mind.

“I see her sitting at the table in the kitchen of that place.  She has a spoon in her hand, and while she waits to be served, she feeds herself from an empty plate.   At last, when the food is placed in front of her, she picks up a piece of herring with her fork and stirs it into her tea.”