Just Do It

I had been trying to have empathy, to put myself in her shoes — but I had been struggling. Is it because she’s my mother?

I mean, this is the woman who would lift me on to the kitchen countertop when I was, what, four or five years old? She would have me lie on my back so my long blond hair could fall into the sink and she would wash it, pouring a pitcher of water over and over until the suds were gone.

This is is the woman who, newly divorced, piled four of us into the car and drove us from central Michigan to Sandusky, OH, so that we could enjoy Cedar Point for the day.

This is the woman who worked as a unit clerk at a hospital for an hourly wage, scraped her pennies together, then took us school shopping so that we could have new clothes to wear each year.

This is the woman who would, on her day off, drive two hours to come help me with my kids, who would take personal vacation days so that I could get a break, who purchased clothes, and toys, and household items that I could not afford with money that came from her own hard work.

How could she now be so helpless?

Crippled by unrelenting pain, she was spending most of her time in a reclining chair. She pushed a button to raise and lower her legs — doctors’ orders to help with the edema. When she did get up, she clung to a walker to move between bedroom, bathroom, living room, and kitchen. The volume on the TV stayed up because she struggled to hear. She, once an avid reader, could do so no longer because of limited vision.

Her life was confined, most days, to the upper floor of her home, and yet she had determined to traverse 728 miles to see her sister — her only sister, her older sister — who also is confined, most days, to a few rooms in her home, who ventures out occasionally and with great difficulty, whose life, which once was at the helm of her family, making it happen for her own kids and grandkids, has become much more limited due to aging and health issues, just as it will for us all.

So, because of my mother’s fierce determination, after weeks of planning, phone calls, and arranging, we rode an hour in the car, took two short flights, drove another hour, and found ourselves at our goal. A cousin came to the car in the pouring rain, pushing a wheelchair while somehow also holding an umbrella. Around the house and through a back entry, and there it was, the reunion.

They sat, these two octogenarians, for five hours — smiling, telling stories, looking at photo albums, laughing, and for a few moments distracted from pain and limitation, occupied with connection, and basking in joy.

We made our trip there on a Friday, returned on a Sunday, rested on Monday, and by Tuesday, her pain was increasing, her kidney function was dropping, and the word hospice was being uttered for the first time.

On Wednesday she had lunch with her brother and his family, enjoyed more stories, laughter, and hugs. They said their I love yous right before we went to the lab for one last blood draw followed by the appointment where she agreed that hospice was a good choice for managing her pain. On Thursday, at her hospice intake, they expected she had three months or less to live; on Friday they said days to weeks; on Saturday they said 72 hours.

During that time she had some visitors — of course hospice nurses, and the personal care aide, and the social worker, but family members were also continuously present. On Friday after a long round of visits, she fell into a deep sleep that extended well into Saturday. The hospice nurse came during that visit, saw Mom was in a lot of pain, and started a smalll dose of morphine.

A couple of hours later, I walked in to check on Mom, who had been sleeping for twenty hours. She saw me come in and said, “You know, I’d like to start planning dinner.”

“Mom, I’ve got dinner started.”

“What are you making?”

“Spaghetti.”

She made a face and said, “I don’t want spaghetti. I was thinking of chicken,..” She closed her eyes and used her hands to help me picture what she meant, “you know how you cut up potatoes and carrots and put them in the oven? Maybe with a little onions and beets?”

I really thought the morphine was doing a trick because she hadn’t really eaten much in weeks. I actualy believed she would say all this and then fall back asleep. But she didn’t. She kept talking about this meal. So, I said, “Ok, let me go get started on it.”

I had turned on the oven, put away the spaghetti sauce, and started to clean the vegetables when I saw her walking from her bedroom to the kitchen with her walker. She had declined so quickly, we had been using a gait belt and assisting her in and out of bed for the past couple of days, but here she came of her own volition.

“Mom, what are you doing?”

“Well, I was thinking if I’m going to boss you around, I better get out here and help!”

I convinced her to sit at the table, and then I put her on the phone with first one granddaughter and then another. She listened, chatted, and laughed while I roasted vegetables, threw together a salad, and baked chicken. One of the granddaughters mentioned a milkshake, and Mom said she loved milkshakes, so I texted my brothers and one of them showed up in minutes, milkshake in hand.

By the time she was eating, she had two sons, a daughter, a daughter-in-law, and a granddaughter in the room. She ate everything, my little 90 pound mother, and slurped on the milkshake as she chatted with the neighbor who dropped by. For about three hours she smiled, ate, and laughed, and then she was in pain again, ready to go to bed, ready for more morphine.

We had a hard night that night until we got the dose and frequency of the morphine correct, but then she rested. On a Sunday, all day, she was quiet. She listened to her church service, which we streamed. Her step son and his wife visited. Three of her kids and three of her granddaughters took turns sitting with her, holding her hand, talking to her, crying, reading her stories, and playing her music.

When everyone else had gone home or to bed, one remained, playing Princess Diaries to wind down the night, and that is when Mom stopped breathing. Just like that.

Mom, who had many regrets from her life, spent the last few decades telling her grand kids to have a plan and “just do it”. In the end, that is exactly what she did. She made a plan to see her sister, and did it. She made a plan for a meal and ate it. And once she agreed to be on hospice and make her exit, she didn’t waste any time at all. She just did it.

And now the rest of us are going to have to figure out how to just do everything without her continual encouragement, unwavering support, and genuine curiosity. I’m not ready, but I don’t see as I have much choice.

Love you, Mom. You did just fine.

From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. John 1:16