Posted on by ChatterLei

A tender mercy

My thoughts are all over the place. Not sure where they will land.

My parents have lived in the same house for 56 years. It is the same house where my sister, brother, and I were raised. Lying here alone, waiting for sleep to overtake my overactive thoughts, in the same room where I was raised, is a little like being in a time machine.

My young self could not imagine my much older self lying here tonight with my mom, who is sleeping alone, snoring the night away in her bedroom next to mine, while my dad is spending the night sleeping alone in a room at the rehabilitation center across town, where he has been recovering from the stroke he had on the 14th of last month. This is the longest my parents have slept without each other in their 61 years of marriage. The good news is that my dad has worked hard with the PT and OT to improve his strength enough to come back home to my mom this upcoming Sunday.

It will be a relief for them to be together again. I will get to return home to my husband, who has been holding down the fort while I have been staying with my mom. Our daughter, her husband, and our young grandson have stayed at our house since before Christmas. After this weekend, everyone will be back in their own homes with their loved ones, and life will return to a somewhat normal state…with the unsettling knowledge lingering in the back of our minds, however, that our dad still has a blocked artery in his neck.

We don’t know what the future holds for our dad, but what we do know is that we are not going to take him for granted and we are forever grateful to God for the tender mercy of this extended time our parents get to spend together in this beautiful little house where they created a loving home filled with unforgettable memories.

Posted on by ChatterLei · 3 Comments

A New Phase of Life

The phone call came before 7:30 a.m. last Wednesday. My mom was sobbing as she told me she thought my dad was having a stroke. He would not let her call 911 because he “would rather die than go to that hospital.” I said I would be right there. I kissed my husband goodbye and rushed out the door.

That five mile drive across town felt like an eternity.  As I opened the door to my childhood home, a door I had opened thousands of times, there was a fearful feeling I cannot describe. Anticipation of the unknown… it was bad.

My mom, her eyes red and still moist with tears, met me at the door. She said she could not wake my dad. I looked his direction. It shook me to the core.

He was sitting in a chair next to the table. The left side of his face was drooping. His left arm and hand was resting next to his body. His right arm was resting on the table, and his fingers were scratching back and forth across an indentation in the table, which was something that had become a habit over the last few years, the scratching on the table.

The look of helplessness on my mom’s face as she walked over and gently shook his arm while repeating his name was unsettling, as was my dad’s effort to lift his eyebrows as high as he could, to open his eyes, yet his eyelids remained closed.

“This is serious,” I whispered desperately to my mother. “I’m calling 911!”

Those few minutes between the time I reached dispatch to the time I saw the flashing lights of the ambulance pull up in front of the house felt like an eternity. 

Two EMTs entered the house. It was surreal watching one of them ask my dad questions and see my dad sit in that one position without moving or opening his eyes, except to scratch back and forth across the table. He looked like my dad. But, as the EMT lifted my dad’s eyelids, the eyes he exposed were not the same caring eyes I was used to seeing. They were blank. Void of warmth or emotion.

His eyes remained closed while more EMTs entered the house and helped move him from the chair to the stretcher, then out the front door and into the ambulance.

When my mom and I arrived at the ER room, my sister was already there. My dad was alert and talking with the doctor, who happens to be my first cousin.

Life is funny. One minute you are babysitting your cousin so your aunt and uncle can have a date night, and the next minute, that little cousin is all grown up and helping care for your ailing father.

My dad survived the stroke with very few deficits. He is in a rehabilitation center where he can receive PT to strengthen his muscles so he can come home soon. My mom is staying home without my dad for the first time ever for such an extended period of time. I am staying with my mom to help ease her concerns. My husband is home waiting for time to pass so we can be together again in this new phase of our lives as supportive caregivers to my parents for as long as they need us.

This is not my favorite new phase of life. However, I am so grateful for the extra time with my dad. ❤️