Aging Sucks!
Watching my parents age is excruciating. They are kind and lovely people and I want them to defy aging. I want to choose a moment in time and freeze them, exactly like they were, at their best – healthy, full of energy, and happy… probably in the early 1990s and keep them exactly like that forever. I want them to be whole and perfect and not to feel any pain–much the same as I feel about my children.
My mother has had Multiple Sclerosis since she was in high school. She’s fought it bravely her whole life and has been happy and very healthy. She has used a cane for most of my life and is now using a walker. When I’m with her, I cannot accept the changes that are happening to her. I want her to fight harder and to defy the aging that is happening to her. I don’t know if she can fight hard enough–start physical therapy again, do exercises, build strength, and stay out of the wheelchair for a couple more years. I know she’s struggling to accept the changes that are happening to her. It is the proverbial “bad thing” that has been looming over her for my entire life: The Chair. Immovability. It is the thing to fight against and I am watching her give up.
I am pushing her to fight, fight, fight. Maybe what I need to be doing is telling her it’s okay. Some of the agony is in me not wanting to say the wrong thing and I don’t want to contribute to her giving up.
Years ago when I trained to be a hospice volunteer, they taught us to be willing to just talk about death. So many people in our patients’ lives wanted them to get better and sometimes they needed someone to just be with them to talk about dying and what they were experiencing. I wonder if this is the same for my mom–that she is facing losing her ability to walk and instead of being there with her to grieve this loss, I am just telling her she needs to try harder because I can’t stand the idea of her being in a wheelchair.
When I was last with them, these emotions got in the way of enjoying the trip with them. I was so worried that I couldn’t really be fully happy and present with them. I wanted to deny reality really, really bad. I notice, as I am home now, that I didn’t talk to them enough, didn’t enjoy them enough, and didn’t appreciate them enough. I worked really hard on trying to help them while I was there. I cleaned out their pantry (a job my mom can no longer do), I worked with my dad and brother on cleaning out the garage (a task neither of my parents can do), I helped my dad with their bookkeeping to get it ready for the accountant, I cooked meals and put them in their freezer. I sound like a really nice daughter. I worked really hard for them. I didn’t mind, although I am exhausted since coming home. But I think the reason is that I can’t accept that their lives are changing and they are getting older. Something about this threshold is different from the aging in the past and I want them to be different.
As I am writing this, I wish I could end with a bit about how I need to change my perspective, how I am ready to accept this, or something like that, but I am not ready to change. I am still in fight or flight mode. I can feel all of my avoidance mechanisms happening. I ate too much food while I was there, I watched too many TV shows on Netflix. I didn’t sleep. I am in deep denial and it isn’t a healthy place to be.
Now what? I am going to try to be with my own emotions. I am going to talk about this to people I trust and see if I can move out of denial. I am going to try to channel my control energy into something more positive–like my weight and exercise. I will focus there. I will keep exploring my feelings and what it means to me to have my parents be “old”. How does it change who I am and what is hard for me about that?
I will try to avoid fighting with Mel because I am ultra vulnerable. I will try to avoid getting angry with the kids. I will work on walking gently this week, allowing what is to be a possibility in my own mind. I will be with my pain and allow it to be ok. I will allow myself to grieve.
