2. Blog Post 11.14.2023 - Comfort & Care

My mom’s in Hospice. Almost 3 weeks now. She chose it, it seemed. She was offered rehab after her last stay in the hospital but she said she didn’t want to work that hard so somehow the status was shifted to Hospice. She has no diseases, besides her heart valve not working anymore - the pig valve is past its warranty. Her own parts seem to be holding up fine. Except I notice her mind is going. It’s always been an interesting one that I couldn’t quite figure out but now it’s definitely shifted. They asked yesterday, in an impromptu meeting of the nurse and social worker after my mom had slided to the floor on our “walk” around the hall, if she was able to get the medication to help her breathe when she wanted. I didn’t know what that was. It turns out it’s morphine. My very controlled mother seems to now be an addict. She’s been there 3 weeks and it started when she got there. I had no idea that they were giving her that. Seems like old school “One Flew Over the Cookoo’s Nest” stuff of chilling the patients with tranquilizers but it’s what they use to help with breathlessness. I’d rather give her part of a gummy. It’s non-addictive and doesn’t have you say weird loopy things. 

I bought her this hairbrush while I was getting her douches that she was really wanting from the pharmacy and her Rollinator which makes it sound like she can conquer the world with just two wheels and a folded down seat. Hers is red. I bought her the brush cause her hair was getting a bit Einsteinish. She always kept herself meticulously. I was the one running around with ripped jeans but she was scarfs and jewelry and perfume. I told her yesterday that she gave me that advice, that one can dress up anything with a silk scarf. She has two plastic boxes of silk scarves in her closet.

I like this picture because she had asked for a mirror, handheld to brush her hair. I handed her her phone and said this is how the kids do it these days. Ok, she made a face and tried it. She was surprised at what she saw in the image. There was a way she did this basic action that was specific to her - her specific gesture in the way she brushed her hair and looked at herself that was timeless for her. It’s the way she looked at herself if she was getting ready to go out with my dad or ready for work. It had a whiff of 40’s Hollywood glamor is how I interpreted her looks. Her old pictures and wedding album, she always was “lit” with makeup and outfits that seemed like a conservative but glamorous Marylin Monroe. And she was steeped in that time period with the films she watched every evening on Turner’s Classics. So even here, sitting on the edge of this Hospice bed in a town she doesn’t really know, the door open which she hates, her coats making an ominous shadow behind the door, she still has that slight gesture of glamor. She tilts her face slightly up, she combs her hair softly to style it. She’s getting ready but I’m not sure I am even with her being such a difficult/complicated person. This is very hard.