Time to Re-Purpose

It's been on my bookshelf for more than 20 years.

I thought of using its title as the "name" for this blog, but it's very long

How to Survive the Loss of a Love.  I would, of course, have to rename it.

How to survive the Loss of your Mother

Okay, I'm not an authority.  My mother has been gone for a very short time.  

And my losing her is a bit different.  I actually began to lose her about ten years ago - when we learned there were signs of dementia.  Fortunately, it was not until the last year or so that those same signs were evident. Sometimes if she didn't know what I was talking about, I could keep talking (or in our case writing on a whiteboard) and she would say something that let me know she remembered.

So I lost part of her way back but now I've lost the RESPONSIBILITY for my mother part of my life.

We learned that my dad had an incurable disease 20 years ago this summer.  That was a life-altering experience.  From then on I became my mother's person.

And now - that's in my past - my not too distant past - that's true.  But it's time for me to regroup - and I'm not at all sure how that's going to work out.

This has not been a normal time for me.  One week past my mother's death, I tested positive for Covid.  And even if I had not been ill (I thought I might die before I got better), I have no wheels at the moment so I couldn't go anywhere.  I felt TRAPPED.

Not just emotionally, but also physically.

As I began to recover, I felt unsettled.  So I wrote thank you notes.  Then I didn't have enough stamps (even though a sweet friend had included a book of stamps in a sympathy card).  I texted another friend and ask if she could make a Publix run that included stamps.

AMAZING.  I felt so much better once those thank you notes were in the mail.

I have had some time this week to catch up on an  Anne Voskamp Bible study, WAYMAKER.  As I watched, Session 4, I had an epiphany.  Anne spoke of the fact that we often have a default direction which means when something is awry our tendency is to turn to a negative solution.  And as she continued my thoughts turned to a positive way to deal with what I was feeling.  

I was sad.  I was a bit confused.  I was grumpy.

And then I found myself being a bit creative.     This is an expression of sympathy from my high school friends.  I wanted to continue to enjoy it - but could find no place where it "fit". 

So I re-purposed it  

Do I think these will survive?  Maybe not.  One thing I did not inherit was my mother's ability with plants and flowers.  

As I have said It's a good thing I can write a little.

And how am I surviving the loss of my mother?  I'm finishing a task and I am being creative. 

 I'll let you know as I find more ways to re-purpose.

May your life have enough sunshine   

To make you appreciate the shadows

those little black patent leather shoes

For my mother's 97th birthday, we gave her a pair of black patent leather shoes.  

They were not little.  By that time in her life, she was sometimes wearing an 8.  The bunions on her toes were the issue.  She was excited as she opened the box and tried them on.

It was March 12, 2020.  The next day the world started to shut down.  And in some ways, I think that was the beginning of my very social mother's decline.  The Westminister Staff arranged twice weekly facetime visits for me with her.  She really didn't get this no visits from Paula business.  She tried to hear and Jenny helped as she could but it just wasn't the same as a face-to-face.

It was several months before my siblings, her sisters, and our children could visit her.  We often met outside the Health Care Center.  Once I wheeled her over to a dock where she was greeted by my son and his family.  They were in a boat. shhhh.

Sometimes she would mention those shoes. When was she going to get to wear them again?  I guess I thought  - well never.

For mother's 99th birthday, I bought her a pretty sweatshirt and some new black slacks. I went to her room to help her get ready for our family who would come to greet her.

We had been in the atrium at Westminster only a short while when my mother scowled.  

I had forgotten to change her shoes.

She was at a party.  She needed her little black patent leather shoes.  LITTLE black patent leather shoes.

So I went upstairs and. . . no shoes could be found. 

We learned that sometimes my mother would take some of her things and move them to another location.  More of her decline.  Did I see it?  Probably not.

And now they are now on a shelf in my garage.  The rest of her belongings are packed and ready to go to Goodwill.  Well, almost the rest. 

One other item is a size 12 pants suit that she loved.  The day before our mother's celebration of life, I asked one of my granddaughters if she could make it a size 8 in the next 28 hours.  

Too big an ask???

So I have these shoes - and an outfit - both too big for me - but neither that I am willing to give up.

I don't know why

It's not like I haven't had to do this before.  1998 - what to do with Rich's clothes?  I took them to a clothes closet that was operated by St Paul's Episcopal Church.  2009 - daddy's clothes were passed on to grandsons who could wear them and I think we took the rest to Goodwill.

When our mother was moved to a private room at Westminster, we brought her clothes and personal belongings to my garage.  They've been here for over a month.  All neat and packed and ready to go.

I imagine by my posting this I might get suggestions as to what to do with the shoes, the pantsuit, and even the boxes that are full of her clothes.

That's fine as long as no one thinks that not having the shoes, etc., will help me not miss my mother.

I'll let you know how it goes.

May your life have enough sunshine   

To make you appreciate the shadows

 

about being 75

From about June 8 through July 5 I kept saying

"75 years ago, my mother was waiting for me to be born - and now I am waiting for her to die".

Today is my 75th birthday. 

It is my first without her.  I hope she and daddy - and maybe Rich - are celebrating my birthday in Heaven.

On mother's 75th birthday, Rich said to her:

"I hope Paula will look as good as you do when she is 75".

(The photo is, of course, with daddy - I think Rich hoped I'd look at him that way as well!) 

When I was giving her permission to die on Tuesday, I asked her to tell him that I think I look okay.

I do feel very fortunate.  My Grandma Nesmith was 36 when she lost her mother.  My mother was 48 when Grandma Nesmith died.    

It is also very significant to me that it was 40 years ago this month when my children who were 4, 7, and 10 and I arrived on my parents' doorstep.  We were not usually with my family on one of my birthdays.  However - on July 11, 1982, my mother made a big deal over the fact that it was my birthday.  And for the next 38 years - she always wanted to be sure something was happening so that I was celebrated.

The throes of the Pandemic had a major effect on my mother.  The people person part of her was restricted. She lost part of who she was.

Last year Cindy and I went to see her a couple of days after my 74th birthday.  I took her a cupcake.  I told her it was my birthday, but she needed to be celebrated.  I'm not sure she comprehended it.  The 12 months since that day have been tenuous at best. Sometimes clear - others not so much.

The last month as we knew it was time - and watched and waited - was difficult.  'Can't be sugar-coated!

I do hope that today - she and daddy are celebrating - not just their firstborn’s 75th birthday - but the fact that she is happy, content, and plans to have a great day - with thanksgiving for her birth and her parents and the love and guidance they gave her.  Some of which will help her get through this strange time of having a birthday without her mother here to help her celebrate!

 And I hope at 99 I look as good as she did on May 6, 2022. 

May your life have enough sunshine     To make you appreciate the shadows

 

Roller Coasters

I never liked roller coasters.  

However, more than 50 years ago I really enjoyed a  log flume ride.  We were at a Huffingham family outing at Six Flags Over Georgia.  I was quite surprised that I liked it.  

So surprised that I decided to ride the roller coaster at Lake Winnepesukah in North Georgia later that summer.  It wasn't near as much fun.

Fast forward - November 1982 - My children and I were just a few months into life as a single-parent family.  My dad suggested that a great way to celebrate Renee's 8th  and Becca's 11th birthdays would be a weekend trip to Disney World.  I was diligently endeavoring to ensure that my children were having a good life.  And daddy encouraged us to go on Space Mountain.

 I decided to be brave. 

That's my last experience with a roller coaster.   I asked my children how they feel about roller coasters - almost forty years later.     Becca is ambivalent; Renee still hates them; Tray remembers that he hated that experience but admits that he now finds them lots of fun.

And all these roller coaster memories are making me think of what our family is currently experiencing   - some sort of a roller coaster-like experience with our mother. 

For the most part, she lies still, sometimes sleeping, sometimes with her eyes just gazing into the wherever.  She takes a small bite of whatever food is offered.  She sips some water.  She knows us - at least she seems to.

Sometimes her eyes are piercing.  I can imagine that she is saying "It's your fault that I am here in this bed".  Well, yeah it is.  And truth be told that's part of my angst.  

No Paula it's not your fault.  She has been declining.  She is 99 years old.  Her body is giving out. And besides that - this is a joint decision - you didn't make it without your siblings.  

I found her Five Wishes this week.  "Let me die a normal death".

Thank you, Lord.  This is what our mother wants.

And why does it feel like a roller coaster???  Because sometimes it almost seems like she could get out of that bed.  Her heart and lungs are still working.

How long does it take a person to die?  I ask.  This is too hard.  I'm too tired.  I'm not sure about my siblings but I can tell you I am really at a point. . . 

And so I reach out to a dear friend and complain about the roller coaster ride and this is her response

Remember Who is in control of that roller coaster.

 And then I look for an answer in Scripture.  That's what our mother would suggest anyway. 

If there's one thing she taught me.. .   As a little girl, I asked her if everything she said was in her Bible.

I google "scriptures about waiting".

Lamentations 3:25-26 "The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord". 

Who wants to wait?  Who wants to be quiet?

I learned that I don't like to ride a roller coaster so I've never even dreamed to get on one. It's my choice

This experience with our mother is not really my choice - except - I do understand that it is my choice to wait.

Today is the one-year anniversary of my children's father's passing.  As I reflected on that this morning, I remembered his favorite scripture:

 "Those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.  They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31).

Good to remember that it’s important to wait – and to know that the Lord is going to renew my strength! 

I'm still not going to get on a roller coaster.

Getting through the Getting Throughs

 "Everything just seems so rote".

Those were my words to a friend this morning.

Each day I visit Westminister Woods where my 99-year-old mother has been a resident for almost three years.  By now she is in a private room.  She sleeps most of the time.  Someone from Hospice checks on her each day and the nurses and CNAs there are very good to ensure that she is comfortable.

She is neither hungry nor thirsty as well as we can understand.  She will sometime sip a small bit of water.

When I go, I touch her face and she usually opens her eyes.  I wipe her face and neck with a washcloth and then apply Avon moisturizer - the same face cream she has used for as long as any of us can remember.

Our family believes that's one of the reasons she has such nice skin (even at 99).

There's a little packet of moistener for her lips that is by her bed.  I hope she can taste the lemon when I press it across her lips.

This takes about an hour of my day and that includes driving there, and checking in - yes I'm vaccinated; no I haven't been in contact with anyone who tested positive and my temp is no more than 98.6 - inquiring at the nurses' station - any change?  what meds have been given???, the face-washing and skin softener routine and then just sitting quietly - by the bed for a few minutes before driving away.

It's so ROTE

And yet - sometimes just when I least expect it - something happens that makes me smile.

I was in church this morning and the offertory was  Just as I am.  If you have ever been to a Billy Graham Crusade you might recognize that song as an invitation hymn (the song that is sung when a person is invited to come forward and pray the prayer of salvation)

That's one of my mother's favorite hymns.  

As a teenager when she was in a church service and that song was sung mother left her seat to make a profession of faith in Christ.  Some time ago she told me that when she hears it she wants to "get saved" all over again.  If you are unsure what that means -- it's another way of saying one has accepted Christ

Most of our friends know and appreciate what I am saying when I say "ours is a family of faith".  We fully believe that our mother is going to be "absent from the body, but present with the Lord"  (II Corinthians 5:8) and our loved ones who are already there.  We also so appreciate the life that Earl and Iva Huffingham gave us - through their lives - in which they loved God first, each other, and then us - and the rest of their world.  

As I listened to that old hymn this morning, I smiled.   I have so many wonderful memories.  I think God blessed me through that song this morning and I am most grateful that even though life seems to be a "going through the motions experience" there are small things that help me (and my family) get through what we are going through.  

May your life have enough sunshine

                                                             To make you appreciate the shadows

  

No words are necessary

The days are long - and someday I know - they will seem short.

When we knew that daddy was dying we talked.  The morning he died he said to our mother - 

Is there anything we need to talk about???

This is different.  My mother's aging process has caused great times of confusion.  Her hearing has been compromised for many years.  I've been talking with her via a whiteboard for a long time.

There's no way to white-wash it.  This is a difficult experience.  

I'm the pollyanna of our family - I always think it's going to work out for the best.  At least those are the words that I can get out of my mouth.  This in no means eradicates the fact that when it comes to losing one's mother - even the one that I had sort of lost a long time ago - at least I feel like I lost her as a friend - I digress...

One might ask - how am I coping???

One thing I do is every now and then I take a brief walk - where I enjoy ---

I know this blog does not include sound effects.  'sorry about that - the sound of the water helps me.

So do some of my memories - 

It was the summer of 1977.  I had read a few books by Joyce Landorf and recently purchased Mourning Song.  My mother and I both read it while I was recuperating from a caesarian section delivery of my youngest child, Tray.

Just six weeks later her aunt, Lila Mercer Newton, passed away and she told me how reading that book had prepared her for that homegoing.  My mother's mother, Pauline Mercer Nesmith died at age 69 six years prior.

As I began to realize that mother was on her way to Heaven - a year or more ago - my first copy long gone - I ordered another.  By the time this one was published, Landorf had remarried and experienced breast cancer herself.  She had written Mourning Song after she had experienced loss - a baby, a beloved grandfather, and her mother.  The re-print of her book includes letters and discussions she had with others who had suffered great loss as well as her reactions to the truth that she had the same diagnosis. I've since learned that Joyce Landorf Heatherly went to be with the Lord in 2021.

As my mother nears the end of her time on this earth and goes to be with the Savior she has loved and served since she was 15 years old I've been wondering. .  .

What is she thinking about?  I wish she could communicate but try as she might she just can't.

I'm fortunate - I have the words she's put on paper.  I also have memories of the words she's said to me.

I am almost 75 years old.  My mother lost her mother when she was not yet 50.

In her book, Landorf Heatherley lovingly remembers what her mother wanted her to learn as she suffered and then died.  This statement has remained with me -  

"I have spent your life endeavoring to teach you how to live.  Now I am going to show you how to die".

I look back on the things my mother endeavored to teach me.  She tried sewing and made an effort at cooking.  She even tried gardening.  I do know how to cook. 

She did not teach me how to die and more than that to "let her die".

She did teach me (and my siblings)

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart; In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your path" (Proverbs 3:5).

And so I'm choosing to believe - that's what she's thinking about.

No words are necessary.

 

 

I feel like I know her

A man in a blue shirt with a bright smile walked into our mother’s room.  She just knew it was Robert (my sister, Cindy’s husband). 

“Robert”, mother began and then could only say “the foot of the bed”. Mother always has a little project for him.

 It was not Robert, but instead our Hospice Chaplain.

We assured him that if our mother thought he was Robert that was a good thing.

Cindy and I were delighted to have contact with anyone from Hospice because we had some questions.

As it happened, he was delighted to have contact with us.  He wanted to know about our mother. 

So for the next hour, we told him stories – of when we were little, traveling with them to various Gideon conventions, being with mother when she prayed for a parking space, and even begging for a little brother.  

Later I was remembering the afternoon which although the chaplain’s visit had been very dear, was painful.  This is not a fun time. 

 And then I walked past my dining room table. 

I looked at the scrapbooks, photographs, and some of mother’s drawings and remembered that earlier that day I had re-read some of the love notes mother got for one of her birthdays.

My mother was a real note writer.  So when she was approaching one of her birthdays (well into her 80's), I put together a scrapbook - named it "I've a Warm Heart" and ask for people to send a love note to her.  On that birthday I handed her the scrapbook and suggested that she watch as daddy and I planted a crepe myrtle in my front yard.

She liked it so much that she later drew it.  And every year I impatiently wait for the pink blooms to cover it.  Mine is slower than others.

Your mother is a remarkable woman", the Hospice Chaplain had said

"I feel like I know her". 

I  thought back to something I have often said:

 “I wish everyone could have a mother like  I do”.  

But I’m certainly not willing to let anyone have her.  (Except, of course. Cindy and Lester).

May your life have enough sunshine

To make you appreciate the shadows