to be in a downward spiral and I didn’t know how to level it out. Having received the news, my mother always being the ever-present voice of reason, was the one who lovingly gave encouragement and reassurance that everything would be alright. She was always a pillar of strength to everyone no matter their need. More testing was needed, and time seemed to crawl in anticipation of the final diagnosis and what would follow beyond that. During this waiting period, my mother’s dementia was increasing ever so subtly. She just kept repeating that maybe the tests were wrong and that my sister-in-law did not have cancer and in fact, said she knew that she did not have cancer. Perhaps my mother was simply in denial, which is an understandable response to such impending news concerning a loved one, but it constantly plagued her mind almost to a point of obsession. Watching her during this time, I became vividly aware that my care for her was going to entail so very much more than meeting physical needs; it was going to be vital to nurture her mental wellbeing also. I had begun keeping a journal to document my thoughts and events as a means of release and was increasingly growing more isolated from others, consciously or subconsciously, I’m truly not sure. I began doing whatever was within my means to keep a tight control over my life so that I could accomplish all that had been set before me. I became a person driven with a singleness of mind; to care for my mother and keep my life from dismantling. I often correlated my feelings at that time in my life as being trapped in a burning building with no avenue of escape. But I was soon to learn that I did have the means of escape and I could challenge that arrogant adversary who so deviously kept invaded my life.
CHAPTER 2
Acclimating to Crises
Finally, the news came revealing that my sister-in-law did indeed have cancer and in fact, a rare form of it. It is a heartbreaking experience to see loved ones having to face that sort of challenge where the unknown is so unsettling, and the future seems so fragile. Once a treatment plan was formulated, she began chemotherapy and later radiation in hopes of defeating the evil adversary who had unexpectantly chosen her for some seemingly random reason. I wanted so desperately to do something, anything, to bring her and my brother comfort, assurance, and encouragement, but by this point, my self-sufficiency reservoir was running critically low. All the while, my mother maintained her inner strength and positive nature and I was captivated and so internally thirsty for that kind of power and strength. I wondered where it came from and how she could be so resolute in its certainty. I began to intently listen for content and look for the source of her strength. In time, I would come to understand that my mother was providing for me in ways much more valuable than what I could offer her in terms of caregiving. Well, as the year 2017 moved forward, I did my best to adjust to all the changes and unresolved conflicts that seems to shadow me everywhere I went. I had lost all interest in socializing and on at least one rare occasion where I did attend a function, I felt very alone in that room filled with people. I looked around and to be totally honest, I believed that no one in the world had any concept of how depleted and discouraged I felt, nor did I have the energy or words to attempt to explain it. I knew it was no one’s fault that they didn’t or couldn’t understand because frankly, unless I was willing to open myself up to others, there would be no way they could know. It would have sounded very selfish for me to say that it troubled me to see everyone around me carrying on with their normal lives, enjoying themselves in a manner seemingly free from constraints. Though that’s what my mind was telling me at the time, I truly did not resent my friends for moving on because a few did try to involve me in gatherings and activities; I just could not function in those environments as the person I had morphed into. I couldn’t stop it and I couldn’t change it. I felt increasingly helpless. So, I took the easy route and stayed away from people in general unless it involved handling a need for my mother or assisting my sister-in-law if an opportunity arose.
Each new day brought on repetitious duties and intermittently, produced unexpected dilemmas as well. I had come to accept that my routine would involve at least weekly laundry duty, medication management, grocery shopping, and some of the more strenuous housekeeping functions. My mother’s legs were increasingly becoming weaker from failed vascular surgeries and a weakening heart condition was taking its toll on her too. But I wanted her to maintain as much of her sense of independence as safely possible so I would let her ride with me to pick up groceries or let her fold the laundry and make the bed. I found that those things were very important to her need to feel useful and productive. I discovered through talking with others in similar situations, with doctors, and in reading a lot of material on this topic, that if I took away all of her responsibilities, even if I was doing it to help her, then she could possibly give up all motivation to do anything because, after all, why would she if someone else was doing it. It was also believed that by keeping her mind active, her thought processes might stay a littler clearer for a little longer. Taking all her normal daily functions away could have led to her feeling a sense of depression and worthlessness. I certainly did not want that, so I found subtle ways to keep her physically and mentally engaged in household functions and activities. She was becoming acutely aware of her physical limitations and even knew that her memory was not as sharp as it once had been. It bothered her and I later heard her say that sometimes she didn’t talk because she feared that she would say something that was inaccurate or would be repeating herself unintentionally. Still and yet, her positive outlook remained and was still such an inspiration to me.
Towards the fall of 2017, somehow, I was able to maintain my new eating and walking habits and surprisingly began to lose a little weight, which was also helpful in beginning to curb the diabetes. As I started to feel better physically, I began to also want to discover and define who I was as a person in this new phase of my life. Truthfully, I had long been seeking answers to all sorts of things prior to all of this. I imagine everyone becomes a seeker of such things at varying times in their lives, but my initial seeking came in August of 2009. So, let me take you there just briefly. The one simple decision I made at that time was to merely admit that I knew something was missing from my life and I kept somehow being led in my heart and mind towards understanding how God played a role in my life. You see, my mother was a Christian and I was raised going to church, but as many teenagers and young adults do, I fell away from long-term committed church attendance. I learned the basics in church growing up, enough to know there was more, but not enough to know what the more contained. So, in the few years leading up to 2009, I began to seek the intellectual information on who people said God was and, though much of it was confusing to me, I sought the Bible to see what it said about God. I began listening to and watching different pastors on television and eventually found one, Dr. Charles Stanley, who delivered information about God in a method that made sense to me. Well, I began taking notes when I watched his program and wrote down the corresponding scriptures to match the concepts that he was speaking of. I was learning that there was a lot that I did not know or understand. I was gathering all sorts of helpful scholarly information, but I had yet to make the heart connection. Thankfully, that would eventually come during my three-year dark reign.
As the Fall months approached in 2017, Mom’s diabetes worsened, and she began to need two insulin shots per day. Up until that point, I was able to go to her house at non-specific times of the day to check on her and perform the necessary functions for that day, but with the need for regulated insulin, the dynamics of the level of care for her was getting ready to change yet again. Though the shots themselves were fairly simple to administer and my mother said she could do them herself, the reality was that she really could not because her memory had gotten to the point where she was forgetting to take her pill medications on some days so I didn’t have the confidence that she would remember to take the insulin shots either. Then she began to hide the left-over pills so I wouldn’t know she had forgotten to take them. On occasions, she would self-medicate. For example, she was still able to test her own blood sugars each morning and if the numbers were too high, she would go in the pill box and get an extra dose of the diabetes medication from another day and take that extra pill thinking it would bring the sugar number down to a proper level. This in turn, left one remaining day of the week short a diabetes pill plus her body was reeling from the varying amounts of medications being taken. Once a week, I filled her medication pill box and with approximately 9 pills a day, it became a challenge because some had to be taken only in the morning, at noon, or only in the evening and with her shifting pills around, I began to lose confidence that she was taking her medications