I need a hug.
11:10 a.m.
Me: Hi. It’s El.Mom: Hi. Where are you?
Me: I’m in Sh’brooke.
Mom: Where is that?
Me: It’s in Quebec.
Mom: How long have you lived there?
Me: Almost 21 years.
Mom: Why didn’t I know that?
Me: You did know that. You’ve even been here, several times. You’ve forgotten.
Mom: I’m forgetting so much lately. How is your husband? What’s his name again?
Me: He’s fine. His name is Hubby.
Mom: Of course. And your children? How old are they and what are they doing?
Me: Buddy Boy just turned 19 and he’s at Y___ University in film production.
Mom: Oh, that’s marvelous. And you have two other children, don’t you?
Me: No, I only have one other, Little Princess.
Mom: Right.
And so on in that vein for another 15 minutes. I gave her regards from my in-laws who phoned yesterday and asked after her. She was fine with that. But later on, she had forgotten who my husband’s family was. She told me she’d been to the hospital with my brother but couldn’t remember why. Later on it came back to her: she feels as though she hasn’t been quite right in the head lately and thought she may have had a stroke, so they went to get that checked out. She hasn’t had a stroke. She wants to call her doctor about this memory loss business, but can’t remember her doctor’s number and can’t see well enough to look it up. I told her she has it preprogrammed into her telephone. All she has to do is push the right button. I told her this three times. Finally, at the end of the call, I told her she was to hang up from me and push the button that connects with her doctor’s office, making sure she knew exactly which one it was, and that they have her home phone number on file if she needs to leave a message, since she seems to have forgotten it (she’s had this number for the past 58 years), but to do it without delay. I can only hope that that’s precisely what she did.
The disintegration of my mother’s memory is the single most disturbing thing for me these days, more than the prospect of my husband getting a job elsewhere (which isn’t going to happen now; they called him up and told him they’d hired the other candidate who had “considerable administrative experience”), more than Little Princess graduating and leaving home, more than Buddy Boy going off to plant trees out west in less than a week’s time. Everyone is telling me Mummy should be going into an assisted living centre, and I’m convinced that the best place for her is her own home where everything is familiar and which she’ll be able to find when she goes out for walks. I have a horror of her going out for a stroll from the residence where she may hypothetically find herself and not being able to find her way back because she forgets where she lives. But she needs stimulation. As we spoke, she was becoming more clearheaded, but she goes for long stretches without conversing with another human being.
My daughter and I are planning a trip to visit her next weekend. My taxes will be filed (and hers, hopefully), she’ll have handed in and defended her honour’s thesis (it’s on Kasimir energy, in case you were wondering), and the two of us can go off for a visit to the big city. She wants me to go shopping with her, there are a few old friends I’ve promised to look up when I’m next in town, and we can see what’s up with my mom.
God damn. This growing old thing really and truly sucks.
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