Problems Dealing

It’s not an easy thing for me to admit that I can’t handle something. I am the queen of multi-tasking and aligning the planets. But lately my magic wand seems to be broken. I’m realizing that the problems I face are bigger than the tools I have to fix them.

The biggest cloud hanging over me is my parents’ health. Both of them are terminally ill. My father is doing amazingly well dealing with this. He takes his chemo, suffers in silence and continues about life. When you ask how he’s feeling, it’s always the same – “I’m ok.” My mother, on the other hand, has been on a downhill spiral for nearly six years. She’s always sick, always hurts, and always makes sure her problems are smacking you in the face from the minute you wake up until you try to go to sleep (and then she calls and reminds you some more). She needs constant attention and care – mostly with little regard to whether dad or any of the rest of us is able to give it.

My sister and I are overwhelmed by what the future holds. At ages 29 and 35, we should be at a place where we are really enjoying our parents and watching the relationships they have with our children (she has 2, I have 2) thrive. But we weren’t dealt these cards. We got the hand that includes constant worry, stress, hospital trips, ambulance calls and planning for the inevitable. My sister is not the warm-spirited soul that I am; she's a little rougher around the edges. So we don’t often agree on how to deal with our parents. But we are learning. We have to.

In the midst of all of this, something has been lost. And this is where I struggle the most. My parents have disconnected. For instance, I have been pretty sick myself the last month, and I told my mom I was seeing my doctor yesterday. She called me twice to tell me more about her latest ailment, yet never asked about my appointment. They can’t go on field trips as sponsors with my kids the way my grandparents did for me. They don’t have “sleepover” nights with the kids – the kids stay there, but they play independently rather than doing “fun” stuff. At Easter lunch, she walked in and without even a “hello or how are you”, she said “Could you fix me a plate and bring it to me?” Never mind that I was fixing plates for my children at the time. It immediately sets my nerves on end, and I get snappy and sulky. I don’t like what I become and how I feel when this nerve is struck.

They aren’t the parents and grandparents I need them to be. And I haven’t yet found a tool in my magic toolbox to bring this side of them back. There are times when they are spot on – they never say “No” when we need something or have a problem. But it’s not always in an emergency that we need them. We need other sides of them too – sides they can’t give. I’m only 29 years old – I may be a mommy, but I still need my parents, too. They are here – but not. And I’m not sure how to wrap my heart around this. There are times I wish that they could be taken suddenly like so many others – to spare them the truth that lies ahead, and to spare us the long goodbyes.

Our move back home is largely based on being closer in order to help my parents. And the move is nearing. I should see that as an opportunity to spend these final years with them. Yet I don’t want our final years together to be so wrought with stress that I become a bitter shadow of my former self. I have to learn to deal. But I don’t know how. And my heart aches.