Blog 7: We Continue To Worry

Continuing from my last post. 

Soon after, Mom was having a hard time with her medication.  I would call her and she would be frustrated because she was trying to separate her pills in the daily pill container.  She would get so mad and say, “That’s it, I’m so frustrated, I’m not doing it anymore!”  Then she would want to get off the phone. I would ask her if I can come over to help, but she would refuse help.  Mom never wanted us to help her with her medicine or anything else health related.  She would say she’s old enough to know what’s she’s doing. Mom would complain that so many of the pills looked exactly the same.  One day she finally did let my sister Kathy come over to help her and she confessed that two of the pills did look identical. 

Mom was also taking prescription pain medicine for herniated disks in her back.  I’m not sure how she got those, but it may be partially due to osteoporosis.  I don’t know.  She also suffered from neck pain due to a car accident from years ago, where a man rear ended her and gave her a whiplash.  My poor mom was to suffer from that for the rest of her life.  She should have gotten a settlement, but she didn’t sue.  That was in the days when you didn’t do those things.  So, we worried that if she was messing up with her daily medication, then what about those pain pills? 

Mom was always so private about her health.  She would never discuss health concerns with us.  Her reasons were that she didn’t want us to worry.  She was so protective of us.  I tried to tell her that we worry more when she keeps things from us, but she insisted all the time, that everything was just fine. 

In the past we had found out about some things that she tried to hide from us.  One was when she had to go to the hospital and have angioplasty and stents put in her arteries.  She had it done twice and she kept it from us the first time, but we found out about it the second time, nine years later, and showed up at the hospital while she was in surgery.  The wonderful heart surgeon came out and talked to us and explained the procedure and where the stents were placed.  We wouldn’t have known any of that had we not been there. 

Another time Mom had a severe reaction to diverticulitis and had to undergo surgery.  We were waiting for her to show up at my niece’s birthday and she never came.  All of us were so worried, that her husband Bob eventually confessed and told us where she was.  We left immediately and went to the hospital.  Everything turned out fine, but we were so very worried because we could see the pain and the look of fear in our mom’s eyes.  She was scared and that’s why she didn’t want us there. She didn’t want to scare us or have us see her be so scared.

Us girls became increasingly worried that something was wrong with Mom.  We would ask her some questions, only we would tread ever so lightly so as not to upset her.  She always said, “I’m fine!”  One day while I was at her house, she did tell me she had a doctor’s appointment coming up. I asked her if I could go with her and she said no way, she’s not a child.  She would come home from the doctor and not remember what he said, or so she said.  I felt she needed some guidance and someone to help her explain some issues she was having.  It was so frustrating that she didn’t let us help her in any way.  She had appointments with her heart doctor, too.  It made us girls feel like her doctors must think her kids don’t care and just let her go to her appointments by herself.  We have no idea what went on behind those closed doors at the doctor’s offices.

Our mom had been driving her great grandson to school every day and picking him up afterwards.  She had done that for a couple of years, and then the last year she was doing it, some of us girls started to think maybe she should not be doing this anymore.  We were concerned that she was confused on her medication, so she may get confused on the road as well.  The thing is, it was something she looked forward to everyday, it gave her purpose and meaning in her life, and now that her husband was gone, she almost needed this. It was a great bonding time with the great grandson that she spent so much time with from the moment he was born.  How could we take that away from her?

The time came where we had to take some action because of what happened next.

Blog 5: Our Family Is Growing

We are five, five sisters, but we all had our differences in our personalities.  I was the oldest, the strongest, the nurturer, who got her feelings hurt easily but usually was able to cover it up.  Lynda was the emotional one, who couldn’t hide her feelings, and very loving.  Kathy was the quiet one, avoided confrontation, but stubborn in her own way.  Annie was the biggest animal lover, also a nurturer, and with her being the fourth child, was used to being told what to do.  Renee was small for her age, and because of being the youngest, felt that she needed to do more to be seen and heard.  We loved each other unconditionally and accepted our differences, and never gave it much thought.

I was the first to marry, and one by one my other sisters followed suit.  What’s weird is, my mom had a mother’s ring that we had bought her for Mother’s Day, and when I got married my birthstone in her ring fell out, and when my sister Lynda got married shortly after, her birthstone fell out of Mom’s ring.  We thought that was an odd thing to happen twice and always wondered if it was some sort of sign. 

My sister Lynda had the first baby, a boy.  I had three children, a boy and two girls…my pride and joy. J  My sister Kathy had a daughter, Annie had one boy and three girls, and Renee had two girls.  The kids are all amazing extensions of us, extensions of their wonderful Nana.  Our family grew, and life was so much fun having all these little ones in it.

     

The age difference from the youngest to the oldest of our children is eighteen years.  Since mine, Lynda’s, and Kathy’s kids are close in age, two girls and two boys, Mom would occasionally take the four of them to spend the night at her house.   They loved going to Nana’s house where they could play with their cousins and have fun.  Mom would get involved and play with them, and take them to McDonalds and to the dollar store to pick out ‘three things’, and then they’d watch movies at night.  Other weekends my youngest daughter and Annie’s oldest daughter, who are the same age, would go to Nana’s house to spend the night together.  They got the same treatment.  It was so much fun for our kids.  My mom loved it, and I loved watching the sweet bond that developed between my mom and my kids.  It was also nice getting a little break when Mom had the kids.    

Mom was a wonderful Nana.  Besides having them over for sleepovers, she would buy her grandchildren toys, coloring books, crayons and puzzles. She would also buy clothes and buy patterns to make them cute little outfits, Halloween costumes, and stuffed animals.  She crocheted blankets for them and did patchwork quilts, too.   She did so much for our kids, just like she did for us girls. 

Mom eventually remarried about nineteen years after she and Dad divorced.  For years I would pray every night that Mom would find a man to marry.  I remembered what she told me when I was a child, that she wanted a man to love her. I felt guilty for being mean to some of the men she dated when we were kids because I didn't want anyone to take the place of my dad. Well, she finally found a great guy and they were married.  She retired from her work, and he retired shortly after, and they lived on a nice pension.  Everything was grand for a good while after that.

Our extended family would get together for everyone’s birthdays, holidays, picnics, lunches, and whatever else we came up with in between.  Our husbands would say the Carver girls will find a reason to get together if there isn’t a reason to.  For birthdays, we generally went to each other’s houses.  My sisters and I bought presents for each other and we bought presents for each other’s kids. 

Mom always got a ton of presents, and over many years, her house became more full…full of knick-knacks filling every shelf , full of clothes stuffed in the closets and dressers, full of framed family photos and wall hanging with special poems, and full of fancy dinnerware, cookie jars, and other kitchen items.  Occasionally, we pooled our money and bought her something big, like a computer and printer.

Mom loved getting on her computer.  She would do research on topics of interest, send out emails, and she even got herself a digital camera and would upload and print out pictures.

Even though we had our own families, we still spent a lot of time with Mom.  Her husband Bob, just put up with all those kids and grandkids.  He had five kids of his own, too, but they didn't come around much.  I would go to their house probably three times a week just to hang out.  My other sisters did, too.  Renee didn’t live in town but she would try to come home about two to three times a year.  We would also travel to see Renee whenever we could.  Sometimes we would meet half way, and we would stay in a hotel and have a slumber party…just Mom and us girls.  Or we’d stay in a hotel in Chicago and go shopping.  We always did stuff together.  Those were good times and I miss all of that very much. 

Please stay tuned, everything starts to change…