I open this blog and I see the date of my last post and the picture that accompanies it. It was September and my dad had just gone into Serene Gardens assisted living facility in Grand Blanc. He was to be there for two weeks while my mom was taking a respite after injuring her knee. It would later be discovered that my mom would need a full knee replacement surgery. My dad needs 24/7 care and my mom was not going to be able to provide that and insurance doesn’t cover live-in assistance at my parent’s home. It was going to be longer than two weeks.
As I write today, four months later, my dad is still at Serene Gardens. That’s hard to write. It isn’t a triumphant marathon. It isn’t good news. It isn’t motivating. It’s hard, to be honest about it. I want to do more. What more can I do? I think about it all the time. I visit him. I pick him up and take him home. I take him back to the facility. I pick him up. I push him in his wheelchair. I help him with going to the bathroom. I help him take a shower. I get him dressed. I help him eat. It doesn’t feel like enough because my dad is still not at home. He should be at home. He shouldn’t have Parkinson’s. He’s too young.
The other day when I was driving him back to Serene Gardens he said it seems surreal when he is home because it doesn’t feel like home anymore. He goes to PACE with other people and he looks around and thinks, What am I doing here? He’s 64 years old and he is surrounded by people who are so bad off. Yet, there he is as well. He should be running, working out, and making kids laugh. He should be with his friends and family. He should be healthy. He shouldn’t need to be confined to a bed or a chair. He can hardly talk anymore. It’s hard to understand him.
I want my dad back. I want him to feel okay. I don’t want him to feel alone. I want to quit my job and stay with him. I want him to know how much he is loved, and how much he means to everyone. I don’t think he wants me to stop my life. I don’t know if it would solve anything. I don’t know that I care.
Love is all that matters. It is the greatest thing in this world. It lasts through it all. It doesn’t need a voice. It doesn’t need to walk. It doesn’t reside in a particular place. It is in all of us. I want my dad to know how loved he is. Does he know it?
I was talking with my mom the other day. I said that I have not seen the later stages of Parkinson’s in anyone that has ever had it, I mean the real late stages, the hard late stages. Maybe it is because I wasn’t looking. Maybe none of us are. But maybe it’s because we hide the worst of it. Maybe we hide our loved ones when it gets too bad. Maybe we feel it is going to hurt people to see someone they love in such vulnerability. Maybe it’s because we want them to remember us how we were or we want others to remember our loved ones the way we want them to remember them. Maybe people don’t want to see it. Maybe it is natural and maybe it’s okay. Maybe it’s bullshit. We’re all not meant to stay forever. Maybe it’s okay to know and to see and to celebrate life in all stages. Maybe we can embrace it all, the good, the tough, the bad, the health, the sickness, the strength, and the weakness. Maybe we don’t need to be afraid. Maybe we can look at it and share it and in the sharing, we won’t be so alone and when our time comes we will know that no matter what happens or how bad it may get, that we won’t be left alone. We’ll be surrounded by love even when that love is heavy and costly.
I don’t know what’s right but I hope that in sharing this that you will know you’re not alone whether you’re sick or you’re near the sick or you’re healthy and your loved ones are healthy and none of this has ever crossed your mind or your experience, you’ll not be alone when it does.