I Graduated! If By That I Mean I Got Kicked Out

Oh August, you surprising motherfucker. 

Today, on the day that the fired people stayed home, I promised to pivot away from sadness to acceptance. I made a point of eating my lunch away from my desk, so I could get used to who is missing. Then while I was in line to order my food I got an email suggesting politely that I move along from my Alzheimer's caregiver support group, since my mom is dead. True, I haven't been on-topic since mrguy got cancer. But I do talk about Alzheimer's, and I've been holding down the fort for 10 years. I am the OG. The suggestion was that I join a cancer support group. That this is not a social group.

Message received. 

I am not returning to say goodbye, although these *are* my people. It would just be too sad. I wrote to one of the group members, sharing my situation and thanking her for the years of support. Her person is also departed, so she got the same email. 

During another August, in 2010, we got kicked out of our ukulele band. Our bandleader referred to it as us graduating. Over the years we'd heard in whispers about people graduating. Where's Kaunaloa? Oh, she graduated. After a while you'd learn that the person committed some offense, and was asked to leave. I've shared this story, I know, but it still smarts. Our offense was creating a small group and practicing together so that we could play the open mic at the restaurant owned by our bandleader. At a band event where our bandleaders expected to entertain one another.

I want to repeat that in that situation our bandleader's son was so upset with the graduation that he didn't speak to his parents for a year. And they changed the band rules that they'd made up in order to fire us and asked us to rejoin the band. 

It's a different situation, but it still smarts and I did burst into tears. It is time to move on, but I will miss these people. I love them and want to hear about their struggles and their lives.

Oh well.

I'll try to pivot again tomorrow.

Crab Cup

This is my crab cup:

It's by Angie:

I found it on the free table at work a number of years ago and made it my work coffee cup. How can you not like those oversized eyes on thin eye stalks? It gives me so much darned joy.

In March 2020, when we were told to find some work we could do at home and go do it there, I brought my crab cup home, sensing that my cup and I could otherwise be separated for a long time. It's lived here ever since. At home it functions as my beer receptacle during my Alzheimer's caregiver support groups which fall on the first and last Wednesdays of the month. It's impolite to drink out of a beer bottle during a support group, but if I'm going to talk about my mom and my wacky family in my free time, you bet I'm going to drink a beer while doing it. The crab cup is now code. I can tell mrguy that I'm using the crab cup tonight and he'll go "Right, it's Wednesday".

I love you, crab cup.

The Mom Report

I would say that the pot is beginning its inevitable slow boil again. How do I know this? 

Went to visit the mama, and she really wanted me to take her somewhere in my car. Our household sheltering rule is that nobody goes in our cars but the two of us. Mom can't understand any of this. Our caregiver is the one who usually drives her places because the two of them are basically a household. But she lent her car to her son. So today a ride was not possible. Maybe tomorrow or the day after, when her son returns the car. And that should be ok with her. But it is not.

The litany of woe:

• You do not love me. Nobody loves me.
• If you loved me you would put me in your car.
• Prove to me that you love me by putting me in your car.
• When I come to your house tomorrow or the day after you will put me in your car? Why not? (Because I'll already be at my house, Woman. That's why.)
• Other family members put me in their car.
• You're just doing things because people tell you to.
• You used to think I was fun.
• I have done so much for you.
• If you're not taking me in your car today I'll just go back inside.
• Go home and have fun with my things and my money (a personal favorite.)

So that visit basically sucked, and I don't know what happens next.

I leave you with a pretty picture -- end paper from a mid 17th century autograph book:

When All Else Fails

Kittens. The answer to everything. I can't wait until this baby can come out of the bathroom he's in and can join the rest of the family. He's impossibly nice. Purrs like a demon and then pauses to make a sharp and percussive meow. He doesn't cry for any apparent reason. We think it's just because he's happy.

And...the little guy is clever. I've had (and loved) some simple cats but this one figures things out quickly. He is a good distraction from the world of the mama, which is currently under the management of my sister. 

So the scene is that my mom melted down, cops, breaking stuff, etc. The doctor prescribed medicine that my sister referred to as "poison" and when we had a recheck with the doctor he doubled the dose, which made my sister white with rage. She flew here to take mom back home, but stayed, only dealing with Mom and the caregivers, and didn't talk to anyone for a week.

She felt that mom would be better if she were able to get away from her apartment. Every day she took my mom out for a car ride of one to four hours length. She said it's helping her not freak out. Or maybe it's the medication the doctor prescribed. Mom isn't breaking things and yelling any longer, but she's pretty doped up. Sis wanted us to get blood labs for mom so she can take them to a psychiatrist who might tweak her meds. We were ready to do it but then realized that going to a lab would potentially expose her to sick people, and that if we took her to a psychiatrist and that doctor did not agree with our sister, she'd be mad and not listen. 

Then there was the Covid scare of a few days ago because Mom was sniffling and had a cough. I reluctantly mentioned that she often gets sneezy on windy days, which it was. I'm the youngest, and my opinion is not to be trusted.

Two days ago she took Mom home with her for an undetermined amount of time -- supposedly so she can keep mom out of memory care. And because none of us would do as she asked -- continuing her daily routine of Driving Miss Daisy, daily. My sibs live too far away. I won't break social distancing, and I work, and I don't see what driving Mom every day solves. It isn't a plan.

And Now We Wait

It's been a while. We've lived a few lifetimes in May. The many phone calls, the begging to be taken to see my brother, the violent episode where she broke stuff. That time when we thought her doctor fired us. And then middlesis arrived, intending to take mom back to her state.

We didn't want her to (am I repeating myself?) for fear of her safety, mom's safety, coronavirus, everything. And I have stayed out of it since she got here. I appreciate the break from the chaos of mom and the adrenaline poisoning of family strife, but I don't think we're closer to any resolution about what to do about her situation. We are not closer to finding a psychiatrist. If we do find a psychiatrist I don't know whether my family will take recommendations that might not agree with their world view.

I do not know what happens next. I'm avoiding my mom. She's back to loving me, she says.

In the meantime the world is falling down around us. Middlesis' home town is on fire, and the hotel where she was staying here was also close to local protests. I did not help with mom while sis was here, because I believe that my mom needs to be living in a more supportive environment (memory care), and what sis is doing is avoiding that same thing.

Yesterday we did what people do when times get tough. We took the kitten cure. There were 11 kittens in two litters that were offered on our work bulletin board. Yesterday the owners were only able to catch one, and he's the guy we brought home. He's really beautiful.Taught him to purr, gave him a flea bath, and now he's done all of the important functions. He has the run of the ugliest room in the house until his vet appointment in ten days. Currently known as Boy Kitten.

Call The Police!

The adventure continues. As of Tuesday, my sibs have come clean with the people in charge of Mom's community, and they know she has Alzheimer's. And now her neighbors know that as well, because she keeps making a break for it and yelling for help. A different day she was yelling about calling the police, and her neighbors, who are concerned about her, were apparently asking Wellness if it was time for her meds. That was kinda sweet. Now she's just annoying -- suffering and I can't help.

When I thought things had calmed down a bit last weekend, I asked for the sibs to reserve my work day for work. I told them they could talk to me before work, at lunch and after work (which is a lot of the day). "This isn't working for me," I heard, after one day. "I need your help". "Sure," I said. And I waited for the task that I was supposed to do, and heard nothing.

One of the great breakthroughs last week was that middlesis agreed to memory care, after many hours of 4-way phone conversations. I put down the deposit to be on the waiting list for a specific facility. And then she wavered and said of memory care: "I just don't see it. I don't see why memory care is better than her own place, with Ladies" (i.e. our private caregivers). The next day she wanted a private conversation with me to hash things out. We came away with an agreed-upon set of tasks regarding memory care. Then she told my other sister that memory care is not an option.

Mom is now cycling between being violent and remorseful. Sister flew here to bring her to her own home -- a 6-hour flight. I think there are huge risks in this. Not just the trip, where my paranoid mom could freak out and get arrested or endanger people on a plane. But she is a lot to handle even in the best of times. I'm afraid for my sister. She doesn't understand that she's not equipped to deal with a paranoid angry mom. As I said "Sis, we're not in the Ramones any longer" I don't even know why she wants to do this.

As far as I can tell, there isn't really a plan, other than no memory care, a psychotic mother and waiting for her to be kicked out of her community. The only way I know to keep myself sane is not to help. In the meantime my other two siblings and all of our spouses agree that Mom needs memory care, but there seems no way to stop the powerful sister train. I'm just a "doer of things" for someone who doesn't live here and wants Mom to live a specific way.

The latest I hear is talk of getting a psychiatrist to see mom. Experts are to be scorned if they don't agree with my sister, so I don't see the point.

A couple of days ago when Mom was throwing and breaking things, I asked my support group's help in thinking about what to do. How would you get a psych hold? I learned a lot. One thing is that if we managed to get her in a voluntary psychiatric hospitalization, they would set her up with a lot of supportive services and a social worker for the family. You would think this would make me feel warm and fuzzy, but when one sibling is the ultimate authority, will not budge, does not agree that Mom has Alzheimer's, is angry and resentful and feels that she knows more than doctors or other professionals, why spend the time pretending? I tried social workers / family mediation before, to no avail.

Meanwhile, I brought flowers to Mom yesterday and she told me that she didn't need to see me again, because I wasn't going to do what she wants and help her escape from the community where she lives. She thinks that "bad people" are holding children hostage, that "bad people" are in the basement, and that we will remember this moment and be sorry.

I'm sorry now. Do I get any points for that?

Some day we'll laugh, and that's why I'm writing this down in all of its absurd fucked up nuance and glory.

I leave you with Jimmy Lunceford, one of Mom's favorites, and his song "Call The Police!"

A Haiku

I danced but she's forgotten

Delusions in the morning

The mama has Alzheimer's