It’s a difficult, heartbreaking decision, one I never imagined making but now cannot avoid.
Until recently, she did well on her own in a cozy apartment filled with her favorite possessions, accompanied by her aging cat, Sugar.
Then, one night, my mother climbed out of the shower and into her nightgown, and as she buttoned the last button a sharp pain shot from one arm to the other and back to hit her square in her chest. The impact nearly knocked her to the floor, yet she managed to remain upright and reach a phone to dial 911.
An ambulance arrived in less than 10 minutes. Her neighbors in the seniors-only apartment complex rushed over at the first sign of commotion. They assured her, as paramedics wheeled her away, that the apartment and the cat both would receive good care.
One of those neighbors notified my aunt and uncle — my mom’s “little brother,” as she still likes to call him — who notified me.
At the hospital, doctors actually debated whether she had suffered a heart attack. Their initial cursory examination left doubt, although her blood pressure numbers had soared and were tapping the ceiling. So, they booked her into intensive care and scheduled an MRI for the following morning, to be sure.
The MRI showed that, yes, my mother had indeed suffered a heart attack, albeit a mild one, and the damage to her heart was minimal. In the meantime, she was prescribed heavy doses of medication to bring down her blood pressure.
When I spoke to her by phone just before the MRI — I live 1,600 miles away — my mother sounded calm and relaxed, enjoying a light breakfast and feeling better than she had in weeks.
“I’m fine,” she said between bites. “You stay put; everything’s fine, no need to worry. They’ll probably keep me here a couple days is all.”
“But mom,” I said. “You’re in intensive care. They don’t put mild cases in intensive care.”
“Well,” she said, “that’s probably true. Maybe it’ll be a few days longer.”
Regardless, I prepared to visit her. My aunt and uncle, who also live many miles away but closer than I do, were not able to fly out to her bedside immediately.
But before my bags were packed, she suffered a stroke.
Nurses were in the room when it happened, my aunt explained; they said her pupils dilated, they watched a vacant stare cross her face, they heard her struggle to speak clearly in answer to their questions. They saw she also had paralysis in her left arm and leg.
The hospital stabilized her condition again, then sent her to a medical rehabilitation center to watch for further signs of stroke. By then, I had arrived at her bedside. Shortly thereafter, she was shipped to a second rehabilitation center, this one to deal with her paralysis.
I divided my time between staying by her side and caring for the cat. My mother kept worrying about Sugar, her closest companion for going on 12 years, and I worried that her concern for the cat’s well-being was distracting her from concentrating on her own. (The cat, by the way, was doing fine, whereas I wasn’t: I’m allergic to cats.)
“I’ll bet Sugar is fit to be tied,” my mother said in one of her few lucid moments. “She doesn’t like being alone for long.”
Now, almost a month has passed since paramedics carried my mother from her apartment, and the doctors, nurses and insurance company case workers who have been by her side the whole time insist her condition has plateaued; she will not get substantially better, she probably will not walk again on her own, she likely won’t be able to live by herself again.
All of this means she cannot remain in the rehab facility, either. There is a waiting list for the beds, and as far as the staff is concerned my mother is taking up space. Of course, not one of the nurses or therapists will say that. You can tell though by the looks in their faces that the thought percolates just below the surface. They’ve seen this kind of thing before. They know what to expect, and what not to. They have practiced the conversation that comes next with friends and families.
In a few days, I will have that conversation, the conclusion of which will shape my thinking on whether my mother can return to her apartment, her favorite things, her cat, and live the way she used to live — the way she prefers to live.
Which is why, this Thanksgiving, I urge everyone who can to give special thanks for being able to avoid that conversation regarding a friend or family member, or even themselves. Because, when you get right down to it, the most precious gift each of us has is our health. And when that’s gone, our freedom usually goes away, too.
