Posted 12/21/23
Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! -Romans 11:33
Did you know the last day of this year, the date will be 12/31/23? How bell-shaped graph, toddler counting his numbers nifty is that??? Anywhoooo….
There is so much unique out there that we never notice. Things come and they go and, to many of us, we never see them or, at the least, we fail to see their significance. Is this a flaw in our thinking or just a product of hyper-busyness? I would answer this rhetorical question a resounding, silly yes.
The problem, to me, is failing to drill deeper. See, we miss the forest for the trees all around us. Every single day we do it. I get it, mind you, I am tired too. I just don’t have the free mental capital to “care about everything”, but I seem to have plenty enough to care about the big picture. This, friends, is a flaw. It could be a small flaw or a big one.
What I am asking for is what many, if not most of you do already quite well thank you very much. I am preaching to the choir, indeed. However, for our blind spots I want to remind us to always be watching and looking at the most basic level as much as we can for the story behind the situation. I can’t and wouldn’t ask you to care deeply about everything, for that would wear us all out. However, I am asking all of us, me especially, to stop and think a little more often. I am asking us to remember this:
I was driving into work the other day and saw this:
I was blinded a little by the light on the second shot, but I was perhaps, in my own little world, blinded in the first picture as well.
Ignoring the biker who has a story of his own, this picture on the left is now a newly-empty lot with someone living in a pop-up trailer it appears where the house once stood. The house was once my father-in-law’s house when my wife and I were dating, and it burned down within the last 2 weeks. I didn’t know him well enough to know whether he owned it or rented it, but that was long ago. I do know he had Polio when he was young and it rendered him unable to easily do much of what we take for granted, but he worked very hard and did his best until cancer finally took his life early in our marriage. However, I really know very little beyond that. My bride was raised by her grandparents and I knew more of their stories, but not a tremendous amount more. Now they are gone as well. Once something is gone, all that is left is in our collective noggins and the archive of society.
My two-fold point here:
- Stories matter
- Trees matter more than the forest
When I go into the nursing home most every day, I pass by about 30-40 people, mostly residents, before making it to my destination: mom. It is loud some days, smelly other days, and not ideal all days. It is, however, normal for what it is. We weave somewhat around quickly before getting to said destination and come across men and women in wheelchairs in the hall, in their rooms, and the like, and MOST of them are alone. At times we act as if they were never there. We …I…never get to hear their stories, nor do most anyone else…and eventually their room is left as a empty lot. Drivers/walkers-by will look and see vacancy, not the story. Heck, soon the vacancy will be filled and a new story begin, whether house or nursing home abode. Gone is an opportunity. Oh, and for my nursing home friends and, to a point, my home caregivers too: their stories are VERY important in care. I know of dozens of stories of people who wander or have sundowners who are simply reliving their forgotten story. Perhaps they were thinking it was time to work at the garment factory and walking out of the home and heading that way…. Or, in the case of sundowning, maybe they were worried about getting the kids to school on time and were confused. Take the time to ask. Drill down and see why this behavior is happening. I get it…it the the dementia, but that is an incomplete answer. If their story clues you in, it can be a great tool. One lady of the Sweet 17 was a policeman. She seemed mean at first, but when I discovered her past occupation, I could show her a different type of respect, I could use it to help calm her down (“You don’t have to respond (to that noise)… I have some folks on it!).
Their stories matter, and our stories matter as well! When we go to Memory Day in Jefferson City in February and when we go to Forum in Washington DC in April, we are there not necessarily to share about the forest of numbers struggling with dementia. Those numbers do matter mind you. We have 120,000+ moms, dads, grandmas and grandpas, uncles, aunts and neighbors who have dementia in Missouri. These numbers matter too:
We are there to tell about our story. How the disease hit us like a ton of bricks. Our fears, our dreams, and the like. That is what they NEED to hear. Every cause has numbers ad nauseum. Our stories are unique and failing to share them is a wasted opportunity. Our stories are what turns an otherwise ugly corner lot that used to house a pretty home and now has a struggling trailer into the former house of courageous man who mowed yards for a living with arms and legs not working well. Tell your dementia story. Then learn how to help. Call your Area Agency on Aging and call the Alzheimer’s Association and use your experience to brighten lives so the lost stories are not in vain. Tell your neighbor and tell your congressman.
That brings me to the second related point. When we walk into the nursing home forest, we simply can’t forget about the many trees that make up the place in our assessment. My mom’s nursing home is, like nearly all of them, understaffed. They do the very best they can, but new people constantly abound. I was an ombudsman at a different nursing home than my mom’s for a year or so just before COVID and I learned a lot about the inner workings of a nursing home. Despite them not being ideal, they do the best they can. When we enter, rather than sprint to our loved one’s side, we should say hi to staff and resident alike… and share stories. We should love on staff for doing a thankless job the best they can. We should love on residents knowing that an estimated 60 percent of them NEVER have a visitor. Let that sink in a little. Three and five are sentenced to sing the (Lonesome) Prison Blues until they fade away into un-history. My mom has been in memory care for over 10% of my entire life. She has been diagnosed for 1/4 of it. Many are placed prematurely because they simply had nobody and a well-meaning public administrator or similar decided they are safer off with others and alone than alone elsewhere…and they live there for YEARS with only an ever-changing staff as family. So when you go into the nursing home, visit with some every day, even a little. That was my point with the original Sweet 17 of 2018, of whom only mom, Sue and Buffalo Mary still survive. Fight for these trees even as you fight for the forest. 🙂
I hope my well-meaning points make sense here. I just know that in all of our lives we face the last of many things. The last ballgame. The last drive. The last breath. If we lived in light of this and drilled deeper to mine all the multiplied joy and divided sorry we can, we and the world are better for it.
#EndALZ
Update: It has been a hard week for mom. She got bronchitis this week and, under the conditions of her living will/DNR/etc…she did NOT want life extending treatment. Add to that fact that we use hospice care who offers comfort care to the exception of curative care like antibiotics, we had to weigh letter and intent of her directions harder than normal. I/We HATE her to be in pain, even a little. Broinchitis is terrible to her because she doesn’t remember how to cough. We simulate it in front of her off and on and she “remembers” and does it occasionally…and it makes things better until it isn’t again. Weighing breathing treatments being comfort care and not antibiotics offers a guilt like a microcosm version of “pulling her plug”, but without the inevitability. She has had this happen before and came out of it and, as of the writing of this piece, it appears she will again. However, it is still hard. This whole mess is hard, so don’t let my thoughts in this piece make you feel bad. I get it. I am just asking both of us to do our very best. 😉
If you follow me on Facebook, watch tonight after 4pm CST for a Luminary Lighting at Jeff City. 🙂 I will try to post it here as well. 🙂
Using life stories is slowly being researched as a way to help behaviors with mixed results. LINK LINK