Day 32 – What a Difference a Day Makes! – Sunday, May 7

Seriously… WHAT A DAY! Today was such a big day that two people are doing the write-up – both Kim and Chad!

(Kim kicking things off.) Mom had quite a few visitors today and she held up great. No therapies today. I think the downtime was very good for her today. At one time there were eight visitors in the room with her. She didn’t really participate much in conversations or anything, but she was listening and stayed awake the whole time. No one asked her a lot of questions or were too much in her face. They held her hands, massaged her arms, fanned her when she got hot, and more importantly, backed off when she needed space. At one point I did ask her if it was too much (after she mumbled something and we thought she was kicking us out) and she said no. The visitors stayed for quite awhile but took the hint and graciously left when it was time for them to go.

Here’s when things got good… The room had cleared out and it was just me, Chad, and Sam. Sam was doing her homework so Chad and I had a chance to sit with mom and chat. She was wide awake and we wanted to take the opportunity to talk to her about how she’s been feeling and making sure that she knows that understand how tough this is on her. I don’t want her to think that we are mad at her, don’t get it, don’t care, etc.

(Chad taking over.) The conversation went great. I think that Sue has been hungry for information, but it was really too early to have any meaningful discussions until now. We talked about her progress and how far she has come (and how far she has to go). We talked about money, the costs of her care so far and what we are expecting, and the next two or three phases of her care – short-term care, home care, and (hopefully) independent living. Our conversations were frank and honest, and she was fully engaged throughout. She even asked about Cyndie and Samantha and what they thought. She was very concerned that they were involved in the discussions and decisions. It was an incredible conversation.

Then came the biggest shock of the day (at least for me). She said that she wanted to move to be closer to us! I have wanted this for years – probably since Samantha was born. She has always resisted, but this time she brought it up and seemed sincere. I could barely contain my excitement, and we shared some tears of joy over the thought of bringing this part of the family closer together. (She became emotional when I became excited. She told us that she felt that we were saying that we wanted her to move closer out of kindness, but we didn’t really want it to happen. When she saw how happy we were at her comment, she realized that we really did want her close and that started the tears flowing.)

It was a great day. We all needed this. BRING ON TOMORROW!