Decisions, Decisions

Over the past two weeks I tossed out a few living arrangement options to my mother; moving into independent living housing, moving with us to a house in Arizona, buying a small RV and traveling with us while I do the driving, moving into a small apartment or staying in her current home. Mom wants to be warm when it's winter, but all of her family (other than Denny and I) are here in the general Dayton area so she's torn by the idea of leaving them. Wednesday she finally told me that she always assumed that she would die in this house and that's what she wanted. I told her that I could live with that, as long as she accepted hiring someone to come in to do housework and laundry and to have "Meals on Wheels" stop by. I also told her that she would need to get involved at the local senior center because part of her depression stems from isolation and that she needs to interact with people over the dreary winter months. Mom agreed (in theory) so Denny and I are making a list (lists! love lists!) of what needs to be done to make independent living in her home more easy for Mom. Such as having a contractor put in lines for a washer and dryer in one of the bedrooms so Mom doesn't have to walk up and down the basement stairs to do her laundry, putting in a wall safe so she can put her jewelry away when strangers come to the house, arranging the kitchen cabinets so that everyday food items, storage containers and eating utensils are within reach (raising her arms above shoulder level now makes Mom dizzy), putting sliding shelves in the pots and pans cabinet so Mom doesn't have to get down on her knees to get a pan out to cook her dinner and other fix-it jobs like that. Whew! There's a lot to think about when you are trying to think like a quasi-handicapped person.

Being busy is good, because then you don't have to think. Because thinking means remembering when you had the youngest, prettiest, most active mom in the whole neighborhood, one that all the other kids envied. Thinking means knowing that my mother is killing that woman, knowingly and willingly. And that's why I'd prefer not to think too much right now.