Napping in the MRI Machine

Those nice people at Froedtert! Not only do they provide a nice comfy MRI machine but they also give you a great cushion under your knees and provide a very mind-quieting hum for about 45 minutes so a person can nap while all the 'thin slicing' is going on. My book club friends who have read Blink with me will think of thin slicing as something different, but in terms of my brain and my nerves, this means a very, very close look at what's going on in there.

Results will come next week in my consult visit with Dr. Kopell. I am glad the time is finally come and in general I feel comfortable now. I got pain free at the end of November again, and then just as I was forgetting what it felt like, did get one electrical zinger on Christmas night. That was just a reminder, I guess.

I have been really at ease with all of this lately except for the game of "what if" that I play once in a while (more accurately--sometime each day). Mainly this game involves asking myself, "What if the MRI shows nothing wrong?" Then I play out all the possible scenarios of treatment choices and all the regrets of treatment choices that have already been made to get to this point. Invariably I get to the same spot I have been in for a long time, the place of uncertainty about anything other than this place in time right now. Then I am able to stop the worrying and questioning (otherwise known as my anxiety) and settle on the fact that I cannot know everything right now and that I will make the best decisions for me based on what the doctor tells me, which is incidentally why I am consulting with him in the first place.

So, it's about taking a deep breath or two, acknowledging how things are right now and letting the rest go...for now.

SNOW

It's snowing again here in Central Wisconsin. Nothing new with that. One thing I have always enjoyed about living in Wisconsin is the four seasons, but I like it best when they ease into one another. A gradual transition is best in most anything, I think. This winter seemed to come on harshly with cold, cold temperatures and a lot of snow. I can remember so many other years when we truly wondered if there would be snow for Christmas. Not so, this year.

For Chance, snow has its ups and downs. Little snow and ice balls wedging into the pads of his feet is a definite "down." But if you look at the picture above you can see one of the best things snow has to offer.

I wish I could approach new things like that---just run around like crazy and dive right in! I am more of a s l o w transition girl myself.

A poem I really like

The Lanyard
by Billy Collins

The other day as I was ricocheting slowly
off the pale blue walls of this room,
from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one more suddenly into the past—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips,
set cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light
and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the archaic truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hands,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

Christmas spirit has been a bit slow to come to me this year. Certainly, it looks like Christmas outside with all kinds of snow and cold temps. I've played some of my favorite music to get things going (Canadian Brass, classic pieces by Nat King Cole and Burl Ives and those guys...) and have spent an afternoon gift wrapping and even watched "Elf," which makes me laugh and be happy. The tree is up and decorated because Liz, friend Bomie Kim, and Laura took the lead on Saturday. It really looks pretty and has a lot of lights, which I really like. The cats are using the nice concealed underneath area as a lookout spot, but no one has been climbing it this year, which I appreciate.

So it's not that I'm not ready for Christmas or not looking forward to it. In fact, there are more a few things that I am happily anticipating:

1. Midnight Mass, which really is at midnight, with carols beforehand

2. Reading "A Christmas Memory" by Truman Capote with the girls (kleenex at hand)

3. Ginger's tin of caramel corn for "snacking"

4. Watching the kids open presents and pretending NOT to appreciate the new

undies from Santa

5. Board games/card games with the Meinders family

6. Spending fun time with my side of the family, especially those sweet little kids

7. Getting together with Sarah and family, who we have not seen enough of this school

year.

8. The new tradition of white elephant gifts at the Meinders weekend

I think none of us are looking forward to the full realization that Grandpa Frank will not be in "his" recliner this year or at the head of the table for dinner. He died in March, at home, after a long "old age" and a short illness. We all were able to get there to be with him and to help take care of him, and that was good and I think there aren't many regrets, but still, that's an empty spot and we have to acknowledge it.

I'm also getting a bit nervous about long awaited upcoming medical appointments in Milwaukee. Not sure why. Fortunately I have been pain free in the last couple weeks, and that has felt so good. I can't even conjure up a zing or a zap right now! I am not confident that it's gone, but I know the medicine is doing its job, and I am grateful for that. I'm kind of forgetting what those attacks feel like...it would be so great if I did not have to feel one again.

And this morning my aunt Bettie is being buried in Marinette with her Florida family and some of the Wisconsin family there to observe and say a last goodbye. I am here but will visit her grave this summer when things are in bloom...

Unrecognizable

You know how sometimes we seem to categorize certain people we know by where we see them most often? For instance someone you see at the grocery store every time you go seems hard to pinpoint when you might see that person in a restaurant with her family. You are certain you recognize her but just don't know where you know her from. This is a fairly common thing for me, and it always bugs me until I can get it figured out (like trying to remember many other details these days).

This morning I received a call from the hospital about Verna, an elderly lady for whom I am legal guardian. I knew she'd been taken by ambulance last night, and I spoke briefly with the admitting people and planned to call the morning to find out how she is doing. The phone rang here earlier than I planned to call, though, and the voice on the other end was entirely familiar to me. It was a hospital case manager who I worked with really often when I was doing admission coordination for hospice. We had a good working relationship, and although we worked together mostly by phone, we have met in person and I know she knows my full name. When she called this morning, it was all business. There was no recognition of her knowing who I was, even after I said "Hi Darlene" in the same casual, friendly way I always had when I talked to her about patients at work. So I just went with it. It's actually more painful to me to have to explain this than to just do what is needed for Verna. The real twist of the knife came when at the end of the call, she asked if I am home during the day (a way of finding out if she needed to get a work number to reach me), and I simply said "yes."

It's the little things like this that make me feel unsure of where I fit anymore. Hospital and hospice work moves at a quick pace, so I can understand--but when I was working, even if I thought I might know someone, I always found a way to ask and try to make that connection. It helped me and it helped the person I was talking to as well, I think. It would have helped this morning, too.

By the way, Verna is doing okay.

This wonderful woman died today, at home. It sounds like she just closed her eyes and gently went to God.

Bettie and my uncle Charlie took my brother (8) and me (4) in for several months when our parents were in a terrible motorcycle accident. It killed our dad instantly and left our mom with many injuries and a long hospitalization and recovery. As our family changed, so did theirs. Our cousin, Mark, suddenly had to share his parents' and our grandparents' time and attention. As an adult, I have often thought about what it took for all of them to do that.

When we lived in Bluffton, IN with them, my time was split between Charlie and Bettie's and my grandparents, Helen and Ron Adams (my dad's and Charlie's parents). Bettie was an elementary school teacher, working with kids with disabilities and learning problems. In addition she worked in the photography studio they owned. Seeing Bettie's classroom was so exciting for me, a little girl who had not yet been to school. There were toys, books, interesting things to look at on the boards and walls, and a chalkboard. At the studio, I got to see the cameras and the backdrops and I especially loved looking at all of the display pictures, framed and beautiful in the lobby area and the front window. Imagining what each family was like, I made up stories to go with the faces and the relationships I saw there.

Some of my distinct memories from that time: having cheese fondue with those big hunks of bread, getting tucked into bed "mummy style" by Charlie and then trying not to loosen those covers while I fell asleep, the way Bettie cut my french toast, spray painting their house (in my little 4 year old mind I guess I thought that big wall was a canvas) and only getting talked to about it but not really feeling in trouble.

Later when we were re-established with our mom in Union Grove, we always visited Bluffton in the summer. Sometimes Mom went but some summers it was Jeff and me, going by plane, piloted by Charlie. I recall one time in particular that we landed and I puked all over the place in a little airport bathroom. Bettie cleaned me up and cleaned the bathroom, never complaining or making a big deal out of it. We usually travelled by car, and Bettie was the best field trip planner. She took us to amusement parks in Ohio, to Springfield, IL to see Abraham Lincoln's home and to numerous places in Indiana. She often took us to the Amish community of Berne where there were so many people with horses and buggies and that was a thrill. We also went once to the home of Gene Stratton Porter who was an Indiana native and a writer and naturalist. I can still see the inside of that home in my memory. There were so many many trips like that...

Bettie and Charlie later divorced, and this was a very hard time for her. In the years since then, she had a different home in Bluffton and I visited several times after I was an adult. She would take me and her dog (I am sorry I cannot remember his name!) to state parks to take walks and to talk. Bettie was a major dog lover. Her dog was her friend and companion, going on car trips with her and pretty much being right by her side whenever possible.

Bettie was a lover of culture, seeing plays and musical performances as often as she could. She was a reader, and we sometimes shared books and conversations about them. She learned about dreams and what they meant. She was a very wise person, and dignified, with a healthy sense of humor, one that never depended on someone else's embarrassment. Her home was full of interesting things and artwork that meant something--painted by someone she knew or representing a place she'd been.

Bettie had plans to retire in Florida, near Mark and his wife Jennifer. She and her brother drove the moving truck with all her things from northern Indiana to Fort Lauderdale and arrived on the day that her first grandchild, Jacob, was born. The timing was probably not just a coincidence; she was so in love with him from the start. In addition to helping take care of Jacob and later her second grandson, Jason, and watching them grow, Bettie set up her life there, making a nice home for herself, studying the maps so she could see what that area had to offer, joining her church and getting involved.

My mom started an annual spring break trip every year, and the two of them did all kinds of touring and sightseeing, with each day beginning with coffee and conversation. One year, my girls and I were included in that trip, and we had a great time, again with Bettie as our tour guide. Every minute was as full as we wanted it to be and we were treated like special guests the whole time.

Just a few weeks ago, I went to Florida again, along with my mom and my aunt Judy. The reason this time was not to be tourists but to be with Bettie in whatever way she needed. Her cancer diagnosis came in July and the chemotherapy was hard on her. The decision to start hospice care was a difficult one for her. None of this made sense. You don't go to the doctor with a cough and come out with metastatic cancer.

Before our trip, Bettie had asked my mom to bring an apple. She wanted an apple from Wisconsin. She missed the seasons and this was a simple request. My mom went to a nearby orchard and picked two apples for Bettie, packed them safely in her carry on bag, and presented them to her on our first day with her. This is the surprising and completely heartwarming part---Bettie took them in her hands and put them to her nose, breathing in deeply, and then with a voice that cracked with tears, said, "Oh, I want to go home..."

Now you are home, Bettie. May you rest in peace.

Hitting the Wall

This is what I feel like doing every day sometime between 2-4 pm. It's a wave of fatigue that overwhelms me, and I have to fight to keep myself upright and occupied. Otherwise, if I'm sitting down, soon I am lying down. If I am trying to read, my eyes go blurry and my head drops down in between sentences. Next I'm forcing them to focus and I get another sentence in before the whole thing happens again. If I "nap" (weird term for a med induced sleep), it feels so good to just succumb to this heavy pressure to sleep. When someone is home with me, I set a limit of 30-60 minutes and ask to be woken up by then. This kind of heavy sleep can go on for some time, and I miss too much of the day (and of life) by letting it run its full course.

Most days I don't sleep in the afternoon. Instead, I am on my feet. Doing something in the kitchen, putzing with housework, going downstairs to do laundry, going outside with the dog.
Once I get through that period in the afternoon, I seem to be normal again---whatever normal is.

That's a topic for another discussion.