Nanowritmo 20 / Let the river run

Working Girl / Soundtrack









For most of the month of July I watched Mother’s state of being deteriorate. At first subtly and then towards the end of the month I noted greater lack of clarity. Ironically, she was frequently nicer in these states. It was hard to tell if this was heart felt or drug induced.


Still the pattern continued of daily conversations with me and Mother, Mother and G, and G and I. More than not, I would find myself calming G. down saying, based on my interaction of the day, I didn’t think Mother was on her last leg to warrant an immediate drop everything bedside vigil. However, clearly things were progressing and progressing fairly quickly.


Mother too seemed to be gaining an understanding of this. She began to discuss in more detail funeral arrangements and her wishes. She noted certain things in the house that she wished to give to certain people or items that belonged to others. One night we had a lovely conversation about what in the condo I personally wanted. I think she was both pleased and surprised when I cited a water color picture of a boat that had been her favorite as well. She never knew I even noticed the picture.


At this point, though, I started growing more concerned. I knew that Mother had done very little to close her practice. What I knew of her affairs, her house, her office – all of it was in a shambles and I suspected I didn’t know half of it. She had said her lawyer had started to work with her on things, but I was doubtful.


G and I both agreed, her lawyer was another piece of work. G. described him as a rude shyster. He refused to talk to me, thus he had not even said enough to be considered rude. When I raised this with Mother, she had refused to believe it, telling me I was wrong.


With the end growing near, I started really thinking about the reality of what came next. What did I know about estates, never mind one as convoluted as hers? I didn’t know the rules and requirements, but I did know of HIPPA and I did know that as a psychologist there were issues with closing an office. I knew very little about her actual accounts, or what bank held the mortgage on the condo. The bank I thought was the mortgage holder I had tried to contact when the first issue of the check book came up. They told me there were no records for a person of her name. Was I named on bank accounts? I didn’t know for certain having been told different things on different occasions.


M. and I spent many hours talking about this. We tried to find a recent copy of her will, to no avail. She would never give a straight answer as to a copy’s location, though she did say the lawyer had one. He wasn’t giving it up.


Though at that point Mother was consistently saying I was executor of the will and upon her death it would all be up to me. Since this came up in conversations that were usually because she had very specific things she wanted as funeral arrangements, I tended to believe her. Financially, the lawyer had and would take care of things, but in terms of ceremony and process she wanted it up to me. After, it would be mine to deal with. I believed this too, as I believed that Mother knew the mess she was leaving. What I wasn’t sure was if leaving me a mess was one last twist of a knife or if it was done as a bizarre element of trust.


Growing up, our house was always a disaster. Not true garbage, as that would have required there be food and cooking occurring, which there frequently wasn’t. In fact, Mother once sent me a card: It had a hand drawn woman on the front riding in what looked like a covered wagon. With what was to look like hand written words the outside read: “Thinking of you…” Inside it said: “…ate out, it was good.” But while our house wasn’t dirty, it was a sea of stuff: Bottles, the latest gadget on sale at the mall, candles, knickknacks, and papers – lots and lots of paper. Old junk mail. Envelopes with half started do lists, free information picked up wherever and in later years printed from the Internet. Files, office notes, forms. Nothing could be thrown out until it was read, including supermarket flyers. But there was never time to read it all, so it would accumulate, stack up, fall over and get stacked upon.


Because of all this chaos, there were only certain people allowed in the house to witness this mess. Of course, I was one of the special ones. More than once it occurred to me that I had been named as executrix of the will because I was one of the few people who would have been allowed to go through the mess.


I suppose, in retrospect, I should take this as a compliment. Certainly the degree to which she stated that she trusted I would support her wishes was a positive thing. But I find I can’t feel anything about that and at the time, it seemed such a small part of the picture I didn’t see it. I understood her funeral wishes and I promised to abide by them. They were small easy things compared to the looming estate. It’s physical mess. It’s complicated legal issues. And whatever surprises my mother created.


Growing more and more concerned about this, I tried to talk to Mother. As always, she would not have it. I tried to talk to M, but all he could say was he’d support my decisions. I did some research and learned that just because someone is named as an executor, it could be refused. That usually there is, in effect a ‘runner up’ named and worse case, it would go to the lawyer.


I was fairly certain there was a runner up named. Equally I was certain it would be one of the “cousins.” J. might have been out of favor, but his sister B. wasn’t nor were their father. I had been hurt by the cousins in the past, but believed it had been merely inconsideration on their part. I still trusted them.


So I decided. I would refuse the job. One of the cousins, better equipped than I, could take on the position. With our early discussions, I thought I could retrieve the picture and few personal items that were mine or I wished to keep and if not, so be it. I had come to terms with the possibility of not having “things” a long time ago.

Nanowritmo 19 / Take, take me home

No Jacket Required / Phil Collins












G. went to her granddaughter’s second birthday party and Mother gave her the silent treatment for a couple of weeks. I did notice that other things did shift after that, though. It seemed to me that Mother was a little less forthcoming to G. and there started to be inconsistencies in what she’d tell her. These were not new to me, but felt new to G. It seemed to bother her a little and as a result, she and I spent more time on the phone. Likewise, again, G. and my relationship shifted slightly, becoming more relaxed. I felt a little more comfortable being direct.




By true spring, we had entered into a holding pattern. Daily I would talk to Mother and then to G. or vice versa. Some times it was wearing after working all day, still in the job that I hated and was desperately trying to get out of. On the other hand, at least it provided a bit of a distraction.


By the beginning of summer, Mother gave lip service to the idea that she was not going to easily be able to go home. However, she was still dogmatically refusing to talk about closing the office. Some times she’d tell me she was “working on it,” though never what that meant. Other times she tell me she couldn’t as it was the only thing to make money. Of course, the fact that it was only costing money for these past months as she remained hospitalized didn’t seem to matter.


Eventually she decided to go into a ‘long term care’ facility. It was never really clear to me if this was a true Hospice unit, a nursing home, or what. What I did know was that the facilities director was another “friend” of sorts.


I had met L. on several occasions. She was a short, plump, vivacious woman whom I associated with her two noisy young children. By that point her children were probably almost grown, but the association was still there. L. was the wife of our family physician, S.


Initially, I had adored S. as a doctor. Out of professional courtesy he always saw me and mine at a moments notice and never charged a fee. This would, of course, give me shell shock later when I grew up, moved away and dealt with the real world issues of health care. But growing up, he was magical and I trusted him implicitly.
 I had never had good experiences with doctors, so that I had come to trust S. was impressive.  I had almost even started believing in preventive health care as opposed to emergency triage only.  Until he was arrested by the DEA for drug abuse.


My understanding is that Mother and L. got close during that whole “mess.” After his arrest, S. was sentenced to a “treatment” facility several states away, leaving L with their three small children and no income. While S. “recovered” playing golf, L fell apart, pulled herself together and found a job. Ultimately, that job was running this long term care facility that Mother would agree to move to.


L. called me when Mother was going to be transferred. We had a nice conversation in which she assured me Mother would receive the best of care. I thought that was very nice of her, but I was not concerned. It was L’s facility and I had confidence in her, I knew that she thought highly of Mother. The fact that she had taken the initiative to call me herself, I also thought bode well.


When Mother was transferred to this new location it was a mixed blessing. The facility was 30 miles closer than University Hospital and Mother was a lot happier, but it was also more “homey” and the expectations of me grew. Based on some of the responses I got, I’m sure this was also being fed by Mother’s stories about her inconsiderate, uncaring and abusive daughter.


I found myself initially explaining to staff that I couldn’t come daily, I worked, 200 miles away. A fact they seemed confused by. I couldn’t easily bring things from Mother’s house, as that would add two hours to an already long trip. It seemed to me, there were staff who liked me and staff who hated me, but I didn’t know why I was getting either response.


I tried talking to G. about it, but she got uncomfortable. Still, in this context she confessed, “You know, back when your Mother left our Hospital, I have heard from some nurse friends that they felt bad for you. They said your mother had treated you very badly … I’m sorry, I didn’t believe them at the time.”


I suspected the subtext of this was that G. had also at least suspected that Mother had told at least some staff members unnice things. I didn’t particularly care. Mother seemed happy enough, she was getting what seemed like good care and I still had faith that regardless of anyone’s opinion of me, L. would see to it that Mother was fine. I guess I also believed at that point that L. held some respect for me, too.

nanowritmo 18 / I could write a book

When Harry met Sally / Soundtrack











“You’re not going to believe this S.” G. opened our telephone conversation. She was very agitated. “Your mother just hung up on me!”



“I believe that… welcome to the club.” I answered, then wondered if that was over the line. It hadn’t mattered, G. was too beside herself to even hear it. She went on in a rant that didn’t let me get a word in edgewise.


“You know, I’ve been going up to go to the doctor visits with your mom. She likes having another person there, and taking notes and stuff for her.”


I knew this. It was how we were getting significant information. I also knew that Mother had caught on to G. and I because of this and had started having JP go with her to some of her visits. Thus cutting G and I out of the loop. I wasn’t sure if G. knew this and wondered if this was the punch line.


Of course, I had also heard another surprise that evening when I talked to Mother. She had told me that next week, she was going to be released from the hospital. That she and G. had already talked that afternoon and pretty much had a plan all in place, but there was one more doctor’s appointment to finalize things. She had been evasive about the specifics though. Still she had been in very good spirits when I had spoken with her.


“Well, your mom calls me and says she has an appointment with the doctor next week, and wanted me to come up a little early before we went. I reminded her that I wasn’t going to be around next week. Did I tell you that? It’s M.’s daughter’s birthday. I’m going to New Jersey for the week. Anyway, I reminded your mother that I’m going to be at my granddaughter’s second birthday party at the time of her appointment. She got pissed. I mean pissed. Do you believe this?”


Oh yes. I believed. But there was no time to comment as G. went on.


“So, she says to me. I didn’t know about this. And I remind her how we had all these conversations about it. We’ve been planning this for four months. She went with me to the travel agent to get the plane tickets. In fact, the original plan was she was going to take me to the airport. I’m really nervous about flying, especially after 9/11, but you know, I can’t drive it by myself that’s worse. And it’s A’s second birthday, it’s not like she’s going to have another one and I haven’t seen her since she was born. I couldn’t go last year because I was in that cast and had to keep going to physical therapy from the car accident. Anyway. So I tell your mother all this and you know what she says? She gets all quiet and says, ‘Well, I thought you were going to take me to the doctor and then tell him you’d take me home and would be with me at home.”


“Yeah. I heard something about that…” I said, but G. didn’t hear.


“I said, What? S. I can’t take you home. You can’t be home. You can’t walk. What are you thinking? So, she tells me how she has it all figured out, how I’m going to go and live in the condo and how JP can move the bed downstairs in the living room and we can set up a cot for me upstairs and I can live there and take care of her. I said, I can’t do that! I’m not a nurse and like what? I’m supposed to stay in the condo 24-7? We’d need a lot more planning. Like how do we go grocery shopping for Pete’s sake. And I do have a job! So, I say to her, when I get back from the birthday party we can discuss this. And then you know what she says to me?”


“Noooo…” Though I had several ideas.


“She says to me, ‘ I’m here dying! That’s more important! I thought she was joking! I said to her, S, you’re not going to die next week. That’s not an option. And I thought she’d laugh. But no. She says to me, ‘I’m dying, she’ll have other birthdays. You need to cancel your trip.’ I still thought she was joking.” G went on and I could mentally see her shaking her head. I didn’t. “But she wasn’t, I said, ‘it’s A’s second birthday! And your mother interrupted me to say, ‘if your still going, fine then’ and she hung up! I can’t believe it.” G. finally paused.


What could I say? I believed it. It was in kind to many conversations I’d had. I was actually surprised that this was her first. But clearly she was upset.


“I’m sorry.” I said and meant it. What else was there to say.

naonowritmo 17 / Captain Fantastic

Captain Fantastic / Elton John










Being at University Hospital presented a different situation. It was not the local small town institution in which Mother had privileges in every sense of the word. At University, she was another patient. There were no private rooms, no allowances for her to seemingly run her office out of her hospital bed and no “rules bent.” Mother was not pleased with this.



Initially, I had become concerned at the news delivered to me by that young doctor. As a functional person, my mind immediately went to issues of practicality: who was paying the bills on Mother’s office and condo? What needed to be done to close her office, notify patients and shift records? What arrangements did she want made?


Ironically, it was only the last of those issues she was willing to discuss. Perhaps because for her, this was still an abstraction, and she held no acceptance of her impending death. She repeated information back to me, seeming to acknowledge the situation, and willing to talk about funeral plans. But everything else was off limits.


At first, when I tried to ask about the practical aspects of current life, she was evasive, side stepping questions. This had been a pattern through out my entire life, but now there was one element that was different: G.


G. called me every other day to either check on my communications with Mother or give me her report. As we got to know each other thought these conversations, a trust and familiarity developed as we both tentative started feeling the waters for just what and how much we could say. It was not long before we were both expressing our concerns.


“My mother says that “Jenny” is handling her check book and paying the bills. Do you know who Jenny is?”


“Well, the only Jenny I know is her nurse friend, the one who gives her medical advise? The one who’s that proxy person. Do you mean her?”


“Oh… I…don’t know.”


“Don’t you know her?”


“No. I’ve never laid eyes on her. … Do you know her last name?”


“You don’t?”


“No…”


“But she’s your mother’s health proxy.


“Yeah.”


“Haven’t you talked to her?”


“No. I don’t know her. I had never heard of her before last month.”


“Oh…”


With these conversations came tag team approaches, where each of us could get some information from Mother, piecing it together to form a coherent whole. When I learned that Jenny was a former patient and Mother had, in fact, entrusted her with the check book, I was a little concerned thinking of scam artists. But through G. I had a phone conversation with the woman, who was as confused as the rest of us and did not seem to have any criminal intent. All else was being handled by Mother’s lawyer. Mother claimed it was because I was busy and she didn’t want to burden me.


However, upon the moment of her death, all decisions would fall to me. Because of that she allowed numerous conversations about what she wanted for her funeral and the details, most of which she had already taken care of. Given all things, I decided that that it was more important to simply go with the flow.


I stopped worrying about her bills, her office, and associated arrangements. I had stopped hearing from JP. This concerned me a little, but I rationalized it was probably because she knew Mother and I talked at least every other day. Plus, G. hated JP, finding her unfriendly and uncommunicative. I suspected that my developing relationship with G. had also influenced JP’s silence.


So for several weeks we entered into a pattern. I’d speak to Mother and G., and G. and I would share notes. For several weeks G. was certain that each day was Mother’s last. She would describe how weak she sounded, how trembly, and these long silences or confused conversation. She would all the aliments that Mother had complained off and worry that the end was coming sooner than anticipated. I would talk to Mother and there would be no such list and she’d sound perfectly fine. Eventually, G. asked me point blank why I did not seem upset, about her clearly fragile state. What fragile state, I had asked. It opened a long conversation about my mother’s selective and creative sharing of information.


“You get that presentation from her because it gets the reaction she wants” I finally said one day in aggravation. I’d just gotten off the phone with Mother, who had interrupted our long distance call several times to yell at nurses for not getting her what she wanted. I was then thirty minutes into a conversation with G. who was almost in tears because the hour before, Mother had sounded so awful, she was thinking of getting in the car immediately to see her one last time. “In my experience, she is not the dying damsel for me because I can’t drop everything and cater to whatever she wants.”


“I know your mother. And I know she can be a bit of a pain in the ass, but she’s not like that.” G. defended.


“Maybe it’s just me, then. But she was just fine when I talked to her after you. I really think that when you can’t just drop everything and go ‘oh,oh.oh’ you’re going to see a different picture, I hope I’m wrong, but….”


G. had argued that I was wrong, until a few weeks later.

Nanowritmo 16 / Collide

Stop all the world now / Howie Day









One week led to two and a half. Mother still didn’t know if they would be doing any treatment program. Tests were still being run, she claimed. All knew at that point, regardless of its name or location, she had cancer and it was only a matter of time. The details remained fuzzy.



She was still in good spirits though. Still insisting that no arrangements need be made or discussed, as she was going to be out of the hospital any time. She had a plan for how JP’s husband could rearrange the furniture in the condo, allowing her to not do the stairs and as the office was on one floor, she was certain she could take care of everything she needed.


The hold up she finally explained as I pushed at her was she still couldn’t walk. I saw this as a bigger issue than she did, but there was no discussing it, at least not with her.


G., who was then calling me every four days or so, agreed. She was starting to get annoyed with Mother who had stopped telling her medical news and annoyed with JP who didn’t talk to her at all. It seemed G. and I were in the same boat.


By the end of the month it we learned that Mother was not going home, but being transferred to a bigger hospital with better facilities. According to my mother this was to refine the tests and treatment options. Still not having been granted permission to get information from the hospital, I had no choice but to take her word.


The day they transferred her to University Hospital, we took the trip up. I cornered the doctor in the hallway. He was a young Black man who looked too skinny and too tired. I had caught him just as he was exiting her room, but before she knew I was there. Identifying myself as her daughter, I asked carefully for any information he could tell me. Let’s hear it for big bureaucracy and cultural assumptions. The word “daughter” had granted me the password for information. No charts and files were checked, the doctor simply talked to me in the hallway.


Yes, she had lung cancer, but that was the least of the problem. She also had bone cancer and lymph cancer. Had for so long that it was impossible to know what had come first and it was the bone cancer that made her unable to walk. They were not considering any treatment plan because it was just too far gone. The goal was to keep her as comfortable a possible, as he gave her probably about three months, and she definitely wasn’t going home.


“Does she know all this?” I asked a bit overwhelmed.


“Yes. I know that for sure, as she and I talked about all this.” He assured me, thinking that my question stemmed from somewhere it didn’t

nanowritmo 15 / in this town

Revenge / Eurythmics









Although the next day on the phone she promised she would, and then later promised she did, Mother never gave permission for people at the hospital to talk to me. Still, it appeared my visit had set me back into her good graces, despite the cold reception I had gotten through most of it.



By the end of the first week Mother reported back on what the doctor’s had said: She had cancer. At that point, the word I was getting from Mother was that she had lung cancer, but that it had metastasized, so the full diagnosis wasn’t clear. They did not have a treatment plan as she had to see specialists and go through more tests. Of course it was terminal, but the true time frame she didn’t know. She thought she would be home with in a week and was planning on it. Especially if she had a fatal illness there were things she simply HAD to get done. She seemed in surprisingly calm spirits about this news.


As nonchalantly as Mother presented things to me, her friends were not so calm. In the same week I received another upset phone call from JP. She knew I had heard the news from mother, but was checking in with me too. I thanked her repeatedly.


JP told me Mother was happy I’d come and had said I did a lot of work. I had, but it would have been nice to have been thanked by Mother, not a third party through the grapevine. To hear JP talk, my mother was not expected to live through the month. I sensed that she was getting annoyed with me that I did not seem appropriately upset.


“Mother said she was going to be coming home…” I fished, and while JP agreed, her agitation didn’t relent. I tried hard in this conversation to get a gauge on things. Had my mother downplayed things to me? Had she played up things to JP? Was this hyper concern coming from JP? Mother? Doctors? What was real?


JP also had said Mother was planning on coming home the end of the week and had a long list of things she wanted to do. JP had told me she could help some, but wasn’t sure she could do all that Mother was asking. This seemed to be the real cause of her concerns. I tried to reassure her that at least I didn’t think that was an issue. But my attempts at getting real medical information and confirmations as to prognosis and details was fruitless.


It was around that time that I received phone calls from two others, as well. First was G., the one person whom I did consider Mother’s friend, but I barely knew. Of course over the years I had seen the woman on occasion and I had heard stories, but I don’t think until that point we had ever said more than five words. Still, I knew G. as a straight shooting, tell it like it is personality. Mother some times complained of her, that she would not take no for an answer and given her strong opinions there were at times no discussion, one could only acquiesce. G. was also the only one in the mix who had after two weeks refused to work in Mother’s office, saying it was too ‘crazy.’ These things had always made me wonder about G. and on some level like her.


G. was hearing the same versions of stories as I had. She had called me hoping for a straighter answer about both Mother’s diagnosis and prognosis and did not seem surprised when I said not only did I not know, but had no way to find out. When I carefully danced around the subject trying to communicate the fact that my mother often didn’t talk to me and when she did I couldn’t trust what was being said, it was not met with the shock, horror and denials that I received from most. Instead, G. was understanding and we both promised to keep the other informed.


The other call was from W. W. was a voice from my past. We had been neighbors in an apartment building for several years when I was in Middle School. Then he was a newly graduated Middle School teacher, transplanted from Kansas. A rotund, nerdy young man he was a practical joker who always made life interesting.


At one point he hid a box full of Styrofoam peanuts between my mattress and box spring. Like many pre-teens, cleaning my room did not happen with frequency and actually making the bed, even if I did change the sheets was rare. Several months later, I wandered into the kitchen, puzzled at how peanuts had gotten into my bed. He and mother were having coffee. Soon he was literally rolling on the floor with laughter.


“You are not a princess.” He teased and explained they had been there for almost a year.


A few months later I got revenge, calling him at his second job: night clerk at the only motel in town. I asked to book 8 adjoining rooms in the name of S. White.


In my mind, W. was the brother I never had. He took me to my first PG-13 rated movie, handed me tissues as I cried about the injustices of being twelve, gave me an awkward talk about what not to believe when boys said…. While he watched me grow up, I watched him get married, buy a house, have kids and move on from teaching to administration. W. gave me my first high school job, babysitting and my second, housecleaning. It had been a dozen or more years since we had spoken, but in my mind he was family. It didn’t matter. In W.’s case though, I knew that any suggestion that Mother might not be forthright would be met with scolding. She was still my mother. And since Mother was not great about keeping in touch with W, it was he who made me promise to keep him informed as he assured me if there was something he could do I only needed to ask. I assured him I would.

nanowritmo 14 / Home

Home / Deep Blue Something










A day after the phone call from JP, M and I made the trek to Mother’s local hospital. Not sure what to expect, we found her room and tentatively approached. Another, whom I didn’t know was just leaving, and inside, Mother was already reaching for her appointment book and telephone, writing notes to herself while she did so.



“Hi.” I said trying to sound cheerful as I entered, M. trailing behind me.


Mother looked up surprised. I was pleased that the first emotion that seemed to flicker over her face was positive. She seemed genuinely happy to see us.


“Hi.” She answered as we took seats at either side of the foot of the bed. She shifted her appointment book and telephone away from her lap. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”


I resisted the urge to say, you didn’t call. Instead, I told her vaguely that I had heard from JP, not wanting to get the woman in trouble, and asked what her diagnosis was.


“Oh they don’t know yet.” She said with a dismissive wave. “Tomorrow they’ll run some tests and then we’ll see. I hope to be home the end of the week.” I nodded, feeling a familiar edginess. There was no mention of how she'd ended up there, or symptoms.


“Why are they keeping you here then?”


“I can’t walk.” She said with indigence as if this were something I should just know.   The tide turned instantly.   “And my right arm is weak, I can’t even hold a pen. So I can’t take care of myself.”


I frowned, tensing. I had just watched her twice use this arm with no difficulty.


“What’s wrong?”


“They don’t know.” She snapped, the moment of friendliness was now completely gone. “Get me my notebook.” She demanded, pointing to where she just set it on the tray table. I got up and handed it to her. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. There’s stuff in the office that has to get done. It’s the end of the month.” She sighed with irritation.


“What has to be done?”


“Well, the billing! JP could go do the billing, but the daybook isn’t up to day, and that has to be done first, but you know that.”


Yes, I did. For years I had been back up secretary and book keeper. Filling in between the literally dozens of secretaries Mother went through and catching things up annually when they fell overwhelmingly behind.


“Not that you care. You made that clear on the phone, when I asked if you could come help me with it.”


At that point, I couldn’t help it. I bit.


“What? We didn’t talk about the office on the phone.”


“Yes we did. That was the whole reason I called you.”


“No. You called and left a message about cleaning the house and when I called you back, you said I had misunderstood you were just calling about visiting.”


“No. I never mentioned the house or visiting.  I told you the office was behind and I needed help catching the accounts up  so that I could send out bills and I specifically asked if you could come and just do that one thing and you said no.”


M. tried to intervene, making gentle soothing noises. It didn’t work.


“Okay… clearly, I misunderstood something. I’m sorry. What is it that you need now. We have about an hour, still. Is there something I can do in the office in that time that would be helpful?”


She thought about this for a second, then handed me the pad for me to take down the list.






For the next two hours, M. read patiently as I caught up on her office book keeping. She was right, it was behind. From what I saw, no one had done anything for at least four months. As best I could, I brought all accounts up to date, then worked on recording all expenses and balancing the check book for that amount of time. I recorded all that I had done, making sure things were documented and clear. I gathered all the things she requested me to fetch and three hours later we were back at the hospital.


She was on the phone when we arrived and quickly told us to leave and come back later. We backed away and took the opportunity to try to talk to the nurse at the desk. She was a very nice and sympathetic woman, who took my name and number, but told me Mother had not named me as a person who could be told information. She was sure it was an oversight. I was not.


We lingered outside Mother’s door until we heard her off the phone and entered.


“Okay…” I said, noting that her ‘useless arm’ was being employed very successfully again. I said nothing, only outlined all that I’d done and unpacked that which she wanted, where she wanted. With this out of the way, I asked if she would tell give the staff permission to talk to me. It might be easier I explained, that way if I called and she were unavailable, I might get an update.


She complained. I had not done enough. I had not brought enough. I had interrupted her. Finally, as to my request, she side stepped. She told me all about her nurse friend, who she was thinking of making her medical proxy, as by virtue of being a nurse, knew all things medical.


That was fine, I said, if that was what she wished. Anything she wished, but would she please give permission for people to talk to me? It was left vague. But by that point, we had been in town for 5 hours and it would be another hour and half before we made it home. The hospital was requiring visitors to leave and Mother was upset that it was becoming too late to make her calls.