Moving On--A Big Challenge, Even for Highly-Experienced Great-Great Grandmothers
Recently I spent over a week talking with my mother, now approaching ninety-two, about all the moves she's made in her life. She noted that the hardest have been the last few--understandably, since she's had to move several times, as seniors often must in these difficult days, to get adequate funding, safety, and good nursing care all in one package.
Thinking it might help to go back to the countless times she's been forced to move in her lifetime, I asked her how she'd managed in childhood, changing schools almost every year until she reached high school.
"I always knew what to do, back then," she said.
"Oh, because of school?" I asked.
"No, because my dad told me what to do," she replied.
"Well, what about when you became an adult and we kids had to move around, same as you did, often in the middle of the school year? How did you manage then?"
Spontaneously, she answered: "Your Dad always told me what to do."
Suddenly two light bulbs came on--the one that speaks of my mother's dependency on men from which she's never gained full autonomy, even when she began living, soon after my father's death in 1985, with an abusive, drug-addicted son.
One light bulb helped me understand why she's still feeling lost and lonely, though surrounded by people who care about her every day while having frequent overnight visits from caring family members and from old friends who still enjoy her company as much as they ever did.
The other helped me understand how far we've come and how far we still must go, as women, in a world where so many still do not always feel comfortable and confident readily making simple decisions on our own.
All these years, my mother has been my teacher anytime I dare to listen very closely to what she's telling me. And what she's not saying out loud. Yet, with dementia she often voices with astounding clarity things I'd never thought about until this moment in her life.
To her, she lives alone in her new surroundings just now, unless somebody is constantly in the room with her. Thus, she's not fully able to navigate being in a new place where she has the freedom to have fun, to eat and to sleep and be cared for by many, loving "mama's," who attentively nurture her daily.
Yet she'll find a way, making new sets of friends in her own timid way--of that I'm certain. Man or no man. For she's discovered, as so many women do, how many men (and plenty of women, too) seem to run in the opposite direction when an old woman can no longer be counted on to take responsibility for the neediest people in her life. Ironically, this means she's moved past an important developmental milestone, as I see it.
Only problem--now that she's truly free, she doesn't know quite yet what to do with the newfound freedom that's been hers for almost a year now.
Yet she's learning very fast, and it shows in her voice this very day as she romped with little girls who came to visit her and took joy in her presence as much as she did in theirs. And I'm SO grateful. It shows she's still old enough to learn and find joy in life, even with dementia, in much the same way she learned creatively so many times in the past, even with her hands tied behind her back, once she's managed to get her bearings.
After all, isn't that what constitutes female resiliency?
Thinking it might help to go back to the countless times she's been forced to move in her lifetime, I asked her how she'd managed in childhood, changing schools almost every year until she reached high school.
"I always knew what to do, back then," she said.
"Oh, because of school?" I asked.
"No, because my dad told me what to do," she replied.
"Well, what about when you became an adult and we kids had to move around, same as you did, often in the middle of the school year? How did you manage then?"
Spontaneously, she answered: "Your Dad always told me what to do."
Suddenly two light bulbs came on--the one that speaks of my mother's dependency on men from which she's never gained full autonomy, even when she began living, soon after my father's death in 1985, with an abusive, drug-addicted son.
One light bulb helped me understand why she's still feeling lost and lonely, though surrounded by people who care about her every day while having frequent overnight visits from caring family members and from old friends who still enjoy her company as much as they ever did.
The other helped me understand how far we've come and how far we still must go, as women, in a world where so many still do not always feel comfortable and confident readily making simple decisions on our own.
All these years, my mother has been my teacher anytime I dare to listen very closely to what she's telling me. And what she's not saying out loud. Yet, with dementia she often voices with astounding clarity things I'd never thought about until this moment in her life.
To her, she lives alone in her new surroundings just now, unless somebody is constantly in the room with her. Thus, she's not fully able to navigate being in a new place where she has the freedom to have fun, to eat and to sleep and be cared for by many, loving "mama's," who attentively nurture her daily.
Yet she'll find a way, making new sets of friends in her own timid way--of that I'm certain. Man or no man. For she's discovered, as so many women do, how many men (and plenty of women, too) seem to run in the opposite direction when an old woman can no longer be counted on to take responsibility for the neediest people in her life. Ironically, this means she's moved past an important developmental milestone, as I see it.
Only problem--now that she's truly free, she doesn't know quite yet what to do with the newfound freedom that's been hers for almost a year now.
Yet she's learning very fast, and it shows in her voice this very day as she romped with little girls who came to visit her and took joy in her presence as much as she did in theirs. And I'm SO grateful. It shows she's still old enough to learn and find joy in life, even with dementia, in much the same way she learned creatively so many times in the past, even with her hands tied behind her back, once she's managed to get her bearings.
After all, isn't that what constitutes female resiliency?
Thanks Dee, for yet again being able to help us gain new perspective with a reflective look through the lens of the past harnessing those lessons learned through experiences of life. Experiences that help each of us gain our independence and voice as women. Reminding us that for each of us our journey is our own, ultimately dictated by no one other than each of us individually, though maybe delayed for a while by those who intercept our path and change our couurse for a brief time.
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