The Sound of Memory

 

I've spent a few years volunteering with people who have complicated symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease. We use childhood photos along with favorite music to create movies, digital frames and photo albums as non-pharmaceutical, palliative care tools. I've witnessed the transformation that Therese Steinhoff illustrates in this essay about her grandmother's Dementia.  Sometimes the answers are complicated, but sometimes the solutions are simple, beautifully simple. -BTH

Last summer my 97 year old grandmother who we call Nana was agitated with the progression of her Dementia. She always said “as long as I have my mind I will be OK.” I think in a way she saw that her mind was slipping into a world of confusion and mashed up memories. She kept talking about the past and the need to get home to her mother, father, husband, and son who had all passed on years ago. She was losing sleep over it. She couldn’t sit still for more than a few minutes. It was hard for us to witness emotionally and physically as we needed to follow her around in her walker to make sure she didn’t fall.

One afternoon I was alone with Nana and my two year old son.  It was early evening and his fussy time. I was sitting with him on the couch and Nana shuffled over to us in her walker. It had been a long day and regrettably I was frustrated with her. She was constantly repeating “Oh Lord! Oh Lord! Oh Lord help me.”  She was going to the bathroom every five minutes because she had forgotten she had already gone. She was angry with us for telling her to sit down and rest awhile. I had pretty much decided that the most recent mini stroke she had experienced had taken her farther away from us. It felt like she was a boat a drift that we could see from the shoreline but couldn’t call back. So when she said “Can I sit by you” my heart just melted. I had felt bad for having thought that the Nana I knew and loved had left us until I saw a piece of her sweetness emerge with those words.

As she sat next to us on the couch my youngest started to get cranky. As a mother I knew that singing to a crabby toddler usually soothed them. So instinctively I started singing songs to him. He became quiet and listened and to my great surprise Nana also relaxed her body and sat with us without the need to cry out or get up and walk around.

Before I knew it Nana and I were singing Christmas carols in July. I knew that we both loved “O Holy Night” so the two of us were singing it in tandem. Nana even remembered more of the verses than I could remember. She sang loud and clear. She sang with gusto. We sang together for about an hour. I filed that hour away in my mind as one of my favorite memories of my Nana. It went right next to the memories of sleeping over at her house, secretly drinking coffee with milk and sugar, playing bunco together, watching “All My Children,” walking the streets of Rome together, and one of my earliest memories—playing “airplane” together with pictures of food in ads as our meals.

Music was the common thread that held Nana’s life together so it’s no wonder that it now soothes her. She married a Vatican Choir singer who sang every day of their life together—even when he was suffering with Alzheimer’s. She attended Church nearly every day of her life and sang all of the songs. Her son played piano for her. Her house was always filled with music. Even when my grandparents and father would be in the middle of a conversation they would often break into song. I feel like the music of her life was like the yarn that she used to crochet blankets—many different songs came together to wrap around her and comfort her.

So by the end of that hour both my two year old son and 97 year old grandmother were relaxed and ready for dinner. I felt like I had found the key to giving her comfort.

The next day one of her caregivers came to the house and I had Nana sing “O Holy Night” to her. By the end of the song we were both in tears. Her memory was briefly clear and she was present with us.

Music is a powerful thing. No matter what age we are we are soothed by it. It can make us cry, make us laugh, and make us remember. It brought my Nana back to me when I thought she was lost.

Eureka! Things A Dead Mathmatician Taught Me

My oldest son had a big biography project due today.  Last week The Athlete and I were on our first real child-free vacation in several years (we went with The Arch Mother and The Brick - this will be a post for another day - See next week's two part post titled "WHY IS THE TV SO LOUD/The damn TV isn't working again"). When we got back, my oldest hadn't made much progress besides reading and some very basic note taking about the subject of his report.

Now, most of the boys pick people like George Washington, Neil Armstrong, Martin Luther King Jr.. On the note taking worksheet the teacher handed out, she asked, "Why is your subject famous?"

My son's response:  "He's not. No parents really even know who he is."

He picked Archimedes. Of course he did. I'm sure YOU know all about Archimedes.  But in our life, so far only a 22 year old, robotics aficionado knew anything about him.  He was a Greek mathematician and inventor from the pre-Christ era.   There are not as many children's biography's about non-saint, pre-Christ scientists as you might imagine. Thank God that he loves to read and is willing to delve into the non-picture book biographies.

The early childhood homework project should be a college course in psychology - actually it should be a master's program. I am a pretty hands off parent.  I give the older kids a pretty long leash. BUT I found myself fighting back some pretty strong, strange parental urges this weekend while he was working on the project.  It involved a note taking packet, a poster board, a costume and a two page paper. He is an independent kid; he's creative and likes to be inventive. He also has a clear vision of how he likes to do things. He had also read everything he could find about the guy so he felt pretty comfortable with the topic.

He hand wrote the paper on non-lined paper in pencil.

"When you're turning in a big project like this, I think being neat and organized is important. You should get lined paper and a pen."

A pen?  Really?  I told my 9 year old, who is just learning cursive, that he should write his report in PEN? It was at this point that I realized I was offering useless advice and that instead of helping it was disheartening. I'm picturing PowerPoint slideshows when that's not the appropriate picture at all.

He told me that it could be typed. "That would be very professional if you did that!"

"Mom, will you just type it for me?" 

Pause. He'd been working on it for two hours while listening to his sibling play unencumbered by dead mathematicians in the other room.

"Honey, I want to help, but I can't, that's part of the experience of working on a big project.  If you want it to be typed, you need to do it yourself." 

Did I want to type it? Yes.  It would have taken me three minutes (I'm a writer, you know).

But did I type it? No.

The poster board was mostly done but there were a few misspellings and in general, if I'm honest with you, it just didn't really do much for me. I'm thinking about all the other parents who are probably helping cut and paste, who are stenciling and buying glitter.

So what? 

Who's project is it? 

Ummm. Well, I faltered. I used the misspellings to step in and show him the errors and then suggested maybe he slow down and look at the board. I knew he wanted to be done with it and go find a book and curl up in front of the fireplace.

"What is your plan?" I ask.

"Do you want it to tell a story or do you want it to be illustrations from your report?"  He looks down on his project.

 "It's important that the words are big enough to read from a distance.  Pencil is hard to read - its not dark enough." 

After the last question, I could see the breath sort of sink out of his chest. I stopped talking and thought to myself What is MY plan here? Do I want him to be proud of his own work?  Can I help without making it about me ?

"Why don't you take a break.  You've got time to finish it. And you really are almost done."

So yesterday when he got home from school he went right to work on it. He typed the whole thing himself.  I helped him with the formatting. He redid the poster board and set out to work on his costume.

My neighbor, who is also one of my best friends and a more hands on parent than I am, called when she got home from work.  I had asked her earlier if she had a beard that he could borrow and I told her about the project. She knows me well. She knows that he's going to be on his own for getting the costume together.  This idea proceeds to slowly kill her all day.  She has come home to Google Archimedes and see what he's up against. She calls me:

"He can't just wear a robe."

At that very moment I was holding a child size robe in my hand. In all fairness, I was putting it away because he found something else, but still, I was holding a robe.

"I swear, he's got this.  It's going to be good.  We found a black cape and some fur kind of thing. He's all set. Very excited. I'm going to grab the Santa wig from my folks house and he's going to use that."

So finally at about 7:30 last night, he emerged from my office in full, hysterical costume, poster board and two page typed report. The report is less reporty and more narrative.  It beings "I want to tell you a story..." His chest inflated with the pride of a job well done and the smile wide because he had a chance to have fun learning. I could have VERY easily ruined that chance.

Archimedes reminded me to reflect on one of the eternal questions of parenting:

Does a project for third graders need to have an animated PowerPoint? 

Of course not.

We all have lessons to be learned - parent and child.

• Honor your child's intelligence and their style.
• Help them to be their age appropriate best.
• And then just get out of their freaking way.

Ride the Grace of Gratitude

Another elegant post by Elizabeth Eilers Sullivan. Her lovely words reminded me of a group email I sent two weeks ago in preparation for our first 'kid-less" vacation in years.  I had a three page attachment of phone numbers, house details, schedules of events, daily routines and extracurriculars. After reading it, my husband remarked that it takes an army to care for our kids. Sometimes it does feel like we live on the front lines, but then I read essays like this and I remember that it isn't a battle; we're the peacekeepers, if only we take the time to see the beauty and power of our brotherhood in arms. - BTH

The snow has a hint of spring to its edges. The rough crust is giving way to streams in the street. The top layer of snow is soft enough for sticky snowballs, the hills pliable enough to become slick sledding highways that my children toboggan down with glee as my husband shovels ice from walk ways. The sun is higher than it has been in the skies lately and stays out longer. Today it felt like spring was nearer than it seemed earlier this week when the cold kept my shoulders braced to my ears and I shuddered at winter's briskness each time I stepped outside to bring my kids from one place to another. As I entered the swim meet today after it began, I watched runners cruise down Summit Avenue and felt that overall gladness to be alive, spirit unified with body, feet kissing earth, breath coursing through veins.

It is this spirit, this joie de vire that has me feeling doubly grateful for the small things of today. For my children who rose and dressed and ate and readied themselves for play and swim and birthday parties. For my husband who so gracefully cooks breakfast, shops for food, and holds down the home front with me. For the families that came to yoga today and took time to meditate and move and breathe. But paramount in my string of noticeable graces and gratitude is the friends I am blessed with who rise to help, rise to love my children up, and embrace them.

Simply put my friend gave one of my kids a ride form a birthday party to the swim meet. Yes a simple act, but I know it caused her to spend her time driving one of mine to and fro when she has plenty of her own. I know it was done with grace and giving and I hope she notices how much I am grateful for it. We are both the youngest of many, and with that comes a flexibility and willingness to pitch in, and at times to pitch in too much. But while this ride seems simple it underlines something crucial to parenting, that we do not do it alone, nor do we do it with just our partners, nor do we do it with just our extended family, or the babysitters we hire, but with our friends we hold. And, if we are lucky enough, blessed, graced with friends that parent in similar ways and hold their kids to similar standards and will shine their love on our own as they do their own, then it is good to take note. To say thank you. To multiple the grace in more ways than one by sharing it back with them, with others. For in doing so, we melt our rough edges, we relax our shoulders and we breathe into the present moment of today and lean toward the hope of tomorrows--that we do not parent alone, nor assist our parents alone as they age, nor walk this earth in all the promise of the springtime streams alone. For this I give the deepest and most heartfelt thanks for swim meet rides, and heartfelt conversation of dreams and doings and movement toward becoming the grandest version of ourselves; knowing this takes a community willing to see the best in one another, their children, and their wisdom figures as they age.

"If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough." -Meister Eckhart, German theologian, philosopher, and mystic

What's on your litany of thanks?

Surefire Cure for the Flu

So The Brick came down with the Flu a little more than a week ago (Murphy's Law said that because we stayed away when we were sick, he was bound to get it from someone else). He felt crappy. Achy. Coughy. Drippy. Never fun.

Over the course of the week I stopped by and brought movies and puzzles, hoping to offer a little distraction from the discomforts of having the flu.  The Arch Mother, not known for her compassion when loved ones are sick, didn't get much of the giggles this time. They hunkered down and weathered the storm with an increasing amount of agitation and boredom. Neither of them likes to sit still.

After a few days of not feeling better and a long night of coughing and coughing and coughing, The Doctor made a house call to make sure Dad wasn't getting pneumonia.  He pronounced Dad, sick, but not sick enough to be too worried. He told him to drink more water and suggested he get a massage to help deal with his achy back. Sounded like a great idea to Dad (never mind that everyone else had suggested it as well - some suggestions just sound better coming out of the mouth of a doctor).

So The Arch Mother made an appointment for 5:15. At 5:30 she calls me laughing.

"You're never going to believe what I just did."

Of course, I ask what she's done.

"I accidentally made that appointment for Dad's massage at a place in town center but I sent him to a place in the strip mall near by. He's going to kill me."

The massage center had called her to ask if Dad was on his way and she looked more closely at the address in the phone book and realized her mistake. If The Brick was a little irritable before, we figured he wasn't going to be delighted about being sent out on a frigid night to a strip mall where he didn't have an appointment. I hang up the phone shaking my head.

About 10 minutes later, my imagination has gotten the best of me and I'm thinking about Dad not feeling well, driving on a snowy, cold night and trying to find a massage center that may or may not be there.

I call The Arch Mother back. "What's the name of the place in the strip mall? I'll Google it and see if they can take dad later."

"I can't find the name of it.  But I'm sure there is one there," she said.

I Google and Google and I can't find a record of a massage therapist in this strip mall.  So I call a few of the businesses that I know are there and get questionable answers. "There was one but it closed. No, there is one, but no one knows the name. Maybe it's on the other side of the mall. Etc."

Now he's been gone about an hour and he's still not answering his phone.  I have to admit I'm starting to feel a little nervous. So I try one last time and I find a chiropractor with an address in the mall.  I call him and he is very helpful and tells me that he didn't take a walk in at that location because he's not there on Friday nights. I ask him if there is a massage therapist in the mall that my dad might have found.  He says:

"Well, yes there is one.  It's right next store to my office, but I am not at all affiliated with them."

He tells me the name.  I say thanks and hang up already Googling to find the phone.  I call my mom, still no word from dad and now it's been well over an hour.

I STILL CANNOT find a phone or a website for this place.  I resolve to call the chiropractor back and see if he can just give me the number, since as neighbors, I'm assuming he must have it.

"Well, if you Google it.  You should be able to find it," he said to me.

"Nope, I've looked everywhere and I can't find it, " I tell him.

"Hmmm, maybe I can look it up for you. Ummmm. Just to be clear, I have no business relationship with them. They keep kind of odd hours."

"Um, OK," I said. Now it seems like this guy is being a little strange.

"Would they be open on a Friday night?" I asked.

He's trying to find the phone number on a website that he's mentioned. I've never heard of this site, but it sounds little sketchy.

"Yes, I'm sure they'd be open on a Friday night. They are...um...sort of an nontraditional business..."

My heart sinks a little bit. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Well, we're right.

"Wait a second, are you saying that this is a cover for prostitution?"

"Um.  Yes.  I think so."

"You've GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!" I thank him and hang up.

The place is about a mile from my parents house and half my family lives within walking distance from my parents. I am speed dialing my brothers.  All I can think of is that my dad resisted massages for years because he's ticklish and terribly modest. He's feeling crappy, he HATES the cold, and THE ARCH MOTHER HAS JUST SENT HIM TO A BROTHEL.

I'm not sure if I should be laughing or crying yet.

I finally get a hold of a nephew who is living near by.

"I am about to ask you to do something really weird.  But I need you to get into your car," I tell him.

I'm beginning to explain the situation when The Arch Mother calls back. I answer her call and she's laughing saying that he just walked in the door. I tell the nephew he's off the hook and I'll call him later.

"You're never going to believe it.  But he found a place that took walk-ins!" 

 "Mom, you have NO IDEA. It is a brothel."

"A what? A hotel?"

"No, mom, it's a cover for prostitution. The chiropractor told me." 

At this point, we both get the giggles.  Again, terribly inappropriate. And pretty soon I can't stop laughing.

Also, I have no idea why I am using the word brothel?  Suddenly I am from the old west?

I can hear my dad in the background.

"What did she say it was? A brothel? Well, if that's the case than I didn't get my moneys worth."

Meanwhile at my house, my nine year old proceeded to whack his face and finger on our kitchen table. So as The Brick is getting on the phone to tell me the story, I have to hang up to deal with a very bloody nose and bruised finger. Just like my mother,  I am clearly not being sympathetic enough to my poor son, but I still can't get over the fact that my mother just sent my dad to "a happy ending" kind of massage.

I finally got to talk to him later and he said the masseuse was recently emigrated from Laos (3 months), that she wasn't forward or inappropriate, but that looking back it didn't seem like a very fancy place.  He thought there was someone in the next room, but he wasn't sure.  We laughed again.  He had a great night sleep and started feeling better pretty much right away.  So in the end, the massage was just the trick.  Just not the kind of trick she might have been expecting.

You just can't make this stuff up.