A New Normal

Exactly one month ago, mom took her last breath.  She was surrounded by her family at her bedside, minus her husband Rafa who left this earth 14 months before.  We were there holding her hands, praying for her, kissing her cheek, rubbing her forehead, touching her face, while at the same time for about 5 days in a row, giving her Morphine almost every hour like clockwork.  Trying to ensure she did not suffer.

Immediately after, we did what we had prepared for, having gone through this process just a year earlier with dad, to make sure that we completed our mission of taking care of her.

For over 12 years, our lives revolved around mom.  Ensuring that we were there with her and for her. To support her and support dad taking care of her.  To capture as many memories as possible before they disappeared due to the Alzheimer’s disease that was working against our family.  Recording everything in logbooks that we noticed during our shifts, or something priceless that all of us should know.

We were "Mom’s Team” because mom needed a team, full time, to be there for her.  The team, consisting of Evelyn, Carmen, Annie, Luisa and myself, captured everything in our Mom’s Team message thread.  The messages flew constantly from every one, during all of the shifts we took throughout the day, every day.

Once a month, we would get together to work out the next shift schedule for the next month but most of the times, the majority of the shifts had a familiar pattern.

For about the last 4 years of her life, mom was bedridden.  Before that, for about a year or two, we took our shifts to help dad by taking care of the heavy lifting of tending to mom, feeding her, bathing her, changing her clothes, putting her on her bed and getting her out of it.  The shifts were broken into breakfast, lunch, dinner and then the evening shift.

It was how we rose up to the occasion to do our part and take care of her when she needed us most, but also when dad needed us most.  To care of her.

When we lost dad, and moved mom to Evelyn and Manny’s house, the pressures and time went from the 4 shifts to a 24 hour clock since we did not have dad to fill the gap between our shifts.  Even then, during the last few months before losing dad, he had lots of hospital and doctor visits that pulled on us from both ends.

There were times when the stress was intense since we had other things to do as well, such as business trips, doctor’s appointments for ourselves or for our kids, baseball games or swimming practices.  However, no matter what we had needing our attention, our first priority was to make sure that someone was available to cover for the other and make sure mom, and dad, got the help they needed.

For 12 years, we made it our priority to focus on them.  We cried out of despair of not being able to do more to stop or slow down her steady decline and prevent the inevitable.  But also from exhaustion of working a full day, going to take care of them, and seeing her enter a new phase of her disease in which she would forget who we were to her, who our kids were but most of all, who she was.

Now, 30 days later, after we said our last goodbyes and laid her to rest, we walk around with an intense feeling of guilt because of all of this "extra time" we now have.  Where we are not rushing to be there just in time for our shift, planning their next meal or the fact that they are not here with us.  That extreme sadness of not being able to say Hi Mom, or Angelita, which is what we would almost always say, because she did not know who Mom was or that she was Our Mom.

The hole in our hearts from the pain of losing them has been overshadowed for so long with our duty to serve them, that it feels strange not being stressed to do what we had to do in order to take care of her, but having some sense of relief that things are more relaxing for us.  The guilt of not having that stress which also means that we don't have them here with us.

It’s a new normal.  This uneasy feeling that in reality, is nothing more than what it was like, back 12 years ago, before we became Mom’s Team.

Not a day goes by that we don’t stop to look at the clock or look at our phone and wonder what messages we have missed in the Mom’s Team thread.  And when a message does appear, it is strange looking at the group title "Mom's Team" when Mom is no longer with us.

Everyone of us, glad that mom is not suffering anymore and is once again, back in the arms of the love of her life, have been overcome with a strange sense of uneasiness thinking we need to be somewhere else, living what has been our routine of the last 12 years.  We miss you dearly Mom.

A New Normal.