I just had a conversation with my Dad. Well, we tried. He kept saying, "Six, nine, eight, nine." When I'd say the words back to him, he'd smile and nod, like maybe this time I was getting it. When I said I didn't understand, he'd patiently repeat himself, adding with a questioning look, "Six times nine?"
We played 20 questions, and I successfully concluded that he didn't need anything; that he wasn't talking about my sister, Keegan, or me; that he had not seen a mouse; that he knew it was raining and that that was completely irrelevant. He finally lost patience, good-naturedly waving his left hand at me as he retreated in his wheelchair back inside his room. I think he just wanted to share something with me, some thought spurred by what he was watching on TV.
This is the second time in as many years that I have watched a parent become trapped inside their own bodies, and it's not any easier this time around. With my father, there is hope for improvement, with my mother, we had only the promise of continued decline. Watching my father take the six tortured steps from his wheelchair to the toilet, a thousand different emotions crash over me.
There's guilt, an odd first choice of emotion, but it's there. Any other emotion deemed inappropriate by my desire to be a "good daughter" brings with it guilt. Even greater than that, I feel guilt merely for my ability to stand in front of him unaided, for being able to close the bathroom door, as it is dependent upon my being able to stand up and use my arms simultaneously. My youth and impatience seem to be mocking him. My very help seems somehow cruel.
Pity, fear, love, resentment, respect, sadness, pride, each appears briefly and acutely painful in its own way. I focus on my own feelings because to try to imagine his seems somehow presumptuous. His life is forever altered - how could I possibly hope to understand how he feels? I wish I could ask him. I wish he could tell me.
The worst of it is that I can't wrap my head around the fact that he seems happy so often. He's home, he can feed himself, he can communicate basic needs, he seems in good humor. And I don't understand it at all. Watching him struggle makes me cry. Trying to communicate with him makes me cry. There are no actual tears - to cry in front of him seems cruel, but to smile and congratulate him on his ability to stand without help feels falsely bright.
I'm sure that as time passes, things will settle. I expect the tumult of feelings will not subside, but perhaps their strength will lessen. I have no idea if this is how I'm supposed to feel, but I think I've decided to abandon that entire mindset. There's no "supposed to", there's just all of us, doing the best we can. That will have to do.
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