New directions

I could tell that the tides were turning on Thursday evening of this past week. I was lying in bed engaged in a coughing spell when Gilly appeared in the doorway. “Are you O.K.?” he asked caringly. I was taken aback; he seldom moves from his couch during the evening, and rarely takes notice of what goes on around him. “I’m fine,” I assured him. In the wee hours of the morning, I went to the bathroom. Upon return he questioned me again, “Are you sure you’re all right?” “Why?” I asked. “I just went to the bathroom like I always do in the middle of the night.” “It is the way you’re walking,” he responded. “You look like something’s wrong.” How very perceptive of him to notice that I was feeling uneasy and wondering if I’d be able to work the next day.

I woke up for work with a scratch-free throat. I firmly believe this has something to do with his show of concern; he magically healed me with his own burst of strength. I know that he cares deeply all the time, but expressing this is rare these days. Perhaps it’s because he’s at a loss as to what he can do about it, and feels badly that I have to go on managing pretty much everything regardless of my state of health or fatigue.

There have been other changes for the better in terms of willingness to socialize, a more cheery disposition, appetite and a regained sense of hope. He attended two Rosh Hashana dinners and held his own in the consumption department along with the rest of us (well, I suppose I beat him in the dessert department, but that’s nothing new). I gave him the opportunity to sleep to his heart’s content yesterday (until 2:00 P.M.) to allow him the opportunity to enjoy the evening’s festivities which technically cut into his usual nap time. It worked. Everyone who saw him last night would agree; he was in rare form, relatively speaking.

Yaron has changed too. Pretty soon, I’ll come home and fail to recognize my co-inhabitants! I arrived home on Friday afternoon in a mad rush to get ready to go out for dinner. Luckily I was not responsible to make dinner this year; it would have surely been take-out. Yaron asked a favour of me as soon as I walked in the door and I responded by spewing out all I had to do in the immediate future, including the laundry; I had items of clothing in there that I needed for the evening. “I did it, mom,” he humbly informed me. “Did what?” I asked absent mindedly. “The laundry,” he supplied. I put the clothes in the dryer this morning and put another load up to wash,” he announced. The gesture blew my mind. I stood up and took notice of how many notches in maturity he had recently climbed; it’s initiating the assistance without being asked that makes all the difference in my harried life. I was touched, relieved and thankful all at once. When you least expect it, your children demonstrate all you hope you’ve taught them over the years. It’s beautiful. It must have been the love that I added to the apple crisp on Thursday!

We have some decisions to make in the next little while as the doctors take their sweet time reading the MRI information from their respective standpoints and hospitals (ridiculous, but true). Gilly’s right side is much stiffer than before (or so it seems to my untrained, yet loving eyes). He resembles Twiggy, has little energy, yet his mood seems to have improved. He does not initiate self-care, but manages to care for himself when reminded. He does little with his time, but will accept invitations to walk when prompted (as long as the warmish weather holds out; I worry about his willingness to move outdoors once the snow arrives). So, what alternatives are available out there for us to try? With so little free time on my hands, and various other pragmatic constraints, it may be tough to find answers, but western medicine has let us down in the recent past, so I have to work on expanding the possibilities.

George shared a joke with me the other day to help lighten my mood, and it really is very apropos to our current circumstances:

What is the difference between doctors and G-d? Answer: G-d knows he’s not a doctor. (sorry doctor friends and compassionate doctors out there; it is not meant to be a blanket statement on doctors. I hate the old adage about teachers that my father used to remind me of when he wanted to pull my chain: If you can, you do. If you can’t, you teach).

I leant of the term ‘holistic’ from an educational angle a number of years ago, but never fully appreciated its medical significance before now. The western medical world compartmentalizes a person; each specialist examines you from his / her own standpoint. Luckily for us, the CNR team is a glaring exception to this rule. The professionals involved genuinely take the whole person and his needs into consideration. The CSSS is structured in somewhat of a holistic manner, and so we have had a modicum of well rounded services, but not nearly enough. It would be too much to expect, given the resources they have available. We have some leads, and I hope to pursue them this week as the MRI’s are analyzed and compared.