A Life Time

by Merick Humbert

“It hurts… It hurts… I’m scared… don’t leave me…”

I felt powerless—sitting there as she stared through me with a look of horror on her face.

“I don’t want to do this anymore… It hurts…”

My hand was clutched in her weak grip—all the strength she had.

“I can’t… I’m scared… make it stop… help me… help me.”

I will never forget that sound. She was all bones. Her skin was loose. Her hair was white. Her eyes were wide. She squeezed my hand as she cried out and my mother went searching for the nurse.

*

I thought my mother was being dramatic. She told me that my grandmother didn’t have much time left and we needed to go see her.

“She’s in pain,” my mother told me over the phone. “Great pain, but they can’t find anything physically wrong with her. They don’t know what it is. Your aunt was up there this weekend and says I should get over there as soon as I can. They are giving her morphine. I just want her to be comfortable. I’m driving up Friday. I want you to come.”

“Of course,” I said.

They had moved my grandmother to a home about two months earlier. They didn’t want to, and she didn’t want to go. They had been talking about her “situation” for years. It was always a point of conversation anytime my mother got together with any one of her three sisters. She didn’t want to live with any one of them. She wanted to die in her home.

Despite a comfortable savings, her husband refused in-home care. “I can take care of her myself,” he said. “I don’t want anyone inside my house. We are managing just fine.”

They were until they weren’t.

Meanwhile there were no plans put in place and nothing was organized. By the time that they no longer had a choice, long after their lives had become unmanageable, their minds had degenerated into a state of confusion, the body breaking down in unison, only slightly behind the mind on the road to forgotten.

            Dr. Fitzpatrick, her husband, had been picked up by the police in the middle of the night, about two miles from home, wandering around barefoot and in his bathrobe—lost. About a month later, he found his pistol in the basement and decided it wasn’t safe to keep in the house, so he walked through the front door of the police station to turn it in, loaded gun in hand, and he pissed himself when three officers drew their guns on him, yelling for him to drop it and get on the floor.

            Dr. Fitzpatrick had been doing everything for my grandmother. As her ability to walk began to deteriorate, they moved their entire life to the first floor of their three-story Victorian home. He might venture upstairs from time to time, for this or that, but the top two floors became a museum—another life and time preserved in dust. The dining-room was converted into the bedroom.

In the mornings, he would change her Depends, get her dressed and into her chair, wheel her to the kitchen, and make her a breakfast that consisted of toast, eggs, and three prunes. Sometimes he would mix it up, but always three prunes. After breakfast, he would take her to the bathroom and then the living-living room, where he would move her into her rocker in front of the television set. He would bring her the Langsville Daily Bugle and a glass of water and sometimes he would join her in his twin rocker seated to her left. On other occasions, he might run errands or find some project around the house to keep himself busy.

After he drove through the front of the garage, hitting the gas in search of the break, his daughter finally convinced him to give up driving and he hired a young woman named Nancy to do his driving. She was a student who lived down the street and she would come once a day, around noon, to see if he needed anything or wanted to go out. He always went somewhere—the bank or the grocery store or Dave’s Hardware—even if there was nothing that he really needed. Sometimes Nancy would take them both out to get something to eat. Otherwise, he would make my grandmother lunch and, in the evenings, he would make dinner. From time to time he would order pizza or Chinese, but this was rare, and something he always regretted, when he woke in the night with severe indigestion.

He had a garden in the backyard that he would tend to during the days when the weather was nice, where he grew tomatoes and squash and peppers and green beans. If he left my grandmother for too long, she would get scared and call her children, and if none of them answered, she would call the police. The officers got to know my grandparents quite well. One day, Dr. Fitzpatrick fell in the garage and couldn’t get up and by the time the police arrived, my grandmother had soiled herself in her chair and they took him to the hospital for a broken ankle.

Nancy was the only help that he would accept. Eventually, my mother and her sisters were forced to move her into elder-care. “I don’t want anyone in my home,” he kept saying. “I can take care of her.” One day, she was taken to the hospital for a broken hip and from there, she was moved to the facility. She never returned to her home. About two weeks later, Dr. Fitzpatrick, after some pressure from his own children, relented and was forced to have in-home care for himself. It was too late for my grandmother to return. If it had only been a few weeks earlier, they could have been together. My grandmother could have died in her home, as she wished.

*

I left my wife at home with our son. Marie wanted to come but she hardly knew my grandmother. My son would be turning two in the fall and he had never met Hilda. She couldn’t make it to our wedding, and she had only met Marie once—one thanksgiving sometime after. I didn’t see the point. Considering the drive—with the kid, and the dogs—it was just easier for me to go by myself. I figured it would be better just me and my mother, and besides, like I said, I thought she was being dramatic about my grandmother’s condition.

            It was about a two-hour drive to my mother’s, considering the traffic, and then it would be another six-hour drive until we would finally arrive at Sumpterton Assisted Living, just outside Cleveland.

            My mother lived in a little house on a cliff overlooking the river. As I pulled down the cobblestone drive, I was greeted by Frankie and Bettie, a yellow and a chocolate lab. My mom walked out of the house carrying a plant in a large clay pot.

“Hey, Gene,” she said as I was stepping out of my old gray Accord. “Come help me get this in the ground, and then we can hit the road.”

            She set the plant by the corner of the porch.

            “No hello, good to see you?”

            “Gene, I just want to get moving. My mother is dying, ok? So, hello, good to see you. Can you help me with this so we can go?”

            “Yeah. Sorry, mom. You ok?”

            “Yeah, Gene. I just want to get going. Grab that shovel.”

            I took the shovel that was leaning against the side of the porch and began digging a hole next to the steps where she wanted. She began scraping the edges of the soil in the pot and pulling at the plant trying to loosen it. She was clearly shaken by everything going on.

I thought about the day that I would be in her shoes. The day that I would be on the brink of losing her. There was a deep sadness, and dread in the pit of my stomach at the thought. I went through something similar before. I lost my father when I was twenty-four. Lung cancer. He was fifty-nine. Smoked cigarettes for thirty years. Started when he was twelve and then finally quit at forty-five. My mother never remarried. Never even went on a date, as far as I know. That always made me sad. It was hard when I lost my father. But he was young. My grandmother is ninety-four. But I suppose it is always hard.

“There we go,” she said as she patted down the earth at the root. “It’s a Forsythia bush; it’s going to be so beautiful when it blooms.”

            She picked up her watering can and showered the soil.

“She’s thirsty,” she said with a smile on her face. “Alright. Let me clean up real quick, and we’ll go. Thank you, Gene.”

We stopped for a coffee and a breakfast sandwich and were back on the road on our way to Sumpterton by about nine o’clock. It was a Saturday morning and there wasn’t much traffic.

“Thanks again for coming with me, Gene.”

“Of course.”

“This has just been such a nightmare. I don’t want to put you and your brothers through any of this. When I get to this point, I just want you guys to pull the plug. Roll me and my wheelchair right off the dock. I’m going to have everything in order. Just you wait.”

I didn’t want to think about it. She continued talking, telling me the same things I had heard from her mouth again and again. I just listened. I could tell she needed to vent.

            “She’s got three kids,” my mother went on, “all in this area, but ‘Ohio is home’ she tells me. I offered to take them both in here, but no. She says Dr. Fitzpatrick is taking care of her fine. Just an unwillingness to recognize the facts. We all get older, it’s something we all have to face—I don’t begrudge her for that—but they’ve just ignored it.”

            “What about Dr. Fitzpatrick’s kids. They live pretty close by them, don’t they?”

            “Yeah, but they’re no help. Might as well live on the other side of the country.”

            “I just don’t understand why they wouldn’t get in-home help.”

“It makes no sense, Gene. It makes no sense why they were even still in that house. It’s too much. And I told you, Dr. Fitzpatrick has in-home care for himself now. It makes me so angry.”

            “What made him change his mind? And why only after grandma left?”

            “Well, he’s hallucinating now. Seeing people.”

            “What?”

            “Yeah. But he’s aware of it at least. Knows it’s only in his mind. It is what it is, at this point. The stubbornness is just so frustrating.”

            “It’s too late for grandma to go back?”

            “Oh, Gene, yes.”

            “She didn’t seem too bad last time I saw her.”

            “Honey, that must have been two years ago.”

            “Yeah, geez, I guess you’re right.”

            “Are we gonna’ see Dr. Fitzpatrick while we are up here?”

            “No. I don’t think so.”

“Is he still visiting grandma?”

            “Not as much.”

            When we arrived at the home, a kind nurse led us down a long hall. It had the same feel as a hospital—cold tile floors, old-folks being pushed around in wheelchairs with oxygen tanks, or in some cases, IV bags hanging from metal poles. We walked by what looked like a living-room area with residents watching television from a couch or wheelchair. Finally, we came to a cafeteria where my grandmother was sitting with a blank stare on her face, being fed by a nurse. I was surprised to see that. There was another old lady sitting across from her, but she was eating on her own.

            “Hi, mom,” my mother said in her high-animated voice, as she crouched down beside my grandmother and kissed her cheek.

            “Who is that?” she said turning to look at my mother.

            “Your daughter and your grandson came to visit, Hilda,” the nurse said. “Isn’t that nice?”

            She turned and looked at my mother.

            “Carol. How wonderful. It’s so nice to see you. And Jimmy. What a nice surprise.”

            “No, that is Gene, mom.”

“Yes, of course. I know who it is. Misspoke is all.”

            “Hi, grandma,” I said, bending down for a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

            “How lovely.”

            “I can take it from here, dear,” my mother said addressing the nurse.

            “No, I need her.”

            “I’ll feed you, ma.”

            “Well, alright then.”

            The nurse got up and my mother took her place and began spoon feeding her applesauce and a runny egg while she talked. It was shocking to see my grandmother unable to feed herself. It didn’t seem so long ago that she was up and walking, scolding us for smoking cigars and drinking whiskey at our last family reunion.

“Will you take over for a minute, Gene. I need to go speak to the nurse about something?”

            I sat down next to my grandmother and helped her finish her dinner as my mother walked away. I didn’t really know what to say. I guess she didn’t either, really. All of the sudden, after a few minutes of silently eating the smallest little bites that seemed to take forever to swallow, she turned her head, looked at me and said,

            “I love you, Gene.”

            I was taken aback.

I felt tears well-up in my eyes.

            “I love you too, Grandma.”

            I don’t know what it was, but it was unexpected. It is not something I heard from her often, over the years. I knew she loved me, but she was kind of a cold woman. Not in a harsh sort-of-way, but in a, raised during the depression, lived through WWII, sort-of-way. A no-nonsense religious conservative who valued family, tradition, modesty, reputation and etiquette. She fostered some wonderful values that I am grateful she passed on. There are things I would do differently, of course, as it should be, but she was a generous woman. I wished I knew her better.

After a moment, my mother came back with the nurse. It was time for her pain medication, which I didn’t really understand, because we had been told that they had not been able to find anything specifically wrong with her. The nurse brought her into her room, and then a few moments later, told us that we could go in.

            My grandmother’s face was blank. I sat down beside her with my mother directly in front of us. My mother started talking about my wife and my son and the last time she visited us. After a few minutes,

            “You remember, Ma,” she said.

            My grandmother continued to stare blankly.

            “When daddy came home with the…”

            “Mom,” I said. “She’s not in there right now.”

I don’t know how she didn’t realize it. Maybe she just didn’t want to.

            All of the sudden,

            “It hurts… It hurts… I’m scared…”

            It was so abrupt and sincere, like, out of nowhere, she was being attacked.

“don’t leave me… I don’t want to do this anymore…  It hurts… I can’t… I’m scared…help me… help me.”

            My chest tightened and I put my hand in hers and felt her weak bones squeeze.

            “Mom. What’s wrong? What hurts?” my mother asked.

            “Stop it… Stop it… I just want it to stop… I want it to end… I’m scared…”

            She started rocking a little, back and forth.

            “It hurts… It hurts… It hurts.”

“Go get the nurse, mom!”

            My mother hurried out of the room. I could see the fear on her face. We all just wanted it to stop.

            “It hurts… No!... No… Please… It hurts.”

            “I’m right here, Grandma.” I didn’t know what else to say. I felt so helpless.

It was terrifying.

            “They said the nurses are all at lunch for another twenty minutes,” my mother said furiously as she reentered the room.

            “Well, tell them to put their lunches down and get over here. That’s absurd!”

            “I don’t like it… It hurts… I want to die… I’m scared.”

            My mom sat down and leaned in towards her mother.

            “I’m right here, mom. You want to pray?”

            “It hurts… It hurts…”

My mother started to recite the Lord’s Prayer. I didn’t even know that she knew it. I didn’t know it. After a few moments, my grandmother joined in. Her eyes were closed and I saw a tear on her cheek. She was calming down. Repeating those lines, one after the other.

Eventually, a nurse came in, gave her something else and moved her to the bed using a big sling on a crane-type thing. She fell right to sleep.

            “How long would she have been sitting in there, feeling like that, had we not been here?”

            “That was sickening.”

“I think it was the drugs.”

            “Why do you say that?”

            “She seemed alright when we arrived.”

            “I don’t know. I am just worried about her being left alone when we’re not here.”

*

My grandmother died in her sleep a week later. I carried her coffin from the hearse to gravesite and I remember thinking, at the time, how strange it was that her body was inside of this box. She was in there. That person that I knew and that I spoke to and that I learned from and that I laughed with and that I loved. My grandmother. Everything that she had been, it all came to this. Born into a country still recovering from one war and on the brink of another. A much different world than the one she was being buried in. I thought about all that she had been through in her ninety-four years. I thought about all that this country—this world—had been through in that time. I thought about all the things she had witnessed and lived through—the great leaps and bounds we have made as a species. I watched as her coffin was lowered into the ground. The same thing would happen to us all. With time moving on, and little pieces of us living on in each other.