Marking the one-year anniversary of Evelyn’s move to memory care

One year and one week ago Evelyn moved into her new residence at Artis Senior Living in Mason, Ohio. The months since then have seen us both adjust to new routines as well as cope with changes we never anticipated.

One year ago I posted this picture of Evelyn posing with Artis caregivers on the day she moved there.

When I reported the move in a blog post last April, I wrote, “The fact is, there’s no good decision. I’ve made what I hope is the least bad one.” This week I can say without reservation it would be nearly impossible today for Evelyn to live at home. Certainly, we would require 18- or 24-hour daily care: difficult to find, expensive to pay for, intrusive, and likely not much better for Evelyn.

I have learned some things, though. For starters, we couldn’t have seen everything that would come in the year ahead.

Expect surprises

Long ago my support group leader told us, “Expect surprises.” What she really meant, I believe, was, “Expect to be surprised.” Good advice, because this journey has been one surprise after another.

The biggest of these, of course, was Evelyn’s ambulance ride to the hospital June 2. She had passed out and was struggling to breathe. Her blood pressure and oxygen levels were critically low, and she could not be awakened.

I remember thinking as I followed her ambulance from Artis to UC West Chester Medical Center, This is happening way too soon. I know she’ll die someday. But not today. What will I do if she dies today?

I stood over her bed after she was settled in the emergency room while technicians visited throughout the morning to take blood and check vital signs all. Finally, a scan in the afternoon revealed the problem: She had multiple blood clots in both of her lungs. The possibility of death was as real as I had feared.

Thankfully, she fully recovered, but I believe that three-day hospitalization was a fork in the road, turning Evelyn onto a path toward further decline.

Accept change

When she returned to Artis, the director of nursing suggested we enroll Evelyn in hospice care. It has been one of the best decisions I’ve made and most positive changes we’ve experienced.

Not only does hospice supply the hospital bed and all incontinence supplies, it also provides us with a whole staff of caregivers: aides who give showers, a music therapist, massage therapist, and chaplain; and a visiting angel in the personage of the nurse who checks Evelyn weekly and is available any day to answer my questions. She sings to her and shows her videos, checking her vital signs while Evelyn hardly notices. It’s wonderful.

Good, but not wonderful, was the decision to confine Evelyn to a wheelchair.

Good, because Evelyn was very unsteady on her feet and was falling two or three times every week before her hospitalization.

Not wonderful, because she often wants to stand, and if she stands when the chair is not pushed against a table with locked brakes, she will fall.

Thankfully, the few falls since June have not been serious. The staff does as well as they can keeping her safe in the chair. (One new challenge: she fidgets with it and can unlock the brake on the left side with her stronger hand. Unnoticed, this is a problem.)

The reality of change still sometimes takes me by surprise. I was shocked and depressed the first time she wouldn’t smile when we asked her. I am frustrated by the increasing difficulty to engage her with conversation or activity. I am intrigued by her near compulsion to read or study whatever we hand her. But nowadays she seldom reads even one paragraph aloud.

She is withdrawing into an ever-smaller world. I look at some residents around her who sit staring and silent in their wheelchairs all day long. Will that be true someday for Evelyn, too? My Pollyanna core won’t admit the very real possibility.

Look for blessings

Meanwhile, as I’ve mentioned before, my life is awash with blessing. So many friends and professional caregivers extend such goodness to both me and Evelyn. I never have a week without a breakfast or lunch or evening with someone else, and many weeks my calendar shows several such get-togethers. And I’m finding meaningful ways to serve.

When we can coax a smile from Evelyn, she’s as pretty as ever. These pictures were taken yesterday, one year after her move.

Evelyn is diminished but not suffering. I am alone but not often lonely. She doesn’t miss me, and when I grieve all we’ve lost, I’m helped by hollering at God about it—and dumping my feelings into this blog.

At a funeral this week I bumped into many longtime friends and acquaintanceswho told me they are praying for us. I hear this from someone almost every week. I can’t help but believe our equilibrium is at least partly due to God’s response to all this intercession.

Extend grace

I’m slowly becoming more patient with others—and with myself.

One night last week, tornado sirens after 9:00 p.m. sent the Artis staff into crisis prevention mode. They got all the residents out of their rooms (many of them already in bed) and into the central hallways away from any windows.

I can’t imagine the chaos of herding a crowd of folks who are confused most of the time on a good day. Lifting them into wheelchairs. Ushering them into the hall, maybe against their will, and getting them to stay there.

In the hubbub, Evelyn fell. But she didn’t hurt herself. She was as safe as possible. Could I have done any better at home by myself? Upon reflection I realized the answer is no, and so I decided not to fuss. It shouldn’t have happened, but accidents happen. How many falls have been prevented every week because of this staff’s watchful eye?

There’s nothing like facing two incurable, chronic, progressive diseases to remind you of something we all know but often forget: You can’t control anything but yourself. I struggle to manage even that, and our good God has promised to love me anyway.

So I try to demonstrate some measure of the grace that has been heaped upon me. It’s a daily effort.