Open Door Healing

I love staying up until 2 am on Saturdays binging on my favorite show and then sleeping in until 10:30. I feel like I am getting away with something. Kind of like when our local Walmart had the in/out doors and I would go in the out door. I felt like such a rebel! When they redesigned they took the in/out signs down. Now it’s not fun. Which leads me into today’s mom story. I went to visit my mom today. I have a blink in her room, first because she accused the housekeeping staff of stealing her red and green pens, and then her toilet paper because she buys the good stuff, not the stuff they have etc. The blink has turned into a handy tool, I can see what is going on, which usually isn’t much, especially these days. I went by today because she didn’t go to church or go visit my step-dad in healthcare. She’s been having a lot of problem with her right hip, and I don’t know if she just forgot, or she just couldn’t go because of the pain. She said she wanted to ask me something. I’m like, sure, what’s up? Back in May she had taken one of the male resident’s to the air force base that is about 20 minutes away. She is not supposed to drive off of the facility grounds, only using her car to go visit my step-dad in healthcare which is in another section of the grounds. When I found out what she had done, I had a talk with her, that she had promised not to leave the grounds and that I did not want to take her car away. I thought she was taking him to a medical appointment, which seemed strange to me, because the facility has a service to take their resident’s to outside doctor appointments, the grocery store etc. Evidently, the gentleman asked her if she could take him again. She told him no, that I had put my foot down about her driving. She can barely walk at this time, let alone drive. Well, come to find out, she was driving him there so he could get his liquor, at the base because it is a little cheaper and no sales tax and he didn’t want the nurses at the facility to know how much he had, he told my mom they had been keeping track. And what was it that she wanted to ask me? He had asked her that since she couldn’t take him, would I do it? Um no. I am not taking a person I don’t know to get liquor. I told her they had driver’s there that would take him, and if it was too far for the driver, there was a liquor store 5 minutes away. She answered, “Oh, he doesn’t want them to know what he gets.” Again I replied, “No, it is none of my business and none of yours. We are not 17 sneaking alcohol.” When I was driving home, I started laughing. The memories of trying to buy Strawberry Boones Farm. I was never picked because I looked way too young. My mom had looked at me kind of strange, like she never did it. And maybe she didn’t. She grew up differently than I did. She went to the same school and lived in the same house until she was 19. And everyone in her little town knew everyone, so it’s not like you could get away with anything really. By 19, I had moved 14 times, 4 different states and 7 different school districts. I tried to be gentle as possible in telling her it was not her problem, and it definately was not mine. She also mentioned that she wanted to go see a “hip” doctor. I told her they had x-rayed her hips at the facility and could not find anything wrong. “That doctor doesn’t know what he’s doing.” She will not accept that at 83, her body, which she has not taken care of very well, is breaking down. And thus, I am drinking a glass of wine now. I know I won’t have these “problems” forever in my life, and I am doing my best to balance taking care of her and taking care of me. It does neither of us any good if I don’t have the energy for her, or my grandkids or Hubby and my animals. And life goes on. Blessings.