2008-02-19 
 

of baselines and other unanswerable questions

Been visiting Gram every day and helping her to eat one meal or the other. She's still not really home in her head. I mean, she's been getting fuzzy over the past year or so but right now she's still very far away.

The doctors keep asking hopefully about her baseline: how far away from her normal state of mind. This line of inquiry frustrates me. While I can rationally understand that she is one of many patients and that they don't have the frame of reference, my mind screams out at them. Of course she's not normal! Her hands are shaking and she can barely feed herself. She's not even understanding your question! Do you really think this is normal? Is this normal for anyone? (And then I fret because deep inside I'm worried about not having paid close enough attention to her state of mind before. Maybe she's closer to her baseline than I'd like to imagine. What about Christmas when she kept searching out a set of dishes that's been packed away in storage for quite some time yet. But then she didn't have the trouble eating that she does now. Didn't seem surprised to find a fork in front of her in the middle of dinner. Deep sigh. /mental rant.

No doctor, she's quite far away from her baseline.

Today at one point she started to giggle and we had this exchange:

Gram: Well look what he's wearing!
Me: Who Gram? Look at who?
G: The Indian.
M: What's the Indian wearing?
G: (pausing and then looking up she was clearly surprised to see me but answered anyway) A tomahawk.

I can only imagine that she had flashed back to some old movie, vacation or somewhen I shouldn't have been.

Later she seemed convinced that the corridor outside her hospital room was the entrance to a beauty parlor. After she went on about that for a bit, I did brush her hair and it seemed to make her happy.

Then, at times, she'd have moments when she clearly remembered something that happened yesterday, albeit in a slightly confused way. At one point she even asked if I'd found a job yet. (sadly the answer is still no, but then again, I'm not regretting getting to spend some extra time with her)

She'll get obsessed with the blanket on her lap, folding the corners down and smoothing it over. Folding down, smoothing over. Today she looked up at me after doing this for several minutes and said, "I just don't know if this will ever be finished." I distracted her with the fruit cup, but her words hit me hard.

My question isn't whether she's going to get better as that seems a bit of a long shot. Her mind had been slowly unraveling even before she was confronted with the confusion of hospital routines and constant tests. What I want to know, without having to experience it directly, is what she's feeling now. Is it like some mind altered state? Is she aware that she's muddled? (Her obvious frustration at times leads me to answer yes to this.) Is it actually, maybe just a little bit fun for her at other times? The times that make her suddenly laugh? Is it like being under the influence of a mild hallucinogen, something that's okay when you're aware of what it is and willing to go along for the ride?

There's a big difference though. I've always heard that the safest thing to do when you really need the ride to be over, when you're hit with a rocky trip, is to sit quietly and remind yourself over and over again that "this too shall pass." Eventually it does and life returns to normal again.

For Gram, there's no guarantee of a return, and I have no answers for her when she wonders if it'll ever be finished.

Labels: dose of mikey, spirit

* posted by me at 7:42 PM

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