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  • #31
    and finally after all that.

    a reply to my mother in reply to the reply from my sister






    Mom,

    From my perspective I see you making the decision to have Grandma live at a home is you giving her the health care she needs to be happy and healthy. I see this as you wanting her to have a safe environment to live in. Grandma is counting on you to make the right decision that is best for her. I feel that you have made the best decision for Grandma based on her illnesses and her Dr's reccomendation. I don't see this decision is based on what is best for you mentally. I don't see how this could help your mental well being when you are constantly challenging your decision in your mind worrying you have come to this too soon. This sadness that you feel and the worrying that you are not doing best for Grandma will fade in time. After time I think you will be at peace with this decision and will come to see Grandma will be better off for you doing this. Until that time comes you need to do what makes you feel at peace.

    I will do what makes me feel at peace and happy. I have 24 hours in my day and I will hope for as many days as possible I can spend 1 of those 24 hours sharing with my only living Grandmother. I have a quiet joy and sense of peace knowing that I am comforting Grandma and helping her get aquainted with her new enviornment and the people she now will be sharing her life with. I look at this quite differently than Curtis and that is ok. I understand Grandmaws illness as becoming almost childlike again. I look at this in a similiar way of Isabella attending a new school this year with not a single friend there. Isabella closed up and had a very tough year. Isabella was unahppy most of the time and affraid to be outgoing and friendly which is the way I am used to seeing her. Once she made a friend she opened up to the possibilities and potential her new school has. I remember my life and changes we made but I always had a frie nd everywhere because I had my twin and this made changes much easier. Grandma has not a single friend in her new environment. She would probably choose to stay in her room and look out her window alone. Instead, family visiting her will take her to the cafeteria to meet new people to eat. Her family will invite others to stop by her room to see Grandmas great grandchildren and get aquainted with Grandma. Grandma will have her family to help her get aquainted with these people she will be sharing her life with and her family will help her get aquainted with this new environment. I choose to be part of that and help comfort her during this time she is scared.

    This family has always been very unique in their beliefs. It seems we might never come to any resolutions that will make us all happy with each other. This is ok. I am starting to understand that although other peoples decisions and actions make me sad, angry and sometimes hurt I cannot make decisions for them. We all make our own. I need to be happy with my decisions and hope they make me better for them.

    I believe Grandma is at a point in her life where the choice to be happy is not made within herself. I feel her illness and her age does make her helpless to a point. I wish it were as easy as Grandma listening to a tape or reading a motivational book to make herself happy. Wouldn't that just make all our lives easier. I think our family and friends play a big part in creating happiness in our lives. I think of how I have struggled with many things in my life and how sad I have been even to this day. My happiness is not something I create from within because I choose to feel happy. My happiness comes from the joys my family and friends bring to my life. I am the happiest when Kiersten says something new and so silly I laugh. I am happy when I see Isabella growing into a caring young girl who wants to visit a nursing home to see Grandma and other patients she has already become a familiar face to in a weeks time instead of going across the street to play with her friends. I am happy when I am talking on the phone with Mitch and hearing what he's doing in California. I am happy that I have such a wonderful family to share my life with instead of living my life alone. I don't know how I can make a choice to be happy or not. I make the choice to be happy with myself so I can love as much as I do.

    I hope that this family can stay together through this and realize that we have each other to make our lives happier. We have each other to get through the hard times and to have the good times with. Mom, I am seeing you the saddest I have seen you in years but at the very same time the happiest I have seen you in years because of the joys you have sharing time with your grandchildren. I don't feel I am being manipulated to visiting Grandma but that I am sharing my life with my Grandma. I only have one family and one life so i choose to grow with my family, hurt with my family and be happy with my family.

    I know I will always remember this time being hard for Grandma and very difficult for you. I know that more than that I will remember this time being so much easier because Isabella was there and in an instant made this week so normal and made this week so peaceful. As though she has done this before she took hold of Grandmas wheel chair and said we will be down the hall. Isabella had this spirit this week to want to be with Grandma each day and the other patients in the home as well. In an instant she began introducing Grandma to other patients and planning Grandmas week with her involved as though she knew more than we all did. She had a gift to do things I wouldn't have done myself. I will always remember Isabella telling me to wake her up early so she can do something early with Grandma, knowing how difficult it is to wake Isabella up at 13! I will remember Grandma telling Isabella no, she doesn't feel like doing anything but Isabel la asking the following day. I will remember Isabella wanting to be dropped off at Grandmas so she can visit longer than I could visit with Kiersten and Austin. I will remember Isabella making these choices during her summer vacation at only 13. I will remember this time as this because Isabella brought grandma and us happiness during a hard time. I know in time Grandma will be ok and I hope we can all get to that point together as a family.

    I love you and hope you are smiling.

    Love Sonya





    -i thought it was very Inspirational..my niece is something else. and so apparently is my sister sonya.
    www.lizziemorrison.com

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    • #32
      Hi Liz,

      I hope you don't mind me sharing my thoughts since you shared such personal information with us (which is courageous btw).

      I think your brother said it best:

      we can't make another person accept anything. whether it be somone, something, or someplace. from my perspective, grandmaw going into a home was a lot more about your mental health than hers. no matter how many years she manipulates you into believing you are responsible for her happiness, it's just not so. she'll be happy when she chooses to be happy. just like you and i will be happy when we choose to be happy.

      that being said, i have spent more time myself making the choice to be unhappy than the choice to be happy, so i can't really preach in public..yet. today, i'm choosing to be happy, and grandma's perceptions, whether you still share them or not, can't change that.
      People choose how they want to feel. And one of the best things about life is giving someone else the dignity and respect to make that choice all by themselves. It may not be your choice or someone elses choice but it was that person's choice and we all need to respect their decision. Hope this makes sense.

      That said, I wish your family and your grandmother all the happiness they deserve.
      Ladies and gentlemen, take my advice, pull down your pants and slide on the ice.

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