Monica
At the age of 21, and days before my wedding, my grandmother passed away.
The day the decision was made to call the family in, I was in a doctor’s appointment with the ringer on my phone turned off. After my appointment, I realized my mother had called an exorbitant amount of times, and being the dutiful daughter I always am, I immediately called her back. Out of character for her, she demanded to know why I had not answered, and then, ignoring my explanation, she tearfully told me the news.
Now, my grandmother did the same thing every summer where she refused to eat or drink, opting instead to lie comatose in bed with a feeding tube. I didn’t see any reason for this summer to be any different, but unbeknownst to me, the decision was made to let her go.
She hadn’t known who I was in eight years, but her body was still there to visit even if her mind was not. I should have been prepared, I should have been grateful her struggle was almost over, but I was not any of those things. No, I felt selfish and sad.
Never in life have I prayed harder for anything than as I did for my grandmother to know me just one more time, for the chance to say, “I love you,” and she know who said it to her.
As He unfailingly does, God answered my prayers. While in town to pick up bridesmaids dresses, I stopped by for a spur of the moment visit. As I went to leave, my grandmother suddenly squeezed my hand, and made direct eye contact with me. We looked at each other and I knew she knew who I was.
Over the years I was asked many times by friends and teammates why my family went to see my grandmother every weekend when she didn’t know we were there. I admit, sometimes the question was asked by me.
The reason is because the phrase “out of sight out of mind” should never apply to our loved ones.
My mother wrestled with the decision to put her mother in a nursing home, a decision my grandmother was steadfastly against. When we first visited her at the nursing home, she would beg to go with us, forcing us to shut the door in her face and walk away, only to go through the whole experience again a week later.
One of my grandmother’s nurses told us, “Your care is only as good as who is working.” Her words resonated with me and came back to haunt me when I began my career in nursing. Sadly, there is no shortage of bad nurses who know which of their patients have visitors and which do not.
In NY, I worked for a nursing and rehabilitation center, we’ll call Nancy’s Place, in a miserable little town we’ll call Redbud [extra points to anyone reminded of Chevy Chases’ Funny Farm], where I was primarily responsible for administering medications. When a resident needed to be sent to the hospital, I prepared their medical history and notified next of kin. To my horror, many had instructions given by their family and written in all capital letters to not contact them until the resident died.
Nancy’s Place was periodically besieged with scabies. After “patient zero” was hospitalized, administration learned the scabies were actually Norwegian Scabies as opposed to your run-of-the-mill scabie. Nothing was ever done, despite someone making an anonymous call into the state, which only resulted in a two- week quarantine of the facility. The state never followed up to see if the issue was resolved. To this day I cannot understand allowing people to be eaten alive in your care.
No matter how upsetting it may be for you personally, think how sad it is to be locked away and never visited. I can tell you first hand it is a lot sad to see patients eagerly watch the door for a sighting of their loved one that never comes.
Over the holidays I visited my aunt who no longer remembers who I am either, and it brought to mind my grandmother, and all that I experienced working in nursing.
Seeing my cousin now struggling with the same decisions for her mother that I watched my mother grapple with, I felt this was important to share. If you have made the difficult decision to put your loved one in a nursing home, or know someone in a nursing home, please remember my little story and don’t forget to visit.