Driving back from Mom’s nursing home today, I whizzed north
on a road between sun-streaked horse pastures, most with multiple horses out
munching on grass and hay. Blue sky, trees in various autumn stages, yellow
leaves covering rolling lawns, pomegranate-colored bushes, and several dozen
gorgeous creatures in various shades of brown. I especially liked the elegant stance
of their slender front legs. Some horses ate grass under the split-rail fences
near the road.
Today these fences struck me differently than they did on
the dark gray day, April 4, 2011. Since then, fences have represented for me how
a nursing home defines a person’s world. On that horrible day, my father had
his loving homey free world reduced to a lonely regimented bare room. Because
of his Alzheimer’s, he didn’t understand this move, and he couldn’t really
converse with anyone. Imagining his sense of abandonment has made that day
stand out as the absolute worst day of my life. On that day as I drove by these
same fences, my heart, lungs, and stomach all constricted in agony.
Today, not so much. I feel sad that my mother’s homey free
world has been reduced to one room in the nursing home. She told me yesterday
that anxieties of adjusting to new routines and people keep her awake most
nights. And the Medicare rules, oh my goodness. The poor woman has had to fight
for five weeks to get a pill that she used to be able to walk in to Walgreens
and buy over the counter. I am sorry she has these hassles and restrictions.
But Mom is sharp and determined to look on the bright side of being in the
nursing home. When I visit, chances are good she’ll be out of her room,
involved in a trivia game or Songs with Susan or a special celebration.
When Dad began nursing home life, all I could see was one
gray horse far off in a tiny muddy pen. But with Mom’s new beginning, I see
fences, yes, but around huge rolling pastures of green grass. A fence is an apt
metaphor for an institution; but if you’ll forgive my comparing my parents to
horses, I will say that Mom, well, I’m guessing she’ll be among those feeding
out near the edges.
