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Category Archives: We Are Family

Quality Over Quantity

26 Tuesday Jan 2016

Posted by IfByYes in Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 13 Comments

Tags

aging parents, Alzheimer's, aspiration pneumonia, choking, dementia, parents, quality of life, thickening liquids

With the progression of my father’s Alzheimer’s, his physical condition has become increasingly frail.

The man who never ailed a thing throughout my entire childhood now gets recurrent bladder infections and pneumonia. He moves at a slow shuffle, and falls easily. His cheerful tenor voice has disappeared and he can’t speak above a hoarse whisper.

  
We went for dinner at a neighbour’s house. Her son was home for the holidays, and he hadn’t seen Dad in years. Dad taught him how to drive and he has always liked my father very much. He spent half an hour carefully shovelling new snow off of the front porch and driveway so that it would be easier to get Dad to the car, but Dad still slipped and fell into the snow, causing a big kerfuffle.

“It’s embarrassing,” Dad told me later when I asked how he was feeling. “I feel like a sissy.”

Once upon a time Dad would have been the one shoveling the driveway, and clearing off the car. But now he falls in the snow and is hustled, shivering, into the car by the boy he once taught to drive, who is now a thirty year old man.

For the most part, he bears it without complaint. Alzheimer’s robs its victims of their faculties and dignity, but my father had so much dignity to begin with that somehow he still has plenty left, and my mother does everything she can to keep him feeling well and able to live at home.

He chokes on his food a lot, and they think that this is the cause of at least one of his bouts of pneumonia, because he inhales stuff. So they told my mother that he shouldn’t be allowed to drink thin liquids any more, or eat food that is easy to accidentally inhale. Instead of water, he should have smoothies, and so on.

They gave her a list of all of the risky categories of food. That list is two pages long and seems to encompass every single kind of food there is.

  
So, my poor mother now has the burden of finding foods that do not stick together, but also don’t NOT stick together (??) and so on. She also has to thicken his all of his drinks. They gave her a pamphlet on that, too, with suggestions like adding pureed banana, tasteless “drink thickener”, or even baby pablum.

For example, to thicken soda pop (I swear I’m telling the truth), they advise whisking the pop thoroughly and then blending in pablum until it is nice and thick.

  
Mmm. Tasty.

So Dad drinks a lot of smoothies now, since banana is a good thickener, and occasionally Mum lets him have some egg nog. He eats whatever she gives him to eat or drink without complaint, but I am sure he misses drinking water and milk like a normal person.

One night my mother poured me a glass of rosée, and my father came shuffling over. He pointed to the bottle and said in his new, husky, quiet voice, “don’t you think I should keep her company?”

“What’s that, dear?” my mother said distractedly, working on dinner.

He gestured at me. “It seems cruel to make her drink alone.”

“Oh, you want a glass of wine?”

“Just to be polite, you know,” he replied with a hint of a sparkle in his eye.

“Well, you’re not supposed to have that… I can get you some more thickened egg nog if you like…”

“Aren’t we going for quality of life over quantity at this point?” I said, exchanging amused glances with Dad.

“Yeah,” said Dad hopefully.

So Mum poured him a glass of wine. With no bananas in it at all.

Sometimes, it’s the little things in life.

Saying Goodbye To Old Times

14 Thursday Jan 2016

Posted by IfByYes in East, West, Home is Best, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Alzheimer's, Christmas, family, home, Nova Scotia, time, traditions

Our Christmas home in Nova Scotia felt sort of… final, to me, this year.

We plan to spend next Christmas here in BC because it is expensive to travel during the holidays, and it makes a stressful time just that much more stressful. Our next trip to Nova Scotia will probably be during the summer when more people will be free to get together with us, and travel is safer and cheaper.

Although the snow was certainly a thrilling novelty to Owl.

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My father’s Alzheimer’s is slowly progressing. He still knows who everyone is, and what is going on, but he is frail, and quiet, and easily confused. My mother has to help him shower, get dressed, and she puts him down to bed for naps and at bed time like a child.

But he’s still Dad.

img_4313If and when we spend another Christmas in Nova Scotia, the person that I know as my father may have faded away entirely.

Christmas was always a big deal in our house. Both my parents love Christmas, and we used to have all sorts of traditions built up around it. The annual tree decorating was so idyllic that my high school friends used to attend it too, because it was just such a Christmassy THING.

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But many of the traditions have fallen by the wayside one by one what with my commitments to Perfect Husband’s family, and my father’s illness, and the fact simply that time is moving on and things change.

We did still decorate the tree this year. Mum needed PH to help bring the tree in and get it set up. The last time we were home, Dad could still do that. He still sat and watched us decorate while he sipped egg nog, but once upon a time he would have been the one pouring the drinks and sloshing too much rum into everyone’s nog.

The decorators this year were mostly Mum and Owl, with me alternately helping, taking photos, and watching the baby. It was the same, but not the same, at the same time.

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If that makes sense.

Meanwhile, the Christmas Eve traditions on PH’s side of the family are going to be changing soon, too. Their Christmas Eve family gathering had the same food, the same schedule, but less exuberance. My nieces and nephews are older now. The next youngest to Owl is already ten years old, and most of them are young adults in university and beyond.

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Our kids were definitely the hit of the show.

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We got a family photo of all of the “kids”, including Fritter, on the front steps. We don’t know when another group photo will be able to be taken as the grown “kids” start moving away and living their own lives.

I’m really glad we made it home this Christmas, because I felt like I was getting a chance to say goodbye to these old traditions and accept that things are changing.

Owl got to experience and explore these “old times”, and I got to make my peace with their passing.img_4393

And these changes don’t have to feel bad. But they will be different.

Maybe that is okay. Maybe it is time for us to build our own traditions, here, at home.

In Which We Risk Medical Emergency/Financial Ruin To Meet Firefly Stars

04 Saturday Apr 2015

Posted by IfByYes in From The Owlery, How is Babby Formed?, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

Andy Runton, comicon, emerald city comicon, Firefly, Gina Torres, Jewel Staite, labour, Owly, pregnancy, seattle, star trek, travel

Everyone said we were crazy to do it, and we knew that they were right.

You do not travel two weeks away from your due date.

You especially do not travel close to your due date IN THE UNITED STATES.

The cost of American health care is infamous. BC radio is filled with Pacific Blue Cross commercials featuring John Cleese, in which he plays a greedy American (?) doctor called Nigel Bilkington who does x-rays on you just to make sure you have your wallet on you before you even receive care.

(Want to hear? I found one here.)

On the way to the border there are big signs reminding you that even a day trip can result in a broken bone and thousands of dollars of debt.

It’s important to remind Canadians of this because we take free health care for granted.

PH and I have cross-border insurance.

But no insurance will cover you if you wander into the states while totally full-term and end up having a baby there. I can’t even imagine what an emergency C-section or something would cost.

So why would we go?

comiconlogo.jpgWe go to Emerald City Comicon in Seattle every year. It has become a family tradition. Every year we get a new family portrait with some geeky-famous person. The first year was George Takei.

can you come up with a caption awesome enough to go with this photo?

The next year was Patrick Stewart.

My new favourite family photo

My new favourite family photo

I didn’t get around to posting about it last year, but we went again and got our photos taken with Alan Tudyk, otherwise known as Wash from Firefly as well as about a million other characters.

alan tudyk comicon

He put his arm around me. It was awesome.

This year, Levar Burton was scheduled to be there, and I couldn’t miss my chance at getting a photo with Geordie LaForge/The Reading Rainbow guy.

So we bought tickets. I bought a maternity shirt that read “The Next Generation” right over my belly.

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We also packed a hospital bag.

We figured that if we drove like hell, we could probably get back to the border within a couple of hours, and there was a hospital just across the border. All I had to do was hold the baby in ’til we got there.

Everyone told us it was a bad idea.

They were right.

Continue reading →

F*@# The Might-Have-Beens

02 Monday Sep 2013

Posted by IfByYes in East, West, Home is Best, From The Owlery, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

depression, family, introversion, miscarriage, parenting, vacations

I want to talk about the awesome week I just spent in Ontario with my mother’s side of the family. I want to talk about potato canons, and drunken mistakes with chinese lanterns, and 1000 piece puzzles, and the weirdness of hanging out with a bunch of cousins who share many of my nerdy ways.

But I can’t get up the enthusiasm because I’m too exhausted.

That week WIPED me. And I clearly didn’t have a lot of energy going into the vacation.

Oddly, the exhaustion is not directly due to the fact that I spent a week in a cottage with 20 relatives.

A significant portion of my mother’s siblings and their children are introverts. So while they enjoyed each other immensely, no one was surprised or disapproving if you wanted to disappear to your bedroom for a while, or take a book down to read at the beach (I walked down to the beach with Owl one sunny morning and found SIX relations reading on lounge chairs and no one in the water).

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But I was trying to do several things at once:

Continue reading →

I love getting cards from my Father In Law

28 Friday Jun 2013

Posted by IfByYes in I'm Sure This Happens To Everyone..., We Are Family

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

anniversaries, anniversary cards, father-in-law, funny cards, humor

My FIL tends to put his own realistic spin on the usual congratulations for birthdays or anniversaries.

This year’s anniversary card was another gem, check it out:

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We think that the original word was “all” but perhaps he thought this wish unrealistic or possibly even undesirable, since the bad times can be learned from?

Unsure.

Anyway, you can be this card will be treasured, because his personal touches are priceless.

New Traditions

25 Tuesday Dec 2012

Posted by IfByYes in East, West, Home is Best, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

board games, Christmas, elmo, family, gifts, ham, Jane Eyre, Munchkin quest, RC helicopter, sony, tradition, turkey

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas.

Mine was… strange.

I mean, it was good, but it was weird. It was the first time, ever, that I celebrated Christmas without my parents and our set traditions. Instead, Perfect Husband and I had to compromise to make our own.

Perfect Husband’s family celebrates Christmas on Christmas Eve. Santa comes early for them, while the kids are out on a drive, looking at Christmas lights. They have a big feast of ham and pot luck goodies.

My family has always done Christmas more traditionally. We go to church Christmas Eve, open presents Christmas Day, and have a turkey dinner that night.

So Perfect Husband and I had to work things out.

We agreed to open gifts from family/each other Christmas Eve, but that Santa would still come overnight so Owl could open his stocking Christmas morning. That worked out ok.

Perfect Husband got his ham, since I got turkey at Thanksgiving this year. I’m not sure how this quite works, though. He’ll get ham again at Easter (to me, ham is Easter food), so does that mean I have to do ham a third time next Thanksgiving before I get my next turkey dinner? Unsure at this point.

I did my sweet potato casserole, one of my favourite Christmas/Thanksgiving dishes, and Christmas Eve I made tortiere, my own family’s Christmas Eve meal.

So it was weird for both of us – PH because we were eating tortiere on Christmas Eve instead of ham, and me because we were eating ham on Christmas Day, instead of turkey.

We Skyped with my parents so they could watch Owl opening his stocking this morning, and that was nice.

And I got awesome gifts – Perfect Husband got me nerdy T-shirts, including an Anxiety Girl shirt, a geeky board game (Munchkin Quest, which we played this evening and is awesome), a promise of a video card once boxing day sales kick in, and I got a new video camera which I have been needing for a while (my friend and I have been toying with the idea of making dog training instructional videos, but not with my low-def 2007 model handycam!). This is a Sony PJ260V and is entirely awesome and has a PROJECTOR on it. So you’ll be getting some HD videos posted soon.

I was deeply relieved to learn that a gift he had ominously referred to as my “Fifty Shades of Grey Gift” was actually a toy helicopter – something I have always wanted – and nothing scary for the bedroom.

He also gave me (get this, The Squeee!) an 1858 edition of Jane Eyre, which he had professionally restored. It’s beautiful. I want to run my hands over it and keep it in my pocket but I’ve been keeping it up on a high shelf instead, well away from inquisitive toddlers!

And Owl, well, he got TOO MUCH STUFF!

Puzzles, books, stuffed animals, clothes, undies, noisy electronics… I think the cake was taken by our Daycare Lady, who apparently got him (and every other boy in the daycare) one of those Let’s Rock Elmos, which is both adorable AND creepy. I need to post a video of that soon because Owl was just AGOG.

Our favourite of our own gifts to him (which were minimal and actively reduced when we saw the influx arriving from relatives) was a $10 box of plastic foods, which pretty much deserves its own post, accompanied by cute HD video so stay tuned for that.

He fell asleep clutching the shark slippers my sister in law sent him.

We also exposed Owl to The Grinch (which he loved), Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (which bored him) and A Muppet Family Christmas (the unexpurgated version, which PH had transferred to DVD from a VHS tape six years ago), which held him entranced.

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I have a feeling I’ll keep forgetting that Christmas happened, since this was such a departure from all my previous Christmases. It felt like a wonderful day, but not like Christmas per se. It didn’t smell like Christmas, or taste like Christmas, because there was no turkey or gravy. It wasn’t at my parents’ house where Christmas always takes place. We opened gifts Christmas Eve instead of reflecting on the Christmas Story. It didn’t feel right.

I’m sure it felt just as weird to PH. But this is how new traditions start, I guess, with departures from the old. Maybe some day Owl will complain when things don’t match what today was like, because that will be Christmas for him.

I also haven’t been filled with that Christmas peace that I have had in the past, probably due to disruption of traditions and my work schedule interfering with my Christmas spirit. It’s hard to get in the mood when you’re working even on Christmas Eve, instead of on a mini-vacation back home, you know?

But I have no complaints. There will be many more Christmases, with turkey and grandparents, and midnight mass, and next year Owl will understand about Santa, which will be fun. We kept telling him Santa brought him his stocking stuff and he kept saying “No, Daddy did it!”

And I have a second edition of Jane Eyre, man.

No complaints at all.

I’ll Be Home For Christmas… Next Year?

10 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by IfByYes in Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 23 Comments

Tags

Christmas, distance, family, traditions, travel

We aren’t going home for Christmas this year.

Not only is it expensive to do every year, but PH couldn’t get Christmas Eve off of work, and since that’s when his family celebrates, it would be $4,000 for him to miss Christmas anyway.

So we aren’t going, even though I’m an only child and my parents will be spending Christmas alone together for the first time in 30 years. Even though PH’s brother just moved back to Nova Scotia, so it would be the first time his entire family would be together in one room since our wedding, and the first Christmas entirely together in… who knows how many years.

We aren’t going, even though my parents have decided that they can’t come here, either, which is what they did in 2008 when we were recovering from the costs of our honeymoon.

My Dad’s health is pretty good overall, considering his age and considering the fact that his two older siblings both died of cancer in the last five years. But he’s not up for travelling long distances any more. It’s too much hassle and he would rather spend a quiet Christmas at home. Even if Owl and I aren’t there.

My mother is depressed about it. Dad thinks it’s time that PH and I developed our own family traditions, had a private Christmas together, but my Mum would say “Eff that!” and come in a heartbeat if she didn’t think that leaving Dad and the diabetic cat alone for Christmas was probably wrong.

I’m… ok.

It’s hard to explain to someone with siblings how close-knit your family unit is when you are an only child. A friend of mine from Toronto happened to be in Vancouver one day so we went to lunch and we ended up talking about it – when you’re an only child, Christmases are quiet and intimate.

People talk about obligatory family spats and awkward moments at Christmas. My ex used to call me in tears on Christmas Day, after his traditional fight with his mother. In blog posts I hear people talk about a family disagreement as if it is as much a part of Christmas as cranberry sauce.

Yeah, I don’t know what that’s about. We have never had a Christmas argument in the history of ever.

In fact, my family’s Christmases are so idyllic that our yearly tree trimming always attracted a few of friends, who enjoyed watching the fire, sipping my Dad’s heavy-handed egg nog, and decorating our tree while Karen Carpenter sang about sleighs and snow.

For the next two weeks my parents would spend every evening sitting by the fire, listening to music, sipping wine and occasionally sighing “what a pretty tree!”

Christmas Eve we would go to the midnight mass and sing Silent Night by candlelight, and then my parents would send me to bed and Santa would come.

Yes, that’s right, long after I achieved adulthood my parents continued to do the Santa thing, because I was still in the place of the child.

Only last year did things begin to change. We got Owl to bed and I participated in stocking stuffing.

This year my parents will just have each other, and since my mother stuffs both sets of stockings, I know she’s going to be bummed right out.

It will be easier on me – I’ll have Owl to think about, and really children are what make Christmas fun.

He’s discovering Christmas, and I love it.

“Yook! Wismus yights!”

“Yook! Wismus tree!”

“Yook! A man a beard. Santa.”

He still doesn’t really understand, though, so we’ll be talking him through Christmas the way we did last year. He understands presents, that’s for sure.

We’re planning a Skype session – maybe if I set up my netbook or my itouch in the right spot, my parents (and maybe even PH’s parents) can watch Owl opening his gifts.

I suspect that won’t be quite the same, though.

Hopefully next year, we’ll be having a White Christmas again.

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A Week in Wisconsin – Part Of Owl’s Heritage

25 Wednesday Jul 2012

Posted by IfByYes in East, West, Home is Best, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

family, home, in-laws, travel, wisconsin

Well, here we are, home.

Our week with Perfect Husband’s relatives in Wisconsin was an odd combination of relaxing and incredibly exhausting.

On the one hand, we mostly just hung around his grandmother’s house. There was a lot of watching baseball on TV, listening to repetitive stories, and meeting distant in-laws that I will never see again.

On the other hand, we mostly just hung around his grandmother’s house. There was a lot of watching baseball on TV, listening to repetitive stories, and meeting distant in-laws that I will never see again.

I felt like I had to mind my p’s and q’s at all times, because PH has terrified me with stories about his grandmother, who did have a penchant for recounting memories of times when she felt insulted, and graphic descriptions of the violence she wanted to commit in return (I heard the phrase “My, I wanted to jest to punch her face in!” far too many times).

In reality, she was perfectly sweet to me and just doted on little Owl. “C’mere and let me feed you!” she barked at him regularly, and then she’d chuckle as she spoon-fed him yogurt. “He’s just like a little bird!”

But I still lived in fear. PH told me not to read in front of her, because apparently the sight of other people reading has been known to insult her in the past. So mostly I just sat.

When possible we made excursions. We took PH’s mother and Owl to a Brewer’s game and we drove up to Green Bay where PH and his sister drooled over Lambeau Field and Owl toddled around going “Foot. Ball. Foot. Ball.”

But mostly, it was relatives, relatives, and more relatives.

Only one of these relations actually showed up for our wedding, so I hadn’t met most of them. PH barely recognized many of them himself, and had no idea who others were. His American branch of the family doesn’t have much in common with the Canadian side.

Our stay with his distant relations involved a lot of racking my brain for polite rejoinders to announcements like these:

“Women must be stupid for going through the pain of childbirth more’n once.”

“We were so poor even the black kids weren’t allowed to play with us!”

“Mormon’s aren’t Christians!”

“I just had the most blessed bowel movement!” 

Ultimately, even though everyone was very nice to me, I was relieved to leave. I think it was more exhausting to my introvert sensibilities than all of Las Vegas.

But Owl certainly learned a lot about sports while we were there – PH is delighted.

Dwelling On The Hellos

19 Saturday May 2012

Posted by IfByYes in East, West, Home is Best, Life and Love, We Are Family

≈ 6 Comments

It’s morning and I am five years old.

I slip out of bed and pad down the hall to the bathroom. The spare bedroom door is ajar, and I can’t resist a curious peep inside. Sensing my gaze, the woman in the bed stirs and opens her eyes. She spots me and her eyes light up.

“Hello, sweetie! Come in and give me a hug!” she insists.

I break into a smile.

Minutes later, I am in the bathroom and watching with fascination as my aunt shows me how she takes her blood sugar reading. Then she injects herself with insulin while I marvel at her bravery. I hate getting a simple vaccination, and yet she tells me that she sticks needles in her arm multiple times every day?

I proudly tell people that my aunt has “diabeetles”.

At age 5, these are the things I know about my father’s sister:

  • She potty trained me as a surprise for my parents when she babysat me one weekend.
  • She is very brave and gives herself injections.
  • She has diabeetles.
  • She thinks I’m special.

As time goes on and I grow older, I realize that my aunt just adores small children. I take this to mean that she didn’t actually adore ME, just my young age. The childhood worship fades, but you can’t help but love a sweetheart like my aunt.

A quarter of a century later, I am peeping in another bedroom door. At first she doesn’t notice me – my father is bending over her for a hug. But then she spots me peeking in the door, and her trembling hand covers her mouth.

“Oh… Carol…You came all this way..?”

I bend over to hug her emaciated frame, eaten by cancer, and tears stand in her eyes.

It was a long trip for one last visit, but it was worth it… to say hi one more time.

SNEAK POST

18 Sunday Mar 2012

Posted by IfByYes in Life and Love, Perfect Husband, We Are Family

≈ 11 Comments

Hi All,

PH again with my breaking-in. I normally don’t have the urge to gate-crash Carol’s blog, especially so soon after the last time, but I felt it appropriate, given the circumstances.

Today is our six-year anniversary. Not our wedding anniversary – we’ve only been married for three and a half years, give or take – but the anniversary of when we started dating. Yes, I track these things.

Carol is currently off enjoying the best anniversary gift I can offer her – a night out with friends while I guard the homestand. Little Owl has just been sung to sleep after a fun evening with Dada, and all is quiet in the house.

I’m a very lucky man to have ended up with Carol. She brings more to the table as a parent than I ever will. She’s creative, intelligent, and caring. She’s the best mother that I’ve ever met (or, at least, tied for first – sorry if you read this blog, Mom), and she’s an infinitely better wife than a schmo like myself deserves.

After six years, she still makes me smile when she walks in the door. After six years, I still want to be a better person every day just to impress her.

After six years, I still want a lifetime more.

I’m happy that I’ll get the chance.

Happy anniversary, love.

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