My Husband Says I Body Slammed My Aging Mother3

We had an incident today.
My mother, who is 101, has become increasingly helpless. When I prepare her meals, I have to pull her up physically to a sitting position, dash around behind her before she slumps over again, and pile four or five pillows behind her to prop her up.
Then I place her food on a rolling tray and pull it to the bed.
When I try to dress or bathe her, she is dead weight. I can’t coax her into rolling over, turning sideways, or shifting her position, so everything I do requires physical strength.

I am 68 years old, a small 120-pound woman. But fortunately, in light of these most recent caregiving responsibilities, I am fairly strong. I’ve always exercised religiously, and my most recent job required a lot of physical exertion and lifting.
But lifting my mother is beyond my ability. Even hoisting her up enough to dress her is a challenge. So yesterday I called in reinforcements, which happened to be my husband. He was getting ready to step into the shower.
“You need to hold her up so I can get her clothes changed,” I said. “This is beyond me.”
He came to the rescue immediately, in his underwear. Meanwhile my mother, who was also in her underwear, lay inert on the bed. I was the only one who wasn’t in my underwear.

My husband hoisted her up over her vehement protests and deposited her in a chair next to the bed. This gave me a chance to bathe, her, clothe her, and change her sheets while he piled her dirty linens in the washing machine.
But then came the real challenge. Getting her back to bed. He slid his hands beneath her arms, lifted my protesting mother, and that’s when she began to slide.
“I’m losing her,” he said. “She’s going to hit the floor.”
My mother was groaning and crying out as she slipped lower in my husband’s grasp. She reminded me of reluctant toddlers who make themselves heavy when you try to pick them up. My husband said later that he expected me to use my weight to move her slightly toward him so we could both guide her easily onto the mattress.
Instead, I grabbed my mother and slammed her to the bed. At least, that’s what he tells me I did. All I remember is that I darted into action, spurred on by the emergency.

My mother, who had been wailing in protest, was now flat on her back staring up at us silently, too stunned to utter her a sound.
She was clean, she was dressed, and she was sprawled across the bed.
My husband and I became a team again, shifting her, sliding her toward the headboard until she was comfortably positioned, covering her with blankets.
Still no protests from my mother. I used the hospital bed remote control to elevate her head, turned on one of her favorite Westerns, and left her there, looking serene.
I found my husband on the sofa, laughing. “I’m going to sign you up for the World Wrestling Federation,” he said.
“What are you talking about?”
“You body slammed your mother to the bed. You were quick as lightning. One minute she was slipping out of my arms and the next minute you were throwing her on the bed.”
“I can’t do this anymore,” I said. “This job is beyond me.”
Later I went in to see if I could get my mother anything else before calling it a night. I sat on the narrow hospital bed and took her hand. Maybe I needed to provide a little more emotional support, after body slamming her to the bed.

“Can I get you anything before bed, Mama?”
“Just a glass of water.”
So I got water with ice, because water without ice is undrinkable in her opinion, and held the glass while she sipped through a straw. Then I said, “Do you want me to sit here a while and keep you company or would you rather be left alone?”
“I’d rather be left alone,” she said in the matter of fact way that has characterized her life.
She wanted to be left alone. Should I be hurt or relieved? There have been too many emotional moments in the past 17 months for me to dwell on being hurt, so I decided on relief.
It’s funny how often I look back on those early challenging months when she first came to live with us as the “Good Old Days.”
When she said, “Let’s go to Addidas and get chicken nuggets,” I figured out she meant Chick Fil A. When she told me she was in jail for stealing $35,000, I realized she had been watching too many of her favorite Westerns. When she stubbornly refused to get out of the recliner and go to bed, I understood that she dreaded the monumental effort it took to stand and move.
Now I would give anything to load her in the car and head to Chick Fil A, or to see her wake up in the morning and realize it was time to move to the recliner. But with each day’s passing, something else is lost. The things that tether her to this world are slipping silently away.
I have done, I am doing, the best that I can. Sometimes I’m impatient. Other times, my heart is so filled with love that it spills over into tears. Sometimes I feel resentful and trapped. Other times, I am flooded with guilt for feeling that way. Aren’t we supposed to take care of each other, especially those we love?
Sometimes I think, Lord, why don’t you take her? Other times, I pray, Let her breathe one more day.
But in the meantime, my husband and I are a team, and I’m grateful for that. I’m grateful, too, that I’ve had the stamina and health to take care of her; that we have experienced moments I now consider “The Good Old Days.”

But lifting my mother is beyond my ability. Even hoisting her up enough to dress her is a challenge. So yesterday I called in reinforcements, which happened to be my husband. He was getting ready to step into the shower.
“You need to hold her up so I can get her clothes changed,” I said. “This is beyond me.”
He came to the rescue immediately, in his underwear. Meanwhile my mother, who was also in her underwear, lay inert on the bed. I was the only one who wasn’t in my underwear.

My husband hoisted her up over her vehement protests and deposited her in a chair next to the bed. This gave me a chance to bathe, her, clothe her, and change her sheets while he piled her dirty linens in the washing machine.
But then came the real challenge. Getting her back to bed. He slid his hands beneath her arms, lifted my protesting mother, and that’s when she began to slide.
“I’m losing her,” he said. “She’s going to hit the floor.”
My mother was groaning and crying out as she slipped lower in my husband’s grasp. She reminded me of reluctant toddlers who make themselves heavy when you try to pick them up. My husband said later that he expected me to use my weight to move her slightly toward him so we could both guide her easily onto the mattress.
Instead, I grabbed my mother and slammed her to the bed. At least, that’s what he tells me I did. All I remember is that I darted into action, spurred on by the emergency.

My mother, who had been wailing in protest, was now flat on her back staring up at us silently, too stunned to utter her a sound.
She was clean, she was dressed, and she was sprawled across the bed.
My husband and I became a team again, shifting her, sliding her toward the headboard until she was comfortably positioned, covering her with blankets.
Still no protests from my mother. I used the hospital bed remote control to elevate her head, turned on one of her favorite Westerns, and left her there, looking serene.
I found my husband on the sofa, laughing. “I’m going to sign you up for the World Wrestling Federation,” he said.
“What are you talking about?”
“You body slammed your mother to the bed. You were quick as lightning. One minute she was slipping out of my arms and the next minute you were throwing her on the bed.”
“I can’t do this anymore,” I said. “This job is beyond me.”
Later I went in to see if I could get my mother anything else before calling it a night. I sat on the narrow hospital bed and took her hand. Maybe I needed to provide a little more emotional support, after body slamming her to the bed.

“Can I get you anything before bed, Mama?”
“Just a glass of water.”
So I got water with ice, because water without ice is undrinkable in her opinion, and held the glass while she sipped through a straw. Then I said, “Do you want me to sit here a while and keep you company or would you rather be left alone?”
“I’d rather be left alone,” she said in the matter of fact way that has characterized her life.
She wanted to be left alone. Should I be hurt or relieved? There have been too many emotional moments in the past 17 months for me to dwell on being hurt, so I decided on relief.
It’s funny how often I look back on those early challenging months when she first came to live with us as the “Good Old Days.”

I hope you know it’s ok to want the relationship.
I hope you know that it’s ok if you don’t want something casual if you want something more than late-night text messages and kisses that only exist in the dark. It’s ok that you want something more than hookups at two a.m. after you’ve been out on the town with your friends. It’s ok that you want something more than wondering if you’re allowed to text or call, or if you should stay for breakfast the following day or hurry out before anyone sees you in last night’s outfit.
I hope you know it’s ok to want the relationship.
It’s ok that you want to be able to go to dinner before that sleepover at two o’clock in the morning. It’s ok to want to hang out with their friends and introduce them to yours. It’s ok to want the Sunday brunch and the random Tuesday dinner. It’s ok to want to feel emotionally connected before you connect physically, to want to know the inside of someone’s heart just as intimately as you know what’s beneath their clothes. It’s ok to want to know where you stand with another human if you mean as much to them as they mean to you.
I hope you know it’s ok to want the relationship.
And if they don’t want it, I hope you have the courage to walk away so that you may find what your heart desires and what you deserve.

https://www.geogebra.org/m/ezt2u2ju
https://www.geogebra.org/m/hbcsmkzz
https://www.geogebra.org/m/htnf2y6s
https://www.geogebra.org/m/zmybtquv
https://www.geogebra.org/m/aanyn4bn