My father has taken a downward turn
in his long and diligent fight against the Parkinson’s Disease that is
destroying his body and mind. I had planned on coming up to NC next week to
visit him, but when my sister called and explained to me what had happened with
him, my husband and I decided it was better to come right away, just in case.
At the same time, my daughter is
also battling maladies that are crimping her life and giving her a debt problem
in spite of our insurance. I am stretched between these two people that I love.
They both seem to have a great need of me right now.
But do they? Does my daughter
really need “saving”? Is she in a life threatening situation? Yes, my father
is, but it is one that is more or less known and there is a sense of
inevitability about his predicament. His is one we will all face sooner or
later. My daughter, on the other hand, in my opinion has subconsciously created
her situation out of her inability to realize the reasons for her stress levels
much less how to fix them. I feel she is using the only means she knows at the
moment to try and exert some control over her life, of which, it seems, she
feels she has none. I think she can fix her situation fairly easily if she will
sit down with her beau and talk it over. I mean really talk and explore those
sometimes sticky emotional places in a relationship that need attention, in
spite of what one wants to think about one’s own capabilities.
And then there is my father. I look
at him, at his blue, blue eyes looking back at me with love and need. With
desire to connect. He is still here and I hate thinking about how frail he is,
and how aware of that frailty he has now become. I see him accepting his fate.
Realizing his body is failing him and there is nothing he can do about it. What
good is it to look back on a life and say it was a good one when you aren’t
ready to give it up? When something outside your mind is saying you have no
choice in the matter? He said yesterday, "I just want one more plug and I don't think I'm going to get it." One more cast, one more fish. That's all he wants. My tears are ready, lurking in the back of my eyes
waiting for release and I don’t want to allow them that right. I want to
continue as I have in the past, knowing the end is coming but not yet, so I
don’t have to think about it. I am comfortable with the numbness in which I can
function, until I hold his taut, frail thin frame in my arms. I see his
melancholy smile, I see the lack of fight in his eyes and part of me wants to anger
him, bring back his fighting spirit while at the same time I want to cradle him
in my arms and make everything all right for him again.
I need to let my daughter go. I
need to watch her fly on her own wings and see her launch into her life and
love and lessons. This is easy to do and yet so very hard as well. I love her
so much it hurts sometimes. The loving her and the letting go of her both feel
right and uplifting. She is beautiful and strong and yet has so much to learn
about that strength and beauty and how to use and grow it in her future. How to
learn to appreciate what she has and who she is: how to nurture others, to be a
good person, to thrive and live her dreams.
I need to hang on to my father. I
need it for myself and he needs it because he doesn’t want to be alone. He
needs me and my sister and Clarence and my mother and all those who love him so
he can walk this new road with the knowledge of, and trust in, our love for
him.
I have been where my daughter is. I
am going where my father has been. All I can do now is to try and let one go
while hanging on to the other. I realize the question is not whether or not
they need me. I think it is more a statement that I need them. I need them both
and that I will eventually, when the time comes, let go of my numbness and honor
my joy and my grief with those lurking tears.
