It’s funny I think when we look back on our previous lives and sometimes we remember events quite differently than when we were amongst it. Bear with me, as I try to explain.
When I have reminisced with my children – now very much adults, my youngest turning 40 at the end of the year – there are often different memories when recalling events. Of course, that is probably natural as a child’s priorities and emotional responses are usually and naturally quite different from an adults perspective. I remember a conversation with my oldest son some years ago. He – being my first born – was very much my ‘practice baby’ as he liked to refer to himself and he wasn’t far wrong. I was only 20 when I had him and I bumbled on with little support and it’s a wonder we both survived!
He told me something that I never even thought of, but that would have had a profound effect on him as it did on me when he told me. As a young first time Mum I made plenty of mistakes in those early years particularly. He hardly slept, he had chronic colic and would scream for hours when teething. Also, I’m not quite sure why, but starting from the age of about 10 years or thereabouts he developed a wicked temper. One moment he could be playing nicely the next in a rage. I did my best and always loved him, but we both struggled to find some equilibrium and peace at times. One day out of the blue, he told me that when his father and I split up, that he thought for a long time that it was his fault. I was mortified that he should take on the blame for his parents divorcing. When I asked him why, he said that he knew when he was younger that he was a difficult child and he thought because of this it put a strain on the marriage and that he felt responsible. It made me so sad to think that for years he had lived with the guilt and sorrow of causing a breakdown in our marriage. We talked it through and I hope I reassured him that he had no responsibility and no need ever to feel guilty.
So, my practice baby grew to be a young man and although he had his quirks – don’t we all – he was one of the kindest most caring people I knew. He was particularly protective of me and if he was around and even if I hurt myself in some small way, he would be by my side seeing if he could help. Sometimes, I may not have appreciated fully the concern that he had over small mishaps and bumps and bruises, but he was always caring. If I was ever in need of support, I know that he would have been there for me, providing whatever support that he could.
His name was Adam and although we thought differently and didn’t always understand each other, we knew that we both loved each other dearly. Another person that Adam loved was his Nanna, my Mum Fay. She also had Parkinson’s as did my Dad Ron. I used to refer to Parkinson’s as ‘the family curse’.
Adam was a frequent visitor to her both when she was still in her own home and then later when she entered the hospital wing of the facility in which she came to live. He was so patient with her, so much more patient than I could ever be and was always caring and kind, even in the most frustrating scenarios. He was so patient even when for the umpteenth time he tried to explain how to work her computer, or her TV, or her camera or her cellphone. Technical things were difficult for her, but with grace and patience he continued to show her over and over again.
It was clear that they had a special bond between the two of them. He always tried to be there for her and continued to visit her regularly till the very end. One thing that was hard for him was when she started to get confused. One day I visited and she was saying that my brother Phillip had come to see her that day from Dunedin. I expressed surprise that he had come to visit and not caught up with me. I mentioned this to my son and he said, ‘Mum, it wasn’t Uncle Phillip, it was me, she thought I was him!’ I could see the hurt in his eyes and my heart went out to him.
We go through many ages and stages throughout life and for some of us, that means raising children. At the beginning when they are younger, of course we as parents make the rules and look after them and try to keep them safe. We feed them, we clothe them and we generally look after them. We are the adults and we know best. Somewhere along the line though – and I’m not sure how, when or why – roles seem to be reversed. The children, then teenagers and finally to adulthood seem less and less inclined to be the ones that have to abide by our rules. They decide they are adults – often before they actually are – and that our rules at least in part, no longer apply to them.
As our hair starts to go grey, or falls out at the roots, or perhaps both, there comes at first a subtle shift in who feels they can/should tell the other what to do and expect to be obeyed. Our children sometimes seem to think that our mental faculties and ability to choose a safe path through life have leached out of us almost overnight. Little mini lectures about not standing on step stools or ladders, not using power tools, even reasonably harmless things like leaf blowers seem to be a regular part of our conversations. In their eyes, it seems we suddenly become helpless, weak and unable to do things for ourselves – if we listen to them – but when/why/how did this occur? How did we go from being the parent, to feeling like we are being parented? We may be chastised for lifting something they feel we shouldn’t. We may be told not to ride our e-bike or go tramping or do anything solo. They may try to ban us from every risk possible, it may seem, but you cannot do life completely without risk.
I know I have Parkinson’s and I have some cognitive effects, mostly with memory but I know what is a risk and what is not. There might be a millisecond when I might think that I can climb up on our raised garden and pick fruit off the fruit tree, but it would be a moment of madness to do so. So, I have learned to assess risk quite well for the most part and hopefully I can still appease my family members and convince them that my risk is monitored and minimal at present.
So, the roles within the family system seem to swap over at some stage. We may suddenly find ourselves perhaps judged as unable to make a safe decision for ourselves. We may be told whether we can drive or not, what the family deem to be safe. To be wrapped in cotton wool and covered with bubble wrap and told to let others gradually take over our lives. Even from a place of caring this can be challenging as adults with our own view of what we can or cannot safely do.
Is it any wonder that an aging parent – say 60+ – can revert to an almost teenage state, where we defiantly state our right to choose and our right to risk. To baulk at the constraints family deem necessary to protect us. To have taken away from us the opportunity to try some of these things, which family may have decided we ‘shouldn’t’ (a word I hate) do. I’m sure in the future if family come out too blatantly trying to rule our lives, whether we are safe or not, sheer bloody-mindedness may steer us in the direction of doing things that are actually not safe!
It is the telling that you are not permitted to do something that can grate on you, whether you are 8 or 80.
My journey with Parkinsons 