To every thing there is a season
It was time.
In all honesty, it was past time, but none of us was ready to say, "Dad, it's time to go the nursing home."
But ready or not, three weeks ago my father left the farm he'd called home for nearly all of his 86 years and took up residency at the Barnesville Care Center. There was no turning back.
All of us - Mom and my three brothers - finally had to admit that Dad wasn't going to get better. His problems are multi-layered: advancing Alzheimer's disease, congestive heart failure and neuropathy that has numbed his feet and hands so badly he can barely walk and has much difficulty holding silverware or anything else.
I noticed a dramatic decline in his mental and physical abilities between January and May when I visited. Yet I, too, was reluctant to say it was time.
My mother was completely exhausted from caring for him over the past year or so, but she soldiered on in the stoic Scandinavian tradition, helping with his every move, bending, twisting, lifting, dealing with bad days of increasing dementia and reveling in the few good days.
She, too, knew it was time to make a change.
They celebrated their 55th anniversary on June 6, going out for lunch and enjoying some rare time out of the house. But when they came home, Dad tripped in the doorway with his walker and fell, then somehow thought Mom had pushed him over, something he'd never do in his right mind.
Alzheimer's, of course, can cause a person to act in different and unpredictable ways and Mom knows that. Still, her feelings were hurt and it was an unfortunate end to what should have been a celebratory day.
That incident may have been the turning point for Mom. It's one thing dealing with physical ailments; it's quite another dealing with the ups and downs of dementia.
Turning a loved one's life over to the nursing home for good is fraught with paperwork and all kinds of other decisions. Dad had made a short test run at this nursing home two years ago when a bout of pneumonia required him to rehabilitate there, so we were somewhat acquainted with the process.
But when it's for keeps, the nursing home needs things like asset assessments and details about life estates, things that required legal assistance from an elder-law attorney.
This week, we made the decision to sign the "do not resuscitate" order, which will allow my father to die on his own and not be hooked to life support when he ultimately takes a turn for the worst. It was tough on all of us, another grim reminder of what lies ahead.
I knew when I was home in May that it would be the last time I'd spend time with Dad while he was still home on the farm. We took a slow walk around the place, stopping for him to catch his breath with his walker. As he sat in the shade of a fragrant lilac bush on a sunny day, he reminded me of things I'd long forgotten, like the spot where a cherry orchard once stood and the site where the original sod-roofed cabin was located.
His whole life is tied up in that farm and every crevice of his being is filled with those memories.
We sang hymns together and listened to a CD of his accordion music. It wasn't too many years ago he was winning awards at accordion contests, but the neuropathy in his fingers shut down his playing. Now he plays the "air accordion," his fingers flying during a brisk polka. His mind still knows the music by heart.
So far, Dad has adjusted pretty well to the nursing-home routine. But he calls home, reminding Mom to feed the calves he thinks are still down in the barn that has stood vacant for years. And he asks if it's time to come home yet.
Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com