It's not you, it's me

We're coming up on two years since we moved in with my parents.  My mom was starting to show signs of dementia.  She was becoming forgetful, she repeated herself frequently, she became angry, she blamed my dad for purposely trying to drive her crazy.  He called, we came.  Simple enough.  Only it hasn't been, only it isn't.

Going back four years, that's when the planning began.  Turning a family home of 30 years when two mature adults live on their own into a home for a family of six is no easy feat.  On my parents part, they spent the better part of almost six month "under construction."  The added a master bedroom and bath to their three bedroom, two bath home to make room for us.  The three original bedrooms were all being used and the two of them single-handedly emptied them out and moved into the new master bedroom.  This could not have been easy for them.  My mom, whose humble beginnings included living in extreme poverty has issues throwing things out and although the master bedroom is nice and big, it just could not possibly accommodate everything that was in the three bedrooms.  My mother is brave and stubborn and stoic and she threw things out.  She threw out lots of things...but when we arrived the rooms weren't quite ready.

I felt almost as if she had done her very best and now we had to make due with the rooms as they were.  "It's just a few things in the closets, there's still room for your things" she'd say. Unfortunately, I did not want to make due.  I wanted the rooms empty, completely empty.  Not a pillow, not a hanger, not a dust bunny was left when I finished clearing them out.  That was the first of many screaming matches she and I engaged in.

She felt I was ungrateful.  I felt she was ungrateful.  She felt I didn't understand how terribly difficult this transition was for her.  I felt she didn't understand the enormity of selling everything and uprooting my family nine hundred miles because they want to die at home.  (Not, that they are close to death mind you, not at all.)  We are both right inasmuch as we have a right to our feelings of loss and fearful of the future and what it holds for all of us.  We all have had to drastically change our lifestyles, we've had to adjust.  We're still adjusting.  We've had to learn to be more patient, learn to walk away from a fight, we've had to learn to listen, not just to the words but to the feelings that back the inadequate words.  Sigh...not simple at all.