My dad is sometimes sly now. Middle sister coerced my mother into taking my dad for an evaluation. Apparently my father became irritated at the tester asking him a bunch of questions he couldn’t answer, so when she stepped out for a moment, Dad slipped out of the room and hid ( Read more... )

We spent Christmas Eve at my parents’ house. Both my sisters, their spouses, and all children. 100% attendance by the DePlume family.

It’s the first holiday in memory my mother has commanded our presence rather than request it. “This will probably be the last Christmas,” she added, trailing off. Last Christmas before what? I did not ask. At ( Read more... )

When I saw my parents on the way to a wedding last month, I tried to get my mom to consider respite care for my dad as his dementia progresses.

“I’ve been looking,” she confessed. “But I can’t find a male nurse. There’s plenty of females in the business, but I haven’t found a guy yet.”

“Why do you need a guy?” I asked.

Am fast discovering the impossible - after fantasizing from the time my oldest was about six months old (ten years ago) of that day, THAT GLORIOUS DAY, when my youngest child would go off to kindergarten, I would loose the tender shackles of full time motherhood, and be restored to the free-time-having creature I once was - I am finding myself ( Read more... )

Starting to feel pretty sure going to therapy is like playing with a oujia board, in which whatever entity has pissed you off so bad that spending $140 cash money to bitch about them to a stranger seems like a reasonable option, is drawn back into your realm.

Last week I gave up the ghost and went to therapy ( Read more... )

Every time I call my mom these days, she says “Hi, let me put your dad on.” She’s gone in a whisk and a clunk, and I’m on the phone with him.

I don’t know if she’s pissed and doesn’t want to talk to me,

or if she’s making me Dad’s babysitter while she uses the potty by herself for the first time all day,

or if this is some Cat’s In The Cradle ( Read more... )

With BlogHer ‘14 looming, I decided to have business cards made up. Minimum order was 100, so damn if I know what I’m going to do with the other 98 of these bastards come next month, but I am enjoying how they turned out:

A few weeks ago, I went up take care of my nephew while Middle had her second baby. I haven’t blogged much about it, because it was one of those pregnancies where somebody says early on, “If the baby makes it, there’s a 30% chance of normalcy.”

They say it in such a grave tone, a person like me stupidly says, “What do you mean, normalcy?”

“Not ( Read more... )

Last time we spoke, I was in a bad place. I could feel myself getting crushed under this psychic weight, like swimming deep underwater - unpleasant unrelenting pressure prevented me from breathing easy. I began to notice shadows out of the corner of my eye, as if something dark were sneaking up on me. It made me feel unglued to reality, a ( Read more... )