May 2008 – The Great Northwest

Spring and summer provided me with multiple opportunities to travel, connect with family and friends, and commune with nature. In May I finally took the trip to Oregon that I’d delayed twice before. It was definitely worth the wait! I’d never been to Oregon in the spring, and the wildflowers were just breathtaking!

My daughter Carrie looked beautiful, and more fit than I’d ever seen her. Between her hiking, bicycling, and mountaineering she was determined to become ‘hard core’. Since I was on a health kick myself, she vowed to do the same for me (at least, relative to my age bracket). Carrie had never seen my weight so low, so she planned some ambitious outdoor activities: a twenty mile bike tour (mostly flat, thankfully), rowing, and a couple of moderate hikes, culminating in a strenuous climb up Dog Mountain. I wasn’t sure if I was up to the challenge, but I was ready to give it a try!

Our first forays into nature were quite successful. We both agreed that the hike along the Pacific Ocean, though spectacular, was not all that challenging. Our hike in the Columbia River Gorge, also rated moderate, was definitely tougher. My legs were quite sore at the end of that one, though the pain didn’t last. I was still a bit concerned about our strenuous hike, but as it turned out, Carrie came down with an upper respiratory infection a few days before our climb, so we decided to put it off till my next visit. Guess I’m not hard core just yet!

During the week Carrie went back to work for a few days, so I did some exploring on my own. I hit a couple of museums and urban nature trails, and I especially enjoyed visiting the Grotto of our Sorrowful Mother. The grounds feature a mountain-top botanical garden, statues and paintings that depict of the Stations of the Cross and the seven sorrows of Mary, and a replica of Michelangelo’s Pieta. I spent an entire morning walking and praying in a glorious setting.

Another highlight of my trip was the fulfillment of my one request: dancing. We found a Salsa club downtown, brought along a couple of Carrie’s friends, and had a blast! We also had some awesome dinners, with my favorite being the scallop etoufee from a Cajun restaurant. I did some cooking, too, picking up a few pointers from my health-conscious daughter. The roasted vegetables I prepared turned out so lovely that I took their picture before we devoured them!

At the end of my two-week vacation, I headed back to Michigan to resume my relaxing retiree existence of volunteering, dancing, and working my way through my household To Do List. I had not stopped my daily scripture reflections while I was in Portland, and I continued them back at home. While I did find solace in the meditations, I still hadn’t discerned any new ‘missions’ for myself.

For the most part I was pretty pleased with my range of activities. I even had a part time job now, teaching a relationships workshop for singles at the Marriage Place. Even though I never worked more than four hours a week, it was a paying job, and a lot of fun besides! I learned a lot both from the course materials and from the interesting mix of workshop participants.

One change I did make was to take a break from my media work at the Marriage Place. For various reasons, the press releases and media pitches I wrote were never sent out for publication, and I found this a little disheartening. Besides, I had several commitments coming up in July and August, including a week-long family reunion and two camping trips with friends. Since I was the ‘point person’ for the reunion, I needed to get moving.

I informed the Marriage Place Director that I wouldn’t be coming in during the days anymore, and started planning in earnest for the reunion. I was excited about the upcoming events of the summer, and I looked forward to more changes for the fall. I still wanted to take a college or enrichment class (though I still hadn’t decided what to study), and I planned to explore new volunteer opportunities to replace the media work at the Marriage Place. I continued to pray for guidance, and for the grace to remain patient and be open to whatever the Lord might have in store for me.

April 2008 – Blessings and Sorrows

Even before my mother-in-law’s health took a turn for the better, I had started to explore more volunteer opportunities. I joined our church’s St. Vincent de Paul Society, which turned out to be a real blessing for me. The society’s mission, to lead people to “join together to grow spiritually by offering person-to-person service to the needy and suffering” gave me the opportunity to truly be of service to others. April was an especially active month, as our conference President was out of town, and we had more than our usual share of calls.

I also found a position on volunteermatch.org that was quite intriguing. The duties of the Marketing Assistant for a non-profit I’ll call the Marriage Place were right up my alley. I had originally majored in journalism in college, and the idea of writing press releases and brochures really appealed to me. It was fun creating a resume geared to public relations, even if the only experience I had was a number of volunteer positions from 30 years ago. With my new resume and a list of personal references in tow, I went on my first interview in 13 years. Since this was an unpaid position, I had no trouble landing the job.

Now I settled into somewhat of a routine, which gave my life some much-needed structure. I worked at the Marriage Place on Tuesdays and Thursdays, shopped on Wednesdays, and attended Mass on Fridays. I reserved Mondays for journal writing and planning my week. I continued my daily scripture meditations, subbed for Meals on Wheels when called, and worked with the St. Vincent de Paul Society as needed. My husband and I were now dancing four nights a week, and I had choir practice on another night. On weekends we socialized with friends and family, and we especially enjoyed visiting with our older daughter Joanne, who lives in a nearby city. I was certainly busy enough, and no longer plagued with anxiety over my retirement decision.

Five months into my retirement, I took stock of what I’d accomplished so far. I was indeed making headway on my list of household tasks, and I had enough volunteer work to keep me feeling useful. I still hadn’t pursued my creative interests of writing and jewelry making, though I was pleased with the progress I was making with my online photo albums. Another retirement goal had been to spend more time with my mother-in-law and my developmentally disabled sister, Adele. Well, I’d certainly devoted plenty of attention to my mother-in-law! But while I was now visiting with Adele more often, I kept remembering all of the ways I had failed to be a good guardian, sister, and friend to her. For a long time I had been promising myself I would do better, and now that I had more time I hoped to make good on that promise.

I had been very pleased that I kept my patience with my sister over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays; it seemed that every year this was more of a challenge for me. Since my retirement I was also accompanying her on all of her medical appointments. Adele had suffered from gall bladder distress a few years ago, and now it had returned. With her latest relapse, we decided that her gall bladder needed to be removed.

A few weeks before the surgery, I hosted Easter dinner at my house. Poor Adele was in such an agitated state. She had hardly eaten in days, since to do so would just bring her more pain, but she wanted to join in with the holiday meal, too. I tried to give her as many options as possible. First I had her sit at the table with a glass of milk and a few pieces of ham to pick at. She sat for a minute, then jumped up and said she didn’t want to eat but wanted to sit on the couch. No problem, I told her. But a few minutes later she’d be back at the table, then back on the couch. She wanted to eat, she didn’t want to eat. I put another plate of ham next to her on the couch; she brought it into the kitchen and said to take it out of her sight. I told her to sit wherever she wanted, and to eat or not eat, but just let me enjoy my meal with the rest of the company. But she just didn’t know how to handle the pain, and she wouldn’t give me a moment’s peace. Finally we reverted to our old pattern: I screamed, she cried and apologized, the guests squirmed, and I felt guiltier than ever.

I couldn’t wait for Adele to have her surgery, so she’d be out of pain and able to eat again. I spent her surgery day at the hospital with a staff member from her group home, waiting for the results. After a long day the surgeon came out and told us that everything had gone fine. Back in the recovery room, Adele was slowly waking up. I never saw anyone take such delight in drinking a cup of beef broth! The poor thing was starving; she ate every bit of her ice cream and jello, and was discharged to go home. We could tell that she was back to her old self because she now took an interest in the teddy bears that Kay and I had brought for her. Stuffed animals were Adele’s greatest joy in life, and when she barely blinked at the toys in the morning, we knew she must have been feeling mighty low.

When I left the group home that evening, Adele was sitting contentedly on the sofa with a stuffed bear in each arm. That was the last time I saw her alive. The Lord called my little sister to Him the next day, to be with our Mom and Dad. She was only 53.

I tell myself that Adele is at peace now like she had never been before. She’d had a very rough life, living not just with developmental disability but with episodes of psychosis as well. I know she’s in a better place, and I hope she can forgive me for my lack of patience. As children we had been very close, and I loved her so much; I just wish I’d been able to make good on my promise to be a better guardian, sister and friend at the end of her life.

March 2008 – A Mission

Here’s a quick recap of my retirement journey so far:

• I thought that God was calling me to take my company’s early retirement offer at age 55. Oh yeah, and I kind of wanted to get out of a stressful, demanding job where I was pretty much on call 24/7.
• As soon as it was too late to rescind the retirement package, I started to doubt that I’d made the right decision. I began to suspect that the ‘signs from God’ were really just rationalizations to justify my decision to leave my job.
• The first few months after my decision were rife with nausea, insomnia, loss of appetite and panic attacks. Daily prayer eventually helped alleviate the anxiety, and provide me with peace of mind. Now I was just left pondering what mission I had been called to do.
• Before I could embark on a true search of God’s plan for me, I was sidetracked with another pressing matter: caring for my sick mother-in-law. Mom was suffering from some of the same symptoms I’d experienced, but her severe fatigue and rapid weight loss indicated a true medical condition, whereas one might argue my problems were all in my head.

So, in February of 2008 I was occupied with nourishing, transporting, and otherwise assisting my ailing mother-in-law. Shortly after I cancelled my upcoming vacation, the doctors determined a probable cause for Mom’s symptoms.

The gastroenterologist hypothesized that Mom’s pancreas was not producing the enzymes she needed to digest food. Because Mom was diabetic, it was known that her pancreas wasn’t producing insulin, but a CT scan showed that the organ had severely atrophied. However, blood tests didn’t show that Mom’s enzymes were dangerously low, so the doctor wasn’t convinced that this was the sole cause of her ailments. Still, he prescribed an enzyme replacement, and said that it ‘should’ start to work in about three weeks.

This was great news! With the treatment prescribed, I was free to visit my daughter before her class started in March. But when I suggested this to Mom, she nearly begged me to delay my trip until she knew for sure that the pills would work.

At this point, I was feeling quite resentful. Several friends, and even my husband, felt that Mom was putting an unfair burden on me. One friend, a nurse, offered to visit her while I was away, helping her bathe and bringing her food. Terry also wondered if our daughter would be hurt that I was again delaying my trip. Carrie had originally invited me to stay for the entire month of January, but due to a social engagement, I had already delayed it once. If I had to push it back till May, I was afraid she’d think I was rejecting her. Maybe there was a reason she needed me to be with her at this time.

Before I made my final decision, I prayed for guidance. I really didn’t get a clear ‘message’ from God one way or the other so I decided to listen to others and go forward with the vacation. But I was too chicken to tell Mom myself. Instead, Terry told her while I listened to his end of the phone conversation. When it was over, he confirmed that she wasn’t at all pleased that I was leaving town for two weeks.

Now that I’d made my decision, I called Carrie to confirm the dates. She could tell how conflicted I was, but I think she was hesitant to encourage me to stay in Michigan for fear I’d think she was rejecting me. But during our conversation we both concluded that I really felt awful about rejecting my mother-in-law’s request. Carrie told me she would not be hurt with another trip delay, so I again put the vacation on hold.

I called my mother-in-law the same night, before I changed my mind again. She was very much relieved with my decision, and as soon as I heard her spirits lift, I knew I was doing the right thing. Looking back on it, I can’t believe I even considered leaving her. I’m kind of embarrassed when I re-read my journal from February. I had written “Could this be my mission from God? Babysitting my mother-in-law?” Oh, how selfish I was.

And now for the happy ending to this segment: the enzyme replacements did kick in, but after six weeks, not three. My mother-in-law still has insomnia and very little energy, but at least she has her appetite back. And I did go out to visit Carrie in May. The wildflowers were in full bloom, which made for a much more colorful trip than if I had gone in February. But I will tell that story in another blog. This installment will end with a couple final thoughts regarding this, my first mission:

1) The tasks that God asks of us are not for our benefit, but for the benefit of others. They are fashioned by His design, not ours.
2) Perhaps God does not have one big mission set aside for me, but rather a few smaller areas for me to explore and be of service to others.
3) Just because we ask God for guidance, the answer isn’t always explicit. No, playing Bible roulette in the hopes of gleaning a specific message from the selected scripture passage just doesn’t work.

Of course, I didn’t realize any of this when my mother-in-law’s health finally started to improve. In March of 2008, Mom was again driving and cooking for herself, and I was still on a mission to find my mission from God.