My grandmother is 85. She has all her own teeth, and does not use Miss Clairol to keep her hair brown. She wears a hearing aid, but no glasses. She is definitely all there mentally.
\nShe has Parkinson\u2019s, and is now confined to a wheelchair. She lives in a private room in a nursing home in Ontario. When she needs to pee, she has to ring her bell for help. Geographically, I am her closest relative \u2013 and I live more than an hour away by car.
\nYesterday, I accompanied her to a liver specialist to try to get to the bottom of her most recent affliction, jaundice. Because of the weakness in her legs and other factors, it is next to impossible to get her anywhere by car, so we had to rely on an ambulance to get her to and from the doctor\u2019s office. Since budget cuts have reduced the number of ambulances serving the area, non-emergency transports like my grandmother\u2019s are the lowest priority, and we waited almost two hours for some one to bring us home after the appointment.
\nThe doctor has recommended a CT scan and an ERCP, which means we\u2019ll have to get her to and from the Civic Hospital in Ottawa, an hour away.
\nMy grandmother is very tired. It\u2019s all she can talk about. She was tired before we started on our grand tour yesterday. By the time the doctor\u2019s appointment was over, she was exhausted. By the time the ambulance finally arrived to bring us home, she was starting to scare me. I had visions of myself having to explain to my dad that\u2026 well, you know.
\nEvery time she closed her eyes, I got nervous. I managed to resist the urge to poke her, but I found myself reliving those scary moments as a new mother, watching the chest for breathing, just to reassure yourself that you haven\u2019t inadvertently killed some one.
\nMy grandmother, who taught me to swim and made almond shortbread crescents every Christmas, is tired and weak and scared.
\nI still remember the way those almond cookies melted in my mouth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My grandmother is 85. She has all her own teeth, and does not use Miss Clairol to keep her hair brown. She wears a hearing aid, but no glasses. She is definitely all there mentally. She has Parkinson\u2019s, and is now confined to a wheelchair. She lives in a private room in a nursing home … <\/p>\n