From Failing Hands We Throw

It's been a busy weekend. The first big snowfall hit Edmonton, it was the centennial of the armistice that ended the First World War, and my mother was hospitalized.

She's been on blood thinners due to a clot that formed in her right leg a couple of weeks back, but when she bailed on brunch with her friends on Sunday, they knew something was up. When they went to check on her, she was looking a little grey, and actually admitted she didn't feel very well.

This is fairly significant, as my sister and I are pretty sure that Mum's final words (may they be a long time from now) are likely to be, "I'll be fine." For her to admit to feeling unwell is largely unprecedented, but honestly, so was getting her leg looked at by a physician - I can count on one hand the number of doctor visits I've known her to go to willingly.

They took her to the hospital in Leduc and got word to me, and I burned out there and stayed with her after she was admitted. They took blood and ran tests and did a chest x-ray and then a CT scan, and there is a lot to sort out, but safe to say it isn't particularly rosy stuff we are looking at. She was crushed when they told her she would be staying overnight, but I assured her that I would pick up her dog, Willow, from her place and take her home.

This morning, she started presenting stroke-like symptoms, so they transferred her to the University Hospital. I was actually packing my bag to stay at her place in Leduc when the hospital called to let me know, but abandoned that so all four of us could go and visit her.

Mum's always been the tough one in the family, at least as far as I'm concerned (and the Old Man probably wouldn't have disagreed either), so it was rough seeing her so frail and small in the enormous gurney, wincing when the blood pressure cuff inflated periodically. She has some degree of aphasia, so you can see her working things out in her head that she simply cannot find the words for. I know that has to be frustrating to someone so expressive and quick-witted, but I know she is also taking care not to let it show. She was content to let us handle the lion's share of conversation, nodding and smiling, dozing off periodically and then looking around and confirming we were nearby.

She had consults from neurology, hematology and tomorrow internal medicine will swing by. Everyone is waiting for tomorrow's MRI before determine how best to proceed. All these fields are communicating admirably with each other, even with the week-old centralized health information system they are still coming to grips with. In the meantime, Tara is flying up from Houston tomorrow, and it will be good to have her at hand.

The two of us have already had to discuss Goals of Care, which is a determination of just how far Mum (and us) want them to go in order to save her life if those actions should be required. I know Mum wants no extraordinary measures taken, but that sort of affirmation is much more comfortably handled as a hypothetical (which will never happen) as opposed to an algorithm of probability within an emergency room environment where every outcome has some degree of occurrence.

Mum got checked into a room about five hours after the ambulance brought her from Leduc, which felt long to me but impressed the E.R. nurses quite a bit. We helped mule the small assortment of things she had brought and which I had grabbed from her place, and once she was settled in place and looking dozy, swiftly made our exit.

In the midst of all that, why would we bundle up in multiple layers this morning and go out to a neighbourhood Remembrance Day ceremony? Well, it wasn't so much in spite of her, as because of her.

Mum and Dad's commitment to Nov. 11 observances goes back as far as I can remember. the two of them have both served as Royal Canadian Legion Members and club officers, and were instrumental in organizing events in Leduc for a lot of years, and participating in them after that. Fenya and Glory have been raised the same way, and recognize that it is important to not only remember, but to visibly participate in that remembering.

In the nearby neighbourhood of Griesbach, former home of the barracks and HQ of CFB Edmonton, there is a small amphitheatre beside the lake called Patricia Square, named after Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. They march out the regiment from the Edmonton Garrison, and we had stood witness before six years earlier.

Today though, it was bitterly cold - about -26 with the wind chill when we arose. My fear was that the parade wasn't going to have anyone willing to watch it, or an insultingly small crowd. We found this unacceptable, so we layered up and made our way over. It was still only about -20 when we arrived at about 10:20, but the are was already crammed with spectators, over a hundred for certain.

As they read "In Flanders Fields," and played the Last Post, and lay the wreaths, I thought about both my parents. I thought about Dad's final years, when he was prone to confusion but could still recognize all of us and smile just because we were there. And I thought about all the young men and women there in uniform, there to pay their respects, like the rest of us, but to be recognized as well.

I knew Mum wouldn't want us to be selfish with our time, and that having our faces in that crowd meant as much to her as seeing them at her bedside in the E.R. today.

There's a long way to go before we know just what is going on with Mum, and probably a longer road after that figuring out what it all means, and what sort of lifestyle changes it might mean for all of us, but for right now, I am contenting myself with the fact that she is still with us, still knows us and knows that she has family and friends that love her.

We'll just have to sort out the rest as we go.