You and Me Against the World
I always thought that the words "father" and "husband" were supposed to
bring to mind such things as, love, caring and happiness. Isn't a husband and a father
supposed to make you feel loved, needed, wanted, and safe? I guess I will never know
for sure, because my father never showed any of those qualities either to me as my father,
or to my mother as her husband.
The title of this beautiful graphic set is "Homeless." When I first saw it,
the last words my father ever said to me the day before he died came to mind, and I knew
that I just had to use this set on one of mom's pages. While mom was alive it had always been
a
"you and me against the world" kind of bond between us. As long as one of us still had the
other
we felt safe...we felt loved...we felt wanted...we felt needed. It did not matter what
her husband said to her or what my father said to me because the love between us made up
for all of the hurt that he put us through in our lives.
Of course, my mother denied that my father ever treated her the way that I saw
and
knew that he treated her. Perhaps it was easier to live with this monster if she lived her
life in denial. Long before Alzheimer's ever robbed her of her life and spirit, my father
robbed her of her zest for life. He stripped her of her self worth just as he had done to
me, and this gave him the total control that he so desired. His last words to me were,
"You had better pray that nothing ever happens to me because if it does, you and your mother
will be out on the street, homeless, within three days after my death." What kind of
father..what
kind of husband...what kind of HUMAN BEING...says this to someone, especially their loving and
devoted wife and child?
I thank God that I was able to take care of mom after his death, and that she
never was left out in the cold as he had told that her she would be. Yes, we had our hard
times,
but I took care of her. That is why it was so difficult to have to put her into the nursing
home
as her Alzheimer's got worse. I felt as though I was failing her and sending her out into the
cold. At first I knew she felt abandoned, but in time, she accepted her fate and came to feel
comfortable in her new surroundings.
As the Alzheimer's progressed, mom's world became one of
only "her." This selfless woman became very self centered, and it no longer mattered to her
what
kind of struggles I still had in my life. When I told her that I was going in for surgery she
did not even get upset. I knew that this was no longer her but Alzheimer's talking. She did
not even care when I lost my job. All mom cared about was attention being paid to HER. That
was the most difficult part of Alzheimer's for me to accept. She became selfish in her needs
and less and less sympathetic to mine. How I longed for the mom who would comfort me and tell
me that everything would be ok. Now I was truly alone and on my own, and the struggles in my
life no longer mattered to her. In time I came to accept this as part of Alzheimer's,
but it was not easy. It was no longer "you and me" against the world, and I was totally
alone now. Alzheimer's takes your loved ones out of their bodies long before they die. Mom
had
left me years before she had ever left this earth.
As my struggle to survive continues, my father's last words to me echo ever so
loudly in my head. Perhaps I am a failure at life. Perhaps one day I will end up on the
street.
I have no job and I struggle to keep this roof over my head while I watch my savings dwindle
rapidly down to nothing. Perhaps he was right in his perception of me. I just thank
God that mom is not here to watch me fail. I pray that if she can see me that she is not
ashamed of me now.
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