Beauty is useless but
character is the best
Trinidad Ancheta Toto
When my mother-in-law’s age hit the 80’s mark, there had
been a sudden influx of witticisms or sayings and a number of songs or jingles that she began to blurt out of
nowhere. I can only guess these were
adages or songs learned from her youth, probably from her Filipino elders during the American period, as these were all in
English. I do not recall exactly when it started
but we just started hearing her recite these phrases or sing these songs that we never
heard before.
Everyday, everyday, brush your teeth the
proper way
Toothbrush it, toothbrush it, brush your
teeth we say
Soon enough,
these were caught by my children and they would either be reciting or singing
these to her when her Alzheimer’s began to worsen. She would catch the phrase or song and she
would join them and finish the sentence or the song by her lonesome much to everybody’s delight…
until ten years later when she can no longer remember them and all she would do was to stare at us
and wonder.
It is
believed that nobody is pure and that everybody has a skeleton kept inside his
or her closet. There is also a saying
that there is an exception to every rule.
If both could be considered as true, I guess my mother-in-law shall fit
the bill . She hid nothing from anyone
and she was true through and through. I
don’t think she has any secret tucked inside the recesses of her brain. In her later years, she just sat quietly at the table, fixing her gaze at her dolls, feeding them,kissing and talking to them just like she did with her grandchildren. Old habits do not die! It was just like when she was stopped from feeding solid food, she would go through the motions of picking up food with her fingers and slowly bringing these to her mouth, feeding on air.
One time, one dinner, during her more lucid days, I asked her jokingly, Mamang,
what would you do if there will be an American suitor interested in you. Her reply brought us crying on the floor
with laughter. I will tell him I am not a virgin anymore, was her reply. Amidst the guffaws, I just realized to this
date that the response has a lot of historical significance. (1) She grew up in a time when virginity was of
prime importance…that it would be the best gift a woman shall give her husband
and she believed that were so - (2) the fact that the American represents the liberating hero that everybody looked up to and that
his satisfaction should be served, and that (3) he is the epitome of a handsome guy .
I remember
that we would be at odds on many things simply because I did not believe most
of what she believed in or the practices she has grown up to. A true Ilocana by
heart, she grew up with a lot of superstitious beliefs none of which I adhered
to. To my young mind, these were all
none negotiable I cannot surrender my
principles thinking that it is not true that we could follow the belief even if
we do not believe in them for after all, nothing is lost if we succumbed but plenty
to gain if it were true. Unfortunately I was not a follower of this thought. My
thinking is that something big is lost-- like advancing towards progress, for
one thing. And yet, we managed to
survive without any real animosity towards each other. We have learned to co-exist and I have
learned to trust my growing children to her care – which she did a spectacular
job.
We always celebrated her birthday with a bang. My brother-in-law, Abet, would design t-shirts that bore a design testifying how we adored her. Designs like We Love Lola would be worn during the party or sometimes to the point of having a theme like being dressed up in Hawaiian clothes or bearing the Mickey and Minnie Mouse ears.
On December 9, 2018, we were gathered at her hospital room which the children decorated to perk up that depressing place with her feeding on tubes and being aided by an oxygen tank to breathe . We sang happy birthday, ate cake and prayed the rosary to her withering body, her feet locked and crumped as if she wanted to be small and enter the womb again - a process of rebirth, I guess. She turned 95 years old.
The following day, as we were about to go with our daily routines, my eldest sister, Linda, who was with her, called and told us that the doctors discovered that her heartbeat was weakening and that her BP was dropping. She was told to call the relatives as the time for her to leave the world is at hand. We all rushed to the hospital and true enough, she expired. The time of death was 10:25 am having succumbed to infection in her blood. We all bade her goodbye for the last time.
I have had close encounters with Alzheimer's disease. My first encounter was with my mother who passed away in 2006 at the age of 87. Just recently, my mother-in-law had the same affliction. Alzheimer's disease is commonly associated with old age although there are cases of younger people having it. It is a progressive disease where dementia symptoms gradually worsen over a number of years. In its early stages, memory loss is mild, but in its later stage, the afflicted individual loses the ability to carry on a conversation and respond appropriately to the environment.
Such a clinical definition does not capture the essence of the disease and what it does to both the sufferer and the loved ones. It does not capture the extreme disappointments experienced by everybody involved. The despondency becomes lighter with the afflicted person coming up with many funny situations but the pain of not being able to communicate with a loved one just like before becomes painful when one realizes that the person is no longer the same.
I have a more positive take on the affliction, though. Having seen this natural phenomenon first hand, I am beginning to believe that it is a coping mechanism, an anesthesia if you would, that drives away the pain of knowing that one is at the final stage of his/her life. That soon enough one will not see her loved ones anymore, that the person will no longer be able to do what he or she was capable of doing before and just watch as the world pass by doing its own business, enjoying the company of loved ones. Much more so, it is a numbing of the awareness of the possibility of having to survive with the use of painful tubes stuck in one's body, that one shall be fed using a tube or being able to breathe by virtue of a respirator. This was a realization after having witnessed how my mother-in--law was survived until even the doctors advised the family that she probably has had enough and to just sign a waiver that she would no longer be subjected to all the hassles of keeping her alive through artificial means.
Two to three weeks prior to my mother-in-law's passing, the doctors asked a very painful question to the surviving children. Should we resuscitate her if and when she has a seizure? Thinking that my mother-in-law has lived a full life at the ripe old age of 95, her children decided no more. They signed a waiver and let nature take its course rather than subject her to a grueling experience of being poked with a lot of tubes, needles and a life with a machine. The question of should one fight nature and try to extend life as possible always come in when a loved one is at the brink of death. In 2006, I wrote a poem that summarizes my thoughts about the issue of either fighting for one's life or no more.
Oh Hipocrates, save me
please, but only
if you believe
I have yet more years.
But if these be spent
to suffer and shed more tears
spare, let me be
and let my spirit free
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