The Adult Child

I know I am not the only person on the planet transitioning from the role of parent of adult children living on their own to adult child of parent needing more and more help. For a few years now I have been making this transition, and it gets harder every day.

Mom struggles with several significant, life ending medical problems. The two causing the most trouble are heart issues and diabetes. When I think back to when the problems cropped up, but I can’t pinpoint it.

I know in 1999 she had an open heart by-pass surgery. I was working for state government and took her soup two days in a row because she said she didn’t like what the hospital gave her. She didn’t remember me being there.

Gradually, ever so gradually, I watched my mother morph. She went from independent, hopping in a Ford Ranger and driving to Ft Hood, Texas with her sister in 1986, to a frail, stooped figure who prefers to let someone else drive her one mile to Walmart.

Today, I am picking her up to get her “finger stick” test. She takes a blood thinner and requires bi-weekly review. Dad needs the same test. He gets his test at the general practitioner’s office. I don’t know why Mom’s cardiologist requires her test be done at a special lab, but he does.

It’s is an all day process. I will pick her up midday, get her some lunch, take her for the test, and head home. She will remember something she has to get at the pharmacy, or casually mention something she’d like to see or do and I will take her.

I will ALWAYS taker her, and without complaint. She is my mother. She deserves it.

I just find this transition upsetting. It only leads to one place.