Category: 2021

2021, mental health, Writing

Procrastination Progress?

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Procrastination

Not only have I not written here since April, I am guilty of many writing procrastinations. So often my writing has been influenced by the pandemic. It’s hard to avoid. I am surrounded by nurses and people who have lost families to a misinformation vortex that has left them hurt and confused. I have reached the point where it hurts too much to write about it. That concerns me but…today something else.

Below is something I wrote for what was to be the beginning of 1000 words per day. It’s been…a while. Writing is “mine” and I so very often put “mine” at the end of the list. 1000 words per day…part 1

Stephen King tells me (not personally, you understand, though that would be awesome) I should write about 1000 words per day to start. Lacking any plan, today I guess I’m writing about writing. Stephen tells me my muse will appear eventually if I show up about the same time each day so he or she (or, this being a modern society, my gender neutral muse) can know where to find me.

What is it about writing that I’ll write? It beats the heck out of me; I’m new at this.

Or am I?

For years I have been promising all those who have told me, “You should write.” that I would.

This phase of my stop and start journey has begun with the purging of my office so I can think in this space. While purging, I came across a box casually labelled as “Roxi’s writing” in black marker.

I found I had worked on a piece far more thoroughly than I had thought, and the last time I had even attempted any ‘real’ writing was in 2009. It is almost 2018. I was floored and reminded if I am ever to get this done, I need to take it seriously and make it more of a priority.

And a phone call comes, my mentally disabled brother, for whom I am guardian, has been taken to the hospital in an ambulance. I am taken away from my thoughts for a few hours while I sort out with his home and the hospital how serious it is.

Not immediately urgent.

Finally, I am here at 3:00, 2 hours past my originally planned start time.

Writing.

About writing. I can’t dredge anything else from my weary mind today.

How then do I even know I am a writer?

I write sympathy cards, encouraging notes, Facebook posts (you should see them, they are epic), and the feedback is always, “You should write” or “You have a gift with words.”

If I do, why is it so hard to develop the “what” to write? What of that Stevo? Ah, the muse, I need to find my muse or perhaps let my muse find me. I like the idea that somewhere lies something (someone?) who will move me into the ‘idea’ place to get to the ‘write about’ stage.

Do I have a life to write about? Undoubtedly. It wasn’t an easy childhood; nonetheless, I am grateful for the input of all the people around me who kept me somewhat standing (and fed and watered on occasion.) I have chosen to focus on those people rather than rest in the caustic place of my mother’s illness which would have made me bitter and ineffective. So … I am grateful…and still occasionally ineffective (Let’s be honest here…2009 since my last actual writing!)

Besides the external feedback from others, is there something within me that urges me to write?

I believe so.  The thoughts rattling around my head often find their way into journals and social media. I can’t hold onto what I say whether anybody else sees it (Social Media) or not (journal). It’s like ‘verbal vomit’ but not as smelly. I get it out, and I feel better. Reading it later helps me sort things out. Or helps others sort things out if it’s addressed to them.

I was taught in one writing class to pay attention to the voice inside my head (I am not schizophrenic, for the record) and document somehow what the voice is saying. I did that for a while, carried a voice recorder with me. It was pretty grand. Little bits and pieces of things that could turn into something someday. I’m hoping today is someday. I have gradually quit listening to the voices inside my head and just blunder around from one life event to the other. I currently have some quiet time (until the money runs out), so I am trying to focus on at least attempting to write. Really write.

My nephew sent me three pictures today. He became a quadriplegic at the age of 14 and is now 34. A friend of his is having a hard time. This man has not handwritten anything for 20 years. Today he wrote her a 3-page letter of encouragement. If that won’t encourage her, I don’t know what will. If he can handwrite a three-pager after 20 years of not handwriting, this old girl can sure as hell come up with 1000 words on her computer. The gauntlet has been thrown down, and the gauntlet is enormous.

Stephen K claims his muse is a cigar-smoking fella, sort of gruff. If I were to imagine mine, I would probably imagine a slightly flaky chick, empathetic as heck, wearing colourful flowing garments, drinking wine and meditating from time to time.

Meditating, now that’s been interesting to me. I started meditating about a month ago. It taught me how noisy my head is. It’s no wonder the muse can’t get in. Man, that space is crowded! Breathe in, breathe out (I wonder what to get Bob for Christmas) Come back, breathe in, breathe out (Is that person I’m close to gay…I think they are gay…how can I help on their journey?) Come back, breathe in, breathe out. (Where will everyone sleep Christmas night…27 people!) Come back, breathe in, breathe out. I’m getting better at it, squirrel less often, and I really think it is helping me to stay in the moment a bit more. Just starting, but I hope I’m on to something.

My therapist, (yes, I have one…you guessed, didn’t you?) says my problem with staying in the moment likely comes from childhood.  She could be right. I was always scanning my environment, trying to predict when the floor would fall out again and constantly having a contingency plan for when it did. On the one hand, being a planner who looks down the road and plans for the eventualities has served me well in my work world. Doing it all…the…time…however, is exhausting.

It is getting quiet, closing the door to my writing space and planning 1000 words per day. This is how it all begins. Day 1, December 11, 2017. If it’s another nine years, find me and slap me. Please.

The good news is it’s “only” been 4 years, no slap required. (A wee nudge perhaps?) How do you other writers stay on track? Please let me know!

#COVID19, 2021, Doing what's right, Health, mental health, Uncategorized

My Child, Me.

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My child, Me

Today I looked into the eyes of my child. (from an appropriate distance).
My child has children of her own, but today she was my child. She is in pain. I want just to hold her and hold her and hold her.

I cannot.

My child is a nurse. She doesn’t work in the city Emergency Department as often as she used to. The little she is right now, is enough to hurt a skin already scraped raw. She knows others are seeing the same things, doing the same things but doing them day after day after day. Her own experience hurts—her awareness of their’s hurts her too.

There has always been trauma in Emergency.
Emergency nurses know they will see traumatic things, even that they will see death. It’s an unavoidable part of the job they signed up for

But…

This is different.

As cases rise in our area and a more transmittable variant becomes ever more prevalent, COVID cases are pouring into hospitals in our area. And while age shouldn’t matter; (indeed, I said so near the beginning) https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/04/ageism/, there is something so painful about being a nurse to someone very near your age, knowing they, like you, have children at home. Knowing that in this wave, much younger people are in ICU. Knowing that much of this could have been avoided.

How do these people come to know the patient has children at home? These nurses (& their colleagues) get to know these patients more than they generally have time for. They hold their patient’s hands, sit down next to the bed and tell their patient they won’t leave them in their terror. As that patient slides into sedation, that same nurse may move to the far less human process of intubation. That shift from connected humanity is hard. So hard. Nurses and doctors are making these connections with their patients in ED, in ICU… as family members stay outside…hungry for updates. They connect with these families more than they sometimes have had to. And then they hook their recently connected patient to an ECMO machine, prone them, administer drugs, fight for their lives…often losing that fight.
This third wave is even crueler. It is traumatizing, and they haven’t rested long enough.


Then they get traumatized again. Leaving work, they hear people saying the virus “isn’t real,” “just the flu,” “only sheeple believe in it”…. “Don’t get the vaccine.”
Remember the story of the nurse waylaid by an anti-mask protest making her late for her ED shift? This kind of pain is visceral, and their fellow citizens are doing it to them. Some friends are doing it to them. Some family members are doing it to them. My daughter has been off social media for months because she can’t bear to see it.
These people are down, and you are kicking them. You are kicking us, the families of those in health care. We look into their eyes, and we see pain. These are not superheroes; though we value them highly, they are human beings…battered human beings.

They KNOW it is real; they KNOW it is bad; they KNOW the variants are thus far worse; they KNOW it should not have happened this way.

Somehow, the wearing of a mask became enough to make people disrespect people like my daughter. My daughter…One of the ones who will hold your hand in your terror if someday this virus reaches you and takes you down a grim path. One of the ones who will update you if someday one of your loved ones takes this terrifying journey.

A doctor I admire said this,
“For everyone yelling “but the Charter of Rights and Freedoms” – You might be forgetting the part it starts off with: “…subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified.”
There. Are. Limits.


Dr. Fung is right. The people you are endangering also have rights; people working in health care have rights. Your rights don’t supersede theirs. If we had all worked together to stop the spread, you might already have your lives back; Dr. Fung and I may be going for dinner. I might be able to hold (and hold and hold) my daughter.

Cape Breton Trail 2019

We could be closer to the end of this pandemic. We could have been like the Atlantic provinces, whose citizens cared for each other and understood that public health restrictions were meant to protect those they held dear and those they had never laid eyes on, but loved anyway.

I’ve shown you deaths aren’t the whole story. I’ve told this story before but seeing my daughter today brought it back. Although not the entire story, I’ll end with this. COVID has killed 23,062 Canadian citizens…so far. Many more have long term effects. We are a long way from fully vaccinated; some variants are more apt to cause severe complications and cause them in younger people. For perspective, these deaths roughly equal the total deaths from —Pancreatic, Colorectal, Kidney, Breast, Cervical, Larynx, and Thyroid cancers in 2019. Imagine if we could have saved my Dad, my sister-in-law, my friend’s brother, and other mothers, fathers, sons and daughters by wearing a mask, washing our hands, social distancing?

Imagine…

2021, Aging, Retirement

Angel Wings and Memories

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Yesterday my husband’s family lost another one to heaven. I remember looking at my husband when he told me and thinking, “It’s going to happen more often, isn’t it?”

It is.

Today’s angel had a belly laugh that could inspire an entire room to hilarity.

Photo courtesy of Donelda’s family

I can see clearly the first time we met. I was around 19 years old. She was married to my husband’s cousin. The family was gathered around my mother-in-law’s table as they so often were. Donelda was laughing. The family was telling a joke that involved a spring-loaded ring box and D’s left breast, and she was laughing. With her entire body and soul, she was laughing.

The world will be a little less for the loss of that laugh.

The laughter came from shared memory. The whole family got the joke. They were there, and they revelled in the silly things that had happened in the past. (The stories may, or may not, have grown a little over the years.)

Those shared memories are so incredibly fun and good for the soul.

We are losing them. More and more often, we are losing them, these people who “remember when.”

I came from a family with some fragmentation, and walking into this family of shared memory was an undiluted joy.

The first time the loss of shared memory hit me was upon looking at my family’s picture and realizing I was the only one in that picture left. My half-brother remains. He is 18 years older than I and raised by my grandmother in another province, so although we have shared memories of “Granny,” we have little of shared “growing up” memories. ( I mean, he was grown up before I was born!) Although he is developmentally delayed and suffers mild dementia,  I have made a point in recent years to mine him for stories about our grandparents. I have learned new things, and we have laughed a little.

He is on dialysis now. He may live some time, or he may not. This last connection to “remember when” will be a tough one to lose.

When my husband and his siblings get together, there are always stories accompanied by laughter. I envy them this. Some of those stories involve the cousin who lost his wife last night. The families lived close together and gathered regularly. (weekly, I think!) They built memories together. When they grew up and got married, they attended each other’s weddings. More story fodder created. (I seem to recall some fine wedding stories involving my husband…)

One brother-in-law had a scare with his heart last year; another is a cancer survivor. My husband has survived one heart attack. And dementia runs in this family; will some of these shared memories be lost? My sister-in-law is trying to document their history.  She is blessed with distracted siblings who don’t always get her the information she needs. Lord help the woman, but I hope she gets it down and captures a bit of the essence of “them.” I have enjoyed “them.”

Lacking family, I have a friend I met when I was 11 years old: my first “real” friend, best friend…pseudo sister. We were lunatics, and the memories make us laugh. Those midnight giggling talks…she knows stuff about me that others do not. This past year has been a struggle with us landing firmly in opposite camps regarding the  COVID19 pandemic. There’s a line in the sand of an almost 50-year friendship, and it breaks my heart. I hope someday we will be sharing memories again. I miss her.

Shared memory.

As soon as we can safely gather, let’s do more of this. (or let’s do it 6 feet apart in the backyard for now). Less talk of politics, less talk of today’s woes. Let’s share memories in front of the next generation, in front of those that marry into our families. Let’s soak in these moments, and when our people gain their angel wings…we will remember their laughter.

Rest easy Donelda. I’ll listen for your laughter in the summer breeze.

Photo by Anastasia Shuraeva on Pexels.com
#COVID19, 2021, Christianity, Doing what's right, Health

Love Thy Neighbour

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With Christmas recently behind us, I’ve been reflecting on the one whose birthday we were meant to be celebrating. I’ll admit I haven’t been inside a church for a while. It may have more to do with a misalignment between how I and others understood Christianity than with any loss of faith.

I am no theologian. I count among my followers, atheists, agnostics, Muslims, Hindus, evangelicals and those without labels.

I was appalled to see my brother’s church among those that filed a constitutional challenge about gathering. The youth group brought my other brother food when he fell on hard times. They sang at his funeral. How could they get it so right…and then so wrong?

This church has been offering online church for months so I was rather blown away to be honest. My brother misses people at church but this aging man with a developmental disability UNDERSTANDS. For the record, Jesus gathered wherever the people were. The people are at home, or should be. WWJD in 2020? Zoom Church? I think so.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-churches-file-court-challenge-to-covid-19-rules-as-cases-surge-1.5830233

Jesus said, “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there among them” (Matthew 18:20) Not four, not ten, not 100, not 500. TWO or THREE. If you live alone, gathering via Zoom WORKS! Stand down churches. Your larger responsibility is to your community as a whole.

There are lessons attributed to Jesus Christ that hurt none of us to consider. Whether you believe he is the son of God, a prophet or a wise man roaming the countryside, this one benefits all of us.

“And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-39)

All of you…believers, non-believers, those of different faiths…

Love. Thy. Neighbour.

Thy Neighbour with COVID.

Thy Neighbour over 60.

Thy Neighbour with Co-morbidities.

Thy Neighbour working in health care.

Thy Neighbour who has been denied our usual grieving comforts and rituals.

Love Them.

On November 4th I asked for love for our ageing neighbours.

https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/04/ageism/

On November 7th, days after my daughter’s birthday, I asked you to love her and her colleagues. For Dr. Markland and his ICU compatriots, I asked my community to care for them. They are your neighbours too.

https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/07/our-greatest-protest-for-healthcare/

“We saw it in Italy with military trucks hauling away bodies, with Italian doctors and nurses having to choose who received care (and who did not) based on survival probability. Many didn’t “make the list.” These weren’t all COVID patients. Patients with other situations were hitting those hospitals at the same time. Triage, I imagine, was a nightmare.”

On November 11th, I honoured our veterans, many of them seniors, by asking my community to love these heroic neighbours, saying,

“As deaths in long-term care once again reach a crisis point, as we in Alberta break hospitalization and ICU records, there are undoubtedly some veterans or those who love them, among the statistics.”

https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/11/they-protected-us-its-our-turn/

On November 27th, I tried to shine a light on just how many of us, how many of our neighbours, have “co-morbidities”… how many of us are at risk.

“Dr. Hinshaw said that having a chronic medical condition is quite common, with nearly a quarter of Albertans over 20 living with a medical condition. (Almost 800,000 people) Ten percent of Albertans have two conditions, and eight percent have three or more—conditions like hypertension, heart disease and diabetes.

Hypertension is found in 87 percent of Albertans who died of COVID19. Almost 70 percent of Albertan men over 65 have high blood pressure. (My hubby, the moustache guy, is in this group). Having co-morbidities does not equal at death’s door.”

https://pathtothepasture.com/2020/11/27/club-comorb/

As we enter into a new year, hope lies on the horizon in a vial of vaccine. I ask again, “Love thy neighbour.” The vaccine rollout will take a while before it gets to all of us, and until it does, there continues to be a risk of spread. Health care workers and senior home residents come first, which will hopefully drive our mortality rates down significantly.

BUT

Many seniors and those with co-morbidities live in the community and will be waiting a while yet.

During this holiday week, the province reports approximately 1300 new cases. Of those, the WHO estimates about 5% become critically ill. We’ve consistently had around 1200 new cases per day over the last week or so. (Other than one low testing rate day) So we are looking at 48 – 65 people becoming critically ill each day. It is important to remember the cumulative effect. Those entering the hospital are added to people already there. Those in ICU will be there for a while; even once out of ICU, they will use significant resources. (See the November 7th blog for Dr. Markland’s overview of the possible resources required)

As of our last update a few days ago we have 921 in hospital (average age 63, range 0 – 104)

  •  Average age for COVID cases hospitalized with an ICU stay is 59 years making me REALLY excited about that upcoming birthday (range: 0-89)
  • A total of 1046 deaths. (average age 82, range 23 – 107
  • 23 is younger than our youngest death was previously…

The deaths matter. Every single one.

Deaths
 November 4thDec 31
Age 20 to 2924
Age 30 to 3926
Age 40 to 49310
Age 50 to 59823
Age 60 to 6926100
Age 70 to 7979211
80 +223691

While deaths in younger folks are rising, most alarming to me is that folks in my husband’s age group have now hit triple digits. And those “Aged” folks? The ones many don’t think matter, mattered to someone … and this is not an easy way to go.

And our neighbours working in health care…it’s gotten harder.

Dr. Markland’s ICU team in Edmonton is well beyond capacity now. Calgary hospitals are also beginning to see strain. He is regularly working 36 hour shifts. He is an empathetic soul. That’s a tough thing to be these days.


“It’s easy to turn this pandemic into numbers, but it’s so much more than that. These are mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers. That tickle you feel in your throat is how it started for them. Their death leaves scars.” Dr. Darren Markland

ICU admissions
November 7thDec. 31
Under 1 year 7
1 – 9 years  14
10 – 19 years 48
20 – 29 years 821
30 – 39 years1130
40 – 49 years2262
50 – 59 years41118
60 – 69 years56183

 Dr. Daisy Fung has been hurting from the deaths in the LTC homes she covers. Her tweets give us insight on how the world looks from her vantage point.

“I had to tell a child that they had lost BOTH parents today. That was the start of my day. There were similar calls made. People think Christmas is stolen bc they can’t go shopping? I break news regularly that Christmas is devastated for families, stolen from patients.”

On December 5th she wrote,

“Words I heard today: ‘I wish I knew #COVID19 was serious. I now know & will tell everybody.’ Said as I keep their loved one comfortable as they die of COVID.

Broken heart

Albertans need to get it straight that it’s serious, we need to protect our vulnerable. Now.”

Yesterday she shared her joy about vaccines for these people.

“Ended work for 2020 by giving orders for all my #LongTermCare patients to receive the #Moderna #COVID19 #vaccine. Ended 2020 with a prescription for hope, provided by a feat of science and medicine. It’s kind of perfect”.

 There are real people behind available” beds” and these people are becoming decimated by the constant struggle, the constant death of their patients.

If you can’t find it in yourself to love thy aged neighbours, your veteran neighbours, your neighbours with co-morbidities, your healthcare neighbours, I know you love someone.

Risking further strain on our healthcare system can affect any of your neighbours. It can affect you.

The same healthcare workers who accept COVID patients right now are those you will need if you have a heart attack, a severe car accident, a diabetic coma…that your child might need. While COVID mostly minimally impacts children, if they show up at an Edmonton ER for any issue, you want them to be cared for.  Note that the Stollery Children’s Hospital is using space for adult patients and double-bunking kids.

There wouldn’t be room for you to stay the night and hold your child’s hand (or puke bucket…let’s get real…been there).

A situation like we are currently experiencing holds potential to affect every corner of our community and our lives.

When our neighbours get cancer, there’s little we can do to slow the spread.

In this, we have an opportunity. A Merry Christmas. A Happy New Year. A chance to really matter.

An opportunity to save lives.

Loving our neighbour is such a simple way to do it. #StayHome #WashYourHands #SkipHawaii