Yeah, you are the care compass
Pointing hearts back home
Turning quietly, moves into places they belong
To the elderly, the wise you give your steady light
Careful, care-caring compassion
In the soft hours of the night
Hi, it's Nicole Brandon and we are here today with the care compass, the aging parents survival guide
It is my privilege and my honor to be with you and to share this journey with you
For those of you that have been following and that have been with me, I so appreciate your questions, your thoughts, your journey
And I am with you every step of the way
For those of you that are new, I have had a rollercoaster of a journey
With both my parents taking ill at the same time I fought with cancer
My mom would advance stages of all smetering
And then I have gone through a myriad of conditions, my uncle with Parkinson's
And my mom having a stroke and being in a coma feeding tubes
Broken hips and broken necks and on and on
And everybody has their own journey
One journey is not more important than another
One heartache is not a heart that is broken or shattered more than another heart
Whatever you are on your journey
If you are just starting to take care of your parents
If you are moving closer to be able to be with your parents
If you are moving your parents into a facility or getting caregivers or nursing care
Wherever you are, it's sick
But it matters
It matters and the care and the support is there with you
You are not alone and I think that's the one thing that I want to share with you more than anything
Is that you are absolutely not alone on this journey
One of the things I've been astounded about is this started posting that I was creating this show
And the hundreds and hundreds and thousands of people from around the world
That started writing in and said I'd love to come on and be a guest and share my story
Or share my expertise or share my service that I have
And every service is different
Every story is different and if you have a story if you want to be a guest
Absolutely reach out and if you have a question
Whatever that question is how you navigate
Medicare insurance, caregiving, medication
I know that I had a caregiver for my mom
That reached out to me just this week and he said you know, Nicole
Your mom was at the endocrinologist
And the endocrinologist is very concerned because your mom has lost a great deal of weight in a very short period of time
And my mom is now maybe 97, 90 pounds
I have a dear friend of mine that just broke to me today
And her husband is 62
And I think he's down to 110 pounds
And another friend of mine who's dad
Is really not been wanting to eat
And he is also quite tall and I think he's only down to 105 or 110 pounds
But this caregiver told me I said you know, Nicole
I was at the endocrinologist with your mom and the endocrinologist was looking at your mom's medicine medicine
And do you know that this medicine and this medicine and he named two medicines that are prescribed for Alzheimer's
Both of the symptoms and the side effects of these medications are weight loss
And combined almost always cause weight loss
And the endocrinologist would like you to reach out to the neurologist and see if there is another medication they could prescribe for your mom
Because this one obviously is advancing the weight loss
How would you know that the weight loss is being caused by a medicine they're taking and they could be so easily fixed as to change to another type of medication or another form of a vitamin, a mineral, a fluid diet
To be able to do the very same thing that one medication for the Alzheimer's was doing
And so which after us because you might not know you might say all of a sudden these are the symptoms or this is what I am seeing or all of a sudden, you know, when they stand up the blood pressure drops or their legs are swollen
And sometimes it could just be that you need socks like the right constricting socks to be able to help the blood pressure just by be able to get the socks
It can change something but if you know, if you don't know that there are solutions and you don't know that there are answers and you don't know what's out there and you don't know the new treatments or the new research or you don't know how to fill up forms
Or what if you don't know their hereditary or what if you don't know your grandparents or what if they were adopted or they came from another country or spoken other language and you need to know history or you need to know conditions
Or you need to know something that happened when you were like a brag kid and you weren't even paying attention. I know for myself, my mom had grown my whole life and all I know is that she didn't eat certain foods and her belly hurt a lot
But I never really paid attention to when we were in our twenties, my brother and I were built study to some part of a research study that they wanted to know why we didn't have it, why my mom could have crumbs and my her kids could be healthy
to be a part of this research, which was really interesting, but as my mom got into her 60s into her 70s into her 80s and the crowns and the diva ticulitis and what she could eat
And then having Alzheimer's and forgetting that she can't have certain foods. So she might put something in her mouth that would ask for the condition. But if you don't know, is that child to be able to say we can have health or we can't have peanuts, we can't have these things in the house
Because their digestive system isn't going to handle this or they're non dairy or these things, you know, that will help or they die a bit and they shouldn't have sugar cookies, whatever that is. So reach out. Please feel free to reach out to me. I'm happy to bring in experts. I'm happy to give you whatever answers that I could possibly give you
to be able to help you navigate this journey because for myself, I felt like a pinball like I was just being shot all over.
So I wanted to talk today about Mother's Day. So it was just Mother's Day. And Mother's Day for me this year was bittersweet.
That's the best way that I could share it. Last year on Mother's Day, my mom was in the hospital.
And I called a family member to say that my mom was an ambulance going to the hospital.
And their response was, if you want me to text me what life was really busy or send me an email.
Okay, Mother is going to the hospital. So when you feel like you are alone in the world, whether you have other relatives, aunts, uncles, whether your parents have relatives, whether you have siblings, they have siblings that are not stepping up to the plate to help.
And you are a lone soldier in the care.
You need to be a lone soldier. You're never alone. There's always support. If you look around you, there are people that are willing to help you and to come to that for you and to come to the hospital with you.
I had friends that would come to the hospital and say close your eyes, just like 10 minutes 15 minutes. I've got it. I've got it.
But last year she was in the hospital.
And things were not good. We had no idea what was happening last year at this time. And so this year to be able to celebrate a mother's day is a miracle.
The fact that my mom has really backed the fact that my mom is able to be out of the hospital and be able to sit next to my dad again. The many, many, many, many, many, many miracles of this life journey.
And then I look at my mom and I look at all that her body has been through and all that she has endured.
And I was thinking, and I was telling my mom on Mother's Day, whether she remembers it or not, because she has a band stage all summer.
So now mostly she smiles and her eyes will light up.
And I know just by the way she kisses me, by the way she touches my hand that she recognizes me that she loves me. Sometimes she'll say, you're my best girl. Sometimes she'll say, I love you.
You know, not necessarily full on conversations. Sometimes she'll speak, but I know that she's in there. But when I was a kid, we lived on an island.
And my mom is a storm watcher and she used to love to take us down to the beach when the waves were crashing in and hitting the rocks.
And my friends used to think that my mom was crazy, like that she was putting us in danger, that she would put us on the rocks when these like tsunami sized waves were coming at us.
But my mom found such beauty in the storm, such incredibly remarkable beauty in watching these waves come up and I'm watching these waves subside.
And I realized that she has created that in her life. This incredible medical conditions, the stroke, the coma, and the meaning, the feeding tube, everything that she has, has created all of these waves that have come crashing in.
And then they have subsided. And if I look at it from her perspective, there is something quite beautiful in that.
And something quite real, and something quite magical, and something quite powerful, and something quite alive in that.
And so I hang on to her joy in doing that. And then as I was talking to her, I was sharing with her some of the things I remembered about my childhood, and about who she is.
So if you are willing to attach yourself to those memories, and for me growing up, my mom would kidnap us from school.
I don't know any other child that I have ever met that their parents would kidnap them from school, but my mom used to kidnap us from school.
And we would be in the middle of class, and all of a sudden the teacher would go me out of class or put my brother out of class and we would be called to the principal's office and the principal would say that my mom needed us for something that day, whatever that was, that we had a family thing or something we had
and my mom would pull us out of school and we would go to the beach, we'd go to the museum park, we'd go to the Chicago thing, we'd go ice skating, she just missed us, she missed spending time with her children.
And we were both really good students, and our grades were great. And unless we had a test, she thought nothing about pulling us out of school just to spend the day loving and playing with her children.
And there's something so beautiful in that when I think about it, because now when I might just sit next to her and just hold her hand and even know we're not doing anything, or if I go and then we sit and we listen to music or if I put her on a cartoon or movie, just to take her away from whatever
the medical, the conditioning, the pills, the physical therapy that doctors appointments just to take her to spend time with her, just to be with her because I love her and I missed her, then I am getting back what she gave to us.
So you can attach to moments like that.
When I was really little, and I was sharing all of this in here on Mother's Day, when I was really little, I came home crying from school because somebody had told me in school that there was a Santa Claus.
And when I told that to my mom, my mom started to cry and she was crying so hard, she was crying as if it was the first time she ever heard that information that there was a Santa Claus.
And then finally when she spoke, she said, I feel very sad and very disheartened that someone had the need to tell you that.
And then she put me on her lap and she said, when you're little, you can see Santa as a man in a red suit.
But as you grow, so does your perspective, and you can start to see Santa in people's hearts.
And I never forgot that she told me that.
And about a year and a half ago, she was in a coma and she was four weeks and a couple months, she wasn't moving at all or her eyes were in the open.
And she wasn't talking and she wasn't moving her hands or feet.
My dad and I would talk to her and we just trusted that she was inside and my dad would tell her the most beautiful things, how she had the widest teeth.
And that used the same toothpaste and how could her teeth be so white and you would tell her how much you loved her and you'd tell her about their love story and you tell her all the places they traveled around the world.
And it was so precious, but my mom was just there and we kept feeding love into her, just trusting that she could hear us and that somewhere she was inside.
And after several months of nothingness, there was a nurse that was in the room and the nurse sneezed.
And my mom said, God bless you.
God bless you.
Excuse me.
That was the first thing she said, after all this time, God bless you.
That sweet, lovely woman was still inside.
The woman that said, when you're the Lucy Santa as a man in a rape suit and when you grow so does your perspective and you could start to see Santa in people's hearts, that loving you care, that kindness is still in there.
So when you're dealing with your mom or your dad, and they have dementia, they have Alzheimer's, they can't speak anymore, or they're in a coma or they're in a condition where they're not able to respond, the way you would want a response, the way you would appreciate your response, or they're not able to go play
or go play tennis with you or have a party and enjoy the holidays.
If you can latch on to those memories of what made your relationship seem to me, your relationship precious, those things that you remember the most, those things that you'll never forget, those things that
enhance your life and meet you who you are.
And then when they say something, it's not going to hit you the same way, like one of my parents will ask the same questions, you know, how was your day.
Great. What are you doing today?
I do show whatever today.
And then a couple minutes later, how was your day? What are you doing today?
You'll be on the radio job. It may be 15 times, 17 times, 20 times. We'll have that very same conversation over and over and over again.
But I also remember being a little girl.
And my parents would put on the tape recorder, the multiple taken multiplication, just like first you were measuring tone, multiplication tables, you know, one times one is one, one times two is two, one times three is three, one times four is four, two times two.
And they would put the tape recorder by my ear on my bed and I would go to sleep for months, years.
Yeah, how did one take me to learn their multiplication tables, or their eyes learning over and over and over and the repetitive of that.
And to think that that was how they taught me.
That is how my nine learned to grow. That is how I learned to grasp information by that process of repeating. And so how can I now be upset or angry or frustrated when my parents asked me the same question for the 15th time.
I can't possibly be upset because I think they would feed me information over and over again.
Dad, baby, banana, mom, dad, what patients did they have to teach me to speak.
What patients did they have to teach me how to think.
What patients did they have to teach me to solve problems.
They never gave up on teaching me how to walk and how to speak and how to eat and how to do the things that I do.
They were always there, whether it was 500 times they had to teach me how the time I share or be body trained or whatever those things are.
That parents do to teach their children and guide their children.
Now we have the opportunity to be as patient, to be as caring, to be as loving, to be as committed, knowing that they are doing the very best they can with the information that they have.
And they're working and trying their very best to connect with us as we did when we were growing and we were children.
And so I think that's really important and it puts things into perspective because it's so easy to get frustrated and just have this conversation on what we just talked about this or instead of really taking the big how lucky I am
that I'm able to have this communication, how lucky I am that they are wanting to play this tennis game of words, how lucky am I to be in this moment and time and to still have them with me to still have them before me to still have them when it was my birthday two years ago.
And my mom was in a rehabilitation scenario. At that time, they didn't think she was going to make it. I was calling the funeral house. I was calling for less rights. It was a very treacherous, treacherous time.
And my dad was so apologetic and my dad kept saying, you know, honey, I'm so sorry, we're in the hospital, or we should be throwing a birthday party. And I said, Dad, no, I said, it is our birthday.
You have the you mom. It's the three of us created this day. It's our birthday.
And do you know how many girls wish they could spend their birthdays with their parents? How many girls around the world wish they could spend a day with their parents that your doctor or parents are in Bombay.
Do you know how much you want to spend a day with your parents that I'm the lucky girl. I'm the lucky one.
And so when I look at these moments, I remember I was telling my mom's mother's day. She was amazing. She used to take the bus with me. We lived in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
And I would go to New York for dance classes. It was two and a half hours each way.
And my mom would go with me on the bus several days a week. We went about four or five days a week. So that's a five hour trip.
And on the bus, going to my dance classes, we would do my homework and then she would sit and wait for me to dance. And then she would get me dinner.
And then we would take the bus home and I would sleep on her lap and she was alone in the darkness as a child slept on her for two and a half hours home and then scoop me out.
And then she would pick us up from the bus and take me home. And then it was late at night. So she only had a little bit of time to spend with my dad before the night had come to a close.
And then in the morning we were up to have a breakfast and go to school and the day would start all over again. And what she sacrificed what she gave up to be a mother to me to give me every opportunity to give us everything.
And so she would make my costume. She would make our clothes. She would always make us feel important, feel seen. And so on Mother's Day, I was thinking about the flowers and the cards and all of the years of celebrations
that she would celebrate with her mother with my dad's mom, she used to take them to theater to Broadway shows.
And at what point did that stop? And how do we celebrate Mother's life? How do we say not only did you give me life, but you gave me purpose, you gave me heart, you gave me spirit, you gave me soul.
And I have a dear friend of mine who had a very, very tumultuous relationship with his mom and he did not have the mother that I had.
And some people have mothers that they don't think are very loving or very kind or they could be alcoholics, they could be drug addicts, they could have addictions, they could go through relationships that are not supportive of their children.
And I'm not saying all mothers are shining stars like my mom, that's a shining star, but all mothers give their children light.
And he did not have any kind of quality relationship with his mom, but yet he wanted one his whole life.
And then the last stages of his mother's life, they became very important to him.
To forgive her, they became very important to let go of the anger, to let go of the anguish, to let go of the pain or the drama or the situations that caused him unhappiness.
And so, I think it's a very important story to focus since he was a soul caregiver and the only one that could be and would be there for his mom in the last stages of her life and that would have to make the medical decision so have to make the financial decision so it
was a long-term decision that he was able to say who was she?
What was her upbringing? What tools did she have to raise a child and with what she was given, did she do the best she could?
And then she was given the moment that she was given the moment that she was given the moment through that journey, through that lifetime that you felt loved, that you felt seen in a moment that she made, you're mom laugh.
So, I think that she was special or words of wisdom that were shared and that were said, things that you could do or ways that she treated other people or maybe something she could do, something she made or just the scent of the kitchen.
For myself, my mom is incredibly mechanical, unbelievably mechanical. I mean, she could have been, you know, a contractor, she bought you two, but she had no, like nobody trained her, she just had a brain to do that to like building F-14 who knows.
And my dad, as wise and as smart and as knowledgeable he is and was during my childhood, was not the mechanic of the Fafinage.
And I remember for Christmas, my dad had built a bicycle or got a bicycle for my brother and my dad had built the wheels on and did whatever and he put this bicycle and he put it under the tree.
And it really didn't look right. And my mom came down in the middle of the night, my dad was asleep and took the duck apart and put the bike back together again.
So, my brother woke up and he said, well, Tricycle, or whatever it was, you know, he was a little kid and he was going to be able to have a bicycle from Santa Claus.
And I remember her doing that, but she never once said to my dad, you didn't put this together.
She never said to my dad, you are not mechanical. She never said to me, she never made him wrong ever.
She just, while he was sleeping in the middle of the night, she came down and I heard her and so I woke up so I came and I was watching from the top of the steps and I watched her silently take this little bicycle part, put the little tricycle wheels on, put the whole bike back together.
And it just, you know, little bow on it and slid it under the tree from my brother so when he woke up Santa Claus would have had any silver bike.
And the fact that she did things so seamlessly and so graciously, the fact that she never made people wrong for anything that they did.
And she never made people wrong for what they said.
She never made people wrong for their opinions, for their thoughts, for their background, for their ignorance, for their insecurities, for their fears.
She just never met a stranger. She loved people wherever they were at.
And everyone, everyone always loved my mom. And everywhere I go, even in the senior living facility, I think that I can't walk through the halls without people asking how she is today.
Because even when she's not speaking, her heart comes up, her heart shows.
And that is what has made this journey so like quite rutably difficult to go from a mom who called every single day.
I did not know any other daughter. I'm sure there are other ones out there, but that never missed a day, even when I was traveling internationally and never missed a single day, that I did not communicate with my mom, even when I was on cruise ships.
So it's end of fact. During the day, just so she would know that I was thinking about her, but we communicated. That was how we started our mornings.
And then to watch her have all sign words to watch her fear where she didn't want to go to the neurologist.
And she would say she'd be so angry and I never saw her angry before, but she was angry because she thought that people thought she was stupid.
Which was certainly not the case, but that was from her mind, the fact that she was going and being tested.
She thought people thought she was stupid and she had so much fear with that.
And she would go in the bathroom or the bedroom and she shut the door. I locked the door.
Staying bed. And I saw this mom and I never saw a fearful mom until she started to go get tested for dimensional science.
And then the anxiety of her needing to go places, needing to do things.
She just couldn't be in the house and that's when you have wanderers, mom put the alarms on the doors because she needed to go out.
And then the confusion to go to a public bathroom and not to know how to get out because they're too many doors in the public bathroom.
To not remember your last name or the year or to lose credit card after credit card wallet after wallet keys after keys for things to be put down, but you have no idea where they were put down or you can just give your card, but you have no idea what you're signing or what you're charging.
How that works and the loss of that time and the facility and then to go from fashion somebody who was at the upper echelon of people would stop on the streets to say, where did you get that album?
Where did you get that thing?
And I mean, that was always the woman in town that everyone wanted to be like, look like, just like to all of a sudden not knowing, you know, what you're doing.
Fooditch.
aran Friday night.
And so they're menstruating up and just
getNR's and just taking a bath.
Let me hear these comments into much of your speech in the letters, so if you're interested in hearing from each song, just instant hit their sounds, pressure, right?
go through those stages and then she started needing to write everything down.
Tell me that person's name.
Tell me, I want to write a thank you to that person.
Tell me what they just gave me,
but did they just give me, I want to write it down?
She started writing on everything.
These were the stages that I was experiencing and going through.
Then came the time when my mom used to host everybody.
People would come in and she could make a meal for 40 people and then you gave a moment in time.
People would come in and she would suddenly catch and she was no longer the consummate host.
Then that first time I ever experienced my mom having anger was when my dad had cancer
and she wanted to be by his side.
I'm the wife.
I'm the wife and that's all that she knew was that she was supposed to be with him.
She didn't understand what he was experiencing.
She didn't understand why he was in the hospital.
She didn't understand the pain.
But he was experiencing.
She didn't understand the chemotherapy.
She didn't understand what he needed.
Nutritionally, she just knew that she was the wife and wanted to be by his side
and she would sit there through those hours of chemo and she didn't know why they were sitting there.
She didn't know why.
But if you had asked her, she wanted to go shopping or she went to go get some lunch.
She would not leave him.
She only knew she would not and could not leave him, but she didn't understand what was happening.
So if this is your story, if you have a parent that is confused,
if you have a parent that is lost, if you have a parent that is waiting for their independence,
if you have a parent that still wants to drive or that still feels like they are wanting
to be in control, how do you help guide them?
If your parents want to go out to a restaurant, how do you help them order?
How do you help them eat if your parents want to go shopping?
How do you take them shopping and ensure that the wallet's not left behind
or the credit card, but you still let them sign or how do you make sure that people aren't taking advantage
or taking money or some of you that's calling and says, you know, that their roofers
or whatever the experience is that they are having their electricity is shut.
How do you assist in that process?
And so Mother's Day at the senior living was beautiful.
They had flowers from the facility as well as we gifted them enough flowers as well in cards.
But they had this beautiful brunch.
They had that heart player.
They had seafood, towels, and duck and man and ribeye and Italian food and whatever it was.
I mean, my parents are in a beautiful senior living facility.
And all of the bells and whistles and all of the beauty and all of the
specialness is not more special than you just being present, than your phone call,
than your being there, than your touch, than your sharing of memory,
than your, I mean, even I said to my mom, and I'm never sure when I'm talking to her what she really remembers
and what she doesn't.
And my mom used to come rescue us from bad lunches at school.
It's true.
So we had in our kitchen on the refrigerator, we had a list of what the school lunches were.
So if it said sloppy jiggles or meatloaf, whatever it was, peanut butter, jelly,
kimita, celics, whatever it was that we were going to have that day for school lunch was listed in,
it was on our fridge.
And my mom would look at the list and if it didn't sound overly delicious,
if it didn't sound like something that she would want, that she would think was really yummy
and really fantastic and something that she would want to have for lunch, she can get us.
So my brother and I would be in school and we would be standing there with the trays and a long line of kids waiting in the school cafeteria.
We take our little steps forward and take our little steps forward and we know it's going to be something terrible because we had already heard down the lane what it was for a lot of job you saw it on that.
We refrigerated before we left for school.
And as we were standing there with their trays and our bill disappointed faces.
We would see my mom in the doorway and she would be waiting and she'd call us over and go right into my room and she would take us out.
And we would go a chocolate bun too.
We could go have salads. We'd go have French toast for lunch. We'd go to burgers, whatever it was.
My mom would come take us and we would have these really fabulous fun lunches together or sometimes she'd make this lunch and we sit on the beach or we sit on the boardwalk and just we go to the park and we'd have a picnic.
And then she bring us back to school and we go back to our afternoon classes.
But my mom, incredible mom, remarkable mom.
And I've been so blessed.
And then the past four years I've had a mom that has had advanced stages of Alzheimer's.
I've had a mom that had a stroke and collapse in front of me and I watched the paramedics and I was in the ambulance and my life.
Wasn't all the same. I've had a mom who was in a brain unit. One of the nations stop bringing unit where they connect her brain to the wall to see brain activity and that was in a coma for months.
And then I saw my mom right back and my mom opened her eyes and ripped her hands and her feet. And then finally we moved her to rehab and back to the hospital and to rehab and back to the hospital.
And then finally we removed the catheter and we removed the forehead and then we taught her how to use the restroom again and then we taught her how to stand.
And then we taught her how to sit. We taught her how to move her hands on her feet. We taught her how to talk and then we taught her how to say her name and how to read and how to write her name.
And then she had a feeling to because she did not have to eat and then we taught her how to swallow and we taught her how to eat and then she was able to baby food and she was able to drink.
We were able to take the feeding juvenile. We were able to have her use of Walker to walk to the bathroom.
And then we were able to teach her how to hold a telephone. She talked to other people and we were able to bring her back to be with my dad after being married 66 years.
They were apart and she was going through this roller coaster medical journey.
And the miracle is that we were able to bring her back. And this mother's day.
My dad was able to sit next to her. I was able to be with her and told her hand and it was the miracle of miracle of miracles.
So it doesn't matter where you are on this journey.
And I've had to figure everything out. I had to figure out my mom lost her Medicare. My mom lost her social security.
I had to get my Medicare back. I had to get Social Security back.
We went through a myriad of caregiving agencies. How do you find the right caregiving agencies and 24 hour care and the right hospital bed and the right parents so they don't get bed soars and they get turned and the right pillows or support for the ankles.
The feet don't get well and wheelchairs on wheelchairs that lean back and pads for wheelchairs and clothes that are velcroed and clothes that are snapped and clothes that make sense and shampoo bowls when you're in the bed.
And then when finally you can be shampooed shower seats and then planning with shower seats. What is the right kind of shampoo or the right kind of body scrub, the right kind of lotion.
And then how do you prevent UTI as and how do you make sure they're clean to use pull up diapers. Do you use under pads? All of these things that walkers and supports for the bed rails and rails for the couch.
To be able to stand up and all sorts of safety measures and baby cams and ring cameras and doctors and medical transportation, whether it's wheelchair van or it's an ambulance van or whether somebody has a wheelchair or walker and you need a vehicle that you can put it in the trunk compared to a wheelchair
and I'm just going to take you and who is paying for those services and physical therapy and extended home care. All of these things that you let you figure out.
The groceries you figure out the medical supplies you figure out the needs you figure out hygiene and skincare and grooming their hair and their tummets and their dentistry and their eyes and their cardiologist and a pulmonologist and a urologist and that kind of
a gynecologist and whatever that is. And you start to put the pieces together and my dad would always say to me, it's a cinch by the inch and it's hard by the yard.
And he taught me that growing up and he always said, whatever I say, I said cinch by the inch and hard by the yard and I never understood that until I was on this journey.
I never understood that until I had to say, okay, today, this is what we're going to do this morning and okay the thermometer is not working.
So we need to do the amount that you're okay the lender of the baby food blender is not working or we have to puree food so she does not food today so we have to go on and get a blender like the simplest things from the feeder swan we need a different
kind of stuff. The material the labels are bothering her because now she's more sensitive to things so we need clothes without labels or the laundry detergent that doesn't have any sort of chemicals in it.
Each and every step in every stage is it's on journey.
And nobody's journey is harder than somebody else's nobody's journey is more difficult than somebody else's and so my friend, they call me today to say her husband is six months he's 110 pounds.
That's today.
What's happening and we need to find the solutions for that today that my friend whose father.
It is about, you know, just 100 pounds, 105 pounds.
And she's dealing with her father made my mom who's lost weight so rapidly.
And I just learned from the caregiver that it could be caused by medication that she's taking or the combination of medications that she's taking that actually could be causing this.
And so be with us.
Share with us.
Share with me your journey.
Say I've been trying to reach Medicare and all I keep getting is I'm on a mission, you know, getting a lot of a whole where I've talked to someone and this is what they told me or I'm not getting this.
I'm trying to get food services or I'm trying to get transportation on trying to see I don't want to pay for 10 hours of here. I just need someone to take my parents to the doctor and is there someone that can just take them to the doctor or they're at the hospital.
They need somebody to bring them home and if an ambulance brings them home, it's like $1,000 or something for an ambulance to bring them home.
I can bring them home from the hospital because I'm out of town or because I'm not, I don't live nearby, but I want to make sure they get home safely and right now I'm really trying to help them watch their money or I myself or a family has to be careful on what is available for us to be able to do.
Mother's Day was a special secret day.
My name is a day that I appreciated as I remember so many wonderful memories with my mom, her sewing up her dancing with me of my mom making soup and teaching me how to make soup.
But one of the things that I remember most is the way my mom loved my dad.
I just wanted to hear that she took of my father.
And to this day I have never once ever heard my parents have an argument. People think that's crazy and it's probably crazy that I've never, ever heard my parents try to ever in my lifetime.
And when I asked my mom about it she says, honey, of course, of course, we disagree with your father and I are two different people.
They were opinions, different thoughts, but they were our relationship where they were raising you or about her finances. They were our problems.
Now you were so we just never brought them in front of you. They were things we handled together. They were not about our children. So therefore, we never knew about them.
So it's like the secret that they possibly could have had problems. But what I do remember is that when my father walked in the house.
And my mom looked in her eyes like she had just seen the Northern Star, just the joy.
Even when you see these videos of puppies or babies and somebody's coming home and the dog runs and wags their tail or the kid runs and the kids pounding on the glass waiting for their parents to come home.
I was like, she was so excited every time my father walked in the door and anything that he did, she would laugh. She would be overjoyed. She would compliment.
And everyone that we met, every waiter that we ever encountered, my mom would say, you did an amazing job.
And thank you so much and I really appreciate the service. And anywhere we would go on a store, she would say that's, that's incredibly beautiful or you made that that's really special or that's really spectacular.
What a talent. The way my mom gifted people her love was extraordinary.
And she can't see those things anymore. But I can see it in her eyes. I can see the love and appreciation when the caregiver does something for her. She'll smile in a way that they know it mattered, where they did something really wonderful.
And she still lets people know in her very own way. Her appreciation and her gratitude and her love.
And she says, when you're looking at your mom, or that you're looking at your dad and you're going through these stages and even how it's difficult and even know you feel like you might want to be sure you're exhausted and gosh, I can tell you I have gone past the point of exhaustion
and I get up and it's like, whoa, I'm so dizzy just because I felt from the doing and the giving and the caring and I don't think there's any alms in me left.
And I think about my mom. And when we were growing up and she had crowns and you were growing up and you hear other women that have menstrual cramps or that, you know, certain times of the month they're just
ordinary and they're cranking and they're tired and they're angry and they need sugar and whatever those things are.
And when I got older, I asked my mom, I said, mom, didn't you have any symptoms and didn't you have pain with the crowns and didn't you have pain with the deep reticulitis and didn't you have all these things like they don't remember
you're spending days in bed and I don't remember you being mean and I don't remember you having all of these things that people say that women had.
And my mom would say, honey, of course, I had the redays that the pain was unbearable.
There were days that I thought that I couldn't get through another minute of another second of another day.
And I had your brother and you don't stop being a parent, you can't not give a child breakfast because you have cramps, you can't not get a child to school because you have crowns or because your stomachs upset or you still have to be a parent.
And why would I not show you joy because you were my joy and you were my happiness and you were my light and you were my love.
So why would I show you any less?
I just pushed through all those things and just was able to hang on to the love and to my commitment to you.
And I never forgot her saying that to me.
And so I feel that way now when I am taking care of my mom that, yes, I have days as you have days that are painful.
There, there is no getting around the pain of going through this experience.
Somebody told me the other day, the only way to get through it is to go through it.
And I hated that. I love my friend but I absolutely hated that because I really don't want to go through it.
There are days that just don't want to go through it. I feel like I can't go through it anymore and I continue to go through it and march through it.
And so of course I have those days when I have pain that's unbearable and I have days when I am sick and I have days that I don't feel well and I have days that I would rather stay in bed.
And I have days that I'd rather make the world go away.
And I have days that I'd rather not answer the phone days that I'd rather not see anybody and days that whatever one can experience as they're going through the study and not getting the parents and seeing their parents go through these stages.
And I just keep thinking about my mom and my mom saying to me, of course I had pain. Of course I had sickness, of course I had sickness, but I had you.
And I could not take care of you because of these things. And I just focused on joy and focused on a love focused on the gift that you were in my life.
And I continued on and we got through our days. And so I invite you to do the same thing to focus on the focus on the joy to say no matter what I'm feeling it is not invalid.
Nobody's invalidating your feelings and call me screaming.
Do you need a shoulder if you want to go through it? I honestly, I've gone through it. People are like, you need therapy or to bang a pillow or whatever the things that I haven't gone through, which maybe I should and maybe I would when I get to a point.
But the answers that I found in my heart is connecting to the love. And so if your mother is still with you, if your mother is going through a journey, I know that this show we're talking about our parents and we're also talking about our own stage of life.
Our own fears, you know, will I get Alzheimer's if my parents have Alzheimer's will I get cancer if my parents have cancer will I have heart conditions and and if you want those questions answered, we have the experts.
We will burn them on. You can ask them directly to the experts. Feel free to do that. And you will give you every answer that you possibly can have.
But this particular episode today I wanted to focus on others because we're just coming off of Mother's Day and to share with you the journey of the gift of my mom.
The blessing that I've had through my life, that absolute miracle of watching her go down a slide that can to quick sand watching her have to venture and make stages Alzheimer's watching her have a stroke watching her be in a coma watching her go through the neurology watching
her being capacitated to learning again, you know, to take off the cat that are in the Foley and to learn how to use the restroom and to learn how to walk and learn how to talk and learn how to read and learn how to speak and to learn how to swallow and to learn how to drink and to learn how to eat and
and now to be able to express love and to be able to look at a day like Mother's Day and be able to from the beginning feel lucky, feel blessed, feel grateful, feel the wonder and
acknowledge the fear, acknowledge the pain and acknowledge the journey and be just like what my mom said, of course, I'm not negating any of those things that I'm focusing on. I have you.
And I put the sign up on the joy that I have you and the gift that I have you and I love that it brings.
And so for all of you, and we should you with your mothers have your mother's day and have some mothers stay in your mind.
Please feel free to write Nicole and the co-brand worldwide.com with your questions and show you would like to see we will bring on the experts for you to help you navigate this journey for the Asian parents survival guide and may to speak your northern star.
And so I want to thank you for being the guy that you need to help you get through this journey for your not alone and standing right here beside you.
You're doing great. You're doing amazing.
I support you. You're not alone. I'm walking alongside you and together we're walking in love.
You're doing great.