Death

It is so unbelievably fascinating, yet so undefinable. It is illusive, unquestionable, and unquenchable. At some point, all of us will be laying on a table, waiting for that moment when our bodies will cease to breathe on its own, when our hearts stop beating, and we can finally rest.

In my line of work, death is a frequent visitor whom i've gotten to know very well. I've seen so many people die i've started to lose count. I remember the first person i took care of in their post-mordem stage. She'd just passed away about 5 minutes before, while her entire family had gone out to get something to eat (another interesting note on dying; how individuals die will vary. Someone may prefer to die in company, while another may wait until they're alone). My coworker had walked into the resident's room and then soon after, called me and the nurse in so we could declare her deceased. I remember being more than creeped out while handling a dead person; i was mortified. I'd never seen a dead body, not even my own grandparents. This lady was cold in the extremities  which i later learned was a normal part of the dying process, and still warm around her tummy and back. Her eyes were shut, but her mouth refused to stay closed...my coworker told me as we cleaned her up that the morticians would have to sew it shut. I remember the smell of death in the room; not like formaldehyde like a lot of us are used to in labs at school. It was more like a fleshy, old smell. It's difficult to describe...kind of like old mushrooms?

Several dozen deaths later, my last remaining grandparent passed away, and i volunteered to do her post-mordem care at the hospital she was staying in. I took her catheter and IV's out, then washed her up (even though the nurses said they already had. In my opinion, they didn't do a good enough job). My mother dressed her up in pink because it was her favorite color, and my aunt curled her hair and put a light touch of eyeshadow and lipstick on her face. When the morticians came to pick her up, we told them not to embalm her, because she wouldn't want her body to be preserved in any way. When we laid her in the ground, she looked just as beautiful and rosy as when she was still breathing.

The different rituals people have for funerals and body preparations are fascinating. The Irish have wakes, where they lug the dead body around and drink a lot. The Tibetans have "sky burials", in which they cut up the human body and expose them on a mountaintop for animals, specifically birds, to eat. These all seem so strange to us, but if we were born there, our rituals would seem just as weird.

An interesting video i found on dying:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBDz-nALvGo

Integrity

One of the most difficult things to accomplish in America, i find, is to build up and keep your integrity and dignity as you age. Wrinkles start to show, your hair starts to gray, and before you know it, you're sitting in a wheelchair in a nursing home surrounded by other elders in a drugged-up, semi-vegetable state of mind and body. It's depressing but it's true. We abandon our elders to the system; once they get to the physical point where we can't take care of them ourselves in our own homes, we put them in a nursing home and, most of the time, we forget about them or get too busy with our own lives that we rarely ever visit.

I work in a nursing home. Ours is, i will admit, one of the best nursing homes in our area (and the only one in our town that provides dementia and memory care). But the nursing assistants, nurses, and administrative staff can only do so much, and if the resident's family and friends don't visit, our residents become depressed, their sense of relationship with the outside world goes down, and so their integrity goes down. Interaction with life outside the nursing home let's them know they are still important to us; that they still have a social life;  that we still care for and love them. Also, as their physical state declines, so does their dignity. Imagine, you are young, you can brush your teeth and use the toilet by yourself. Suddenly, you're 93, and can no longer walk to the bathroom, so you need help. Their independence is compromised, and therefore their pride takes a major slap to the face. I know mine would...but then, this is probably just because i'm an American.

...Once i hit that dementia stage, though, i really hope i go all-out with the crazy. I'm talking about throwing poop on the walls, biting the caregivers, and yelling random obscenities at passers-by. Heh, naw, i'm just kidding. But really, i just want to have fun when i'm old and physically unstable. When i'm 90 i wanna be telling stories (most of them will probably be made-up just to mess with people), eating ice cream all day, and taking long, long, long naps at least twice a day. Maybe my grandkids will visit, and maybe one of them will be the nurse that cares for my body after i die. For me, that's what integrity looks like. Leaving a legacy.

Mid-life

Where do i see myself in 20-30 years? This was the first question that popped into my head when i first started reading the chapter on the mid-life stage in our textbook. Everyone else usually asks me "where will you be in 5 years? next year? next month?"; never anything too far ahead. I don't know, maybe they think it'll scare us youngsters to think that far into the future. Or maybe mid-life is less complicated once you get the next few years of your life figured out and organized  I look at how my parents turned out, and i shudder. By the time i'm 62, i will most certainly not have a split-level house in the middle of a small retirement town in Skagit County, with thousands of dollars in debt and no legacy of any kind to leave my grandchildren except a sad painting of a woman by a well.

No thanks.

However, i do not plan on buying a porche, living in a mansion, or only having 1-2 children because any more is improper. Nope...although a yellow corvette convertible would be nice. I'm going to live wherever i get along with people, with a great school nearby, have at least 4-5 children, and love one man for the rest of my life. That is my ideal (also, divorce is not an option. There will be problems, yes, i expect that. But unless abuse or neglect is involved, i'm not going there). On the other hand, nothing ever goes the way we plan, does it? Or maybe it does, but it's a small variation of it.

I was asking my friends this same question, and they looked at me confused. This is probably because mid-life isn't something we normally think about; we usually discuss what we're going to do tomorrow, next week, etc. Everything is happening RIGHT NOW, so we have no time to think about what might happen later. Then we get to that mid-life stage and we look at each other like, "how did we get here?" I myself am somewhat excited to get to that mid-life phase, when i can learn to appreciate things more (hopefully), teach my kids about complexities, how to do things on their own, and how to come back home whenever they get in trouble. It's a whole different bundle of responsibilities  and it's wonderful that they're given to us when we can handle them in the best possible way.

To Be and How to Be. That is the Question.

Most Americans would say the answer to that is to be whatever you want, how you want, and when you want it. Live selfishly, if i put it bluntly. This lifestyle disgusts me, and yet when i see a pushy parent telling their ADULT child how to live, i find myself encouraging that kid to push out of their comfort zone, do something crazy, find themselves outside of their family circle. But we as humans naturally go where we are comfortable and familiar, even if that place is abusive or negligent, to whatever degree.

Just today i invited a friend over to watch movies sometime and she said she'd have to ask her mom first. I raised my eyebrows, "honey, how old are you?" She replied, "19." I smiled, "and you still do what your mom says?" She shrugged, "i live with her, so she sets the rules, i guess." I said, "I think you should do what you want, and if your mom threatens to kick you out, you can come stay with me." Which i immediately regretted saying, because even if somebody is old enough to buy cigarettes and get tattoos, it doesn't mean they're mature enough to handle life's hardships apart from family. I realized it wasn't my place to push my friend to rebel against her mom (even if she's being bossy), because we should always respect our parents.

I myself have been struggling with the internal debate of "intimacy vs. isolation" and only a while ago realized i cannot go without love from people. I tried to live apart from people for 5 months; i moved into the middle of the woods, by myself, as far away from my parents as possible without totally banishing them from my life, and said goodbye (literally, to their faces) to all my friends. To me, people were disappointments, and i was tired and scared of being disappointed. What i didn't know was that my family had ingrained in me these unattainable expectations of humanity (more specifically, men); that if they aren't perfect and meeting my every need then there's something wrong. So i disappeared. And for 5 months i wrestled with how i should think, act, feel; like i needed to be a new person, remake myself. But i realized this new person was how my parents wanted me to be, not how I wanted me to be. I dated a doctor, then a wealthy computer entrepreneur, and still i was unhappy. Isn't money all that matters? Isn't that what makes a relationship work?

Finally i approached my parents and said, paraphrased, "i want to be who i want to be. I want to marry who i want to marry. If my future husband is a missionary working in Uganda, and we're dirt poor the rest of our lives, then so be it. All that matters here is that i'm happy. If you guys have a problem with that, tough. I'm tired of worrying about what you guys think." To which they both said, paraphrased, "sounds good. we just want you to be safe."

And now, i'm back with all my old friends (who welcomed me with open arms), i'm going to marry a man who's working towards being a youth pastor, and i'm happy. So there.

Braaaaaiiiinnnsss!!

There’s an article that identifies young children with puppies; plastic and willing to please the parents. While teenagers are more like cats; temperamental and only willing to be with you if you play hard to get. They're moody, fidgety, and usually don't like to be held for long periods of time. I myself get antsy whenever my mom hugs me for longer than 3 seconds. I don't know; that might just be a personal thing, and not so much a generalized one.

Teens are difficult to deal with. I help lead a small group of high school freshman from my church, and my patience is always worn thin by the end of each session. I've never heard so many dirty jokes in one sitting. Nor have i heard so much talk about Justin Beiber. So kudos to any parent willing to take on that venture for the rest of their life. My hat's off to you. I can handle kids, especially ones who can't talk back (or ask me questions non-stop; "why does this do that?", "what are you doing?", "who's that?"). But i can only handle teens for an hour at a time, once a week. This is partly because they bring so much unnecessary drama to the table, and i have to spend most of the session clearing it off so we can focus on the task at hand. I'm hoping when i get older and decide to have kids of my own i'll be prepared to deal with this.

I was REALLY fascinated by the new information they're coming out with now about teen brains and how their growth and emotionality aren't due to hormones, but to the stage of development their frontal lobe is at. I had no idea we weren't finished growing/pruning our brain cells at 18 years. We could be pruning on our deathbed. In high school i was under the impression that we were done growing at 18. In reference to week 5's topic, the hurried child, i don't think children are hurried to grow up, so much as teenagers are, at least for my generation (the college years, around 18-23). In an interview with Jay Giedd, he says, "I think that [in the teen years, this] part of the brain that is helping organization, planning and strategizing is not done being built yet ... [It's] not that the teens are stupid or incapable of [things]. It's sort of unfair to expect them to have adult levels of organizational skills or decision making before their brain is finished being built". It's like expecting a house to stand up without framework. And what's worse is that adolescents subject themselves to this, and even do it to themselves; jumping ahead without laying out a foundation. We push ourselves to do things like get tattoos, smoke, drink, etc, just so we can pretend we're grown-ups. It's foolish, but unfortunately widely accepted.

Parenting Difficulties

It's tough. I think everyone can agree on that. I personally wouldn't know, as i have not had the opportunity (or the right lifestyle/environment) to have kids. I have babysat, though, and volunteered to help teach kids at a preschool. I have also heard advice from and seen first-hand how multiple sets of parents raise their kids. It blows my mind how different everyone's style is. And really i think that's because of every one of our different backgrounds, our own temperament, and the child's temperament.

My own parents used the good-cop, bad-cop method, unintentionally, and though that isn't the most optimal strategy, my siblings and i turned out okay because our parents also taught us independence and self-reliance. My old housemates had 2 kids, ages 1 and 3 and another on the way. Their style was inconsistent time-outs, permissive behaviors, and letting the kids watch TV all day while the mother cleaned and the dad was out working. This was frustrating for me to watch because i would babysit these kids on a regular basis, and when i did i would always make progress with them as far as behavioral issues. I never condoned bad behaviors (interrupting, screaming, temper-tantrums, bad manners, etc.), but i always made it age-appropriate. For example, i never expected a 1-year-old to know how to ask for something instead of crying about not having it. But as i worked with him i taught him how to sign for "please" and "thank-you". The 3-year-old took a lot of work to help, because she had already gotten to the point where she knew how to push boundaries and continually cry for something until she got it. I saw her give her dad puppy eyes and cry until he would give her ice cream before they had dinner. It worked. But when i had her all to myself for an entire day, our interaction would start out this way; she would scream at me for not letting her have what she wanted (the usual candy item from a bowl on top of the refrigerator), i would stoically say something like "no, but since you're hungry, i can make you [this] or [that]", and she would scream some more. Eventually she would stop crying, i would offer her something else again, she would say yes, and i would say "yes please?", and she would repeat that back to me. Throughout the rest of the day, whenever she would demand something, i would give her a look and she would shyly ask for it, and add a please at the end. I made sure to hug her after that, saying something like "I love it when you say please!!!!" She was so pumped to do anything to get praise from me after that. She picked up her toys, ate all her lunch, etc.

Another issue with these kids was the TV. Since they were so used to it being on when their mom was home, they kind of freaked out when i turned it off as soon as she left. Tempers ensued. I resorted to distract them with some toys i borrowed from the preschool, like various blocks, puzzles, puppets, word games, etc. I went and got them a kid-sized table so they could draw pictures. I put on music and we danced around. We played hide-and-seek. Anything except TV.

Then mom and dad came back home and everything went back to the way it was, and i'd have to start all over again the next time i babysat. I was making progress, but in a two steps forward, one step back kind of way.

The Education of Our Nation

I am continually fascinated by the educational system. If i wasn't going to be a nurse, i'd most likely be a pre-school teacher. Way back in the day, when public schools had yet to be founded, everyone was taught by their parents. Depending on the child's gender, they were either taught their family trade (i.e. carpentry, masonry, fishing, etc.) or taught by their mothers on how to care for the house and its occupants. As more scientific discoveries and inventions were made, more occupations became available. But these occupations required a little more attention to detail, and so required more education. Apprenticeships by other people were mandatory. Populations grew, small schools were developed which consisted of a single instructor with a small number of students (and by small i mean smaller than what we have today). Academies, boarding schools, universities were founded, etc.

I believe they probably had difficult children even back then, even in historic schools. I don't know for sure, but they probably didn't have the data we have today about disorders and how to therapeutically handle them in a way that benefits the child. Those difficult children were probably labeled as dunces, or something. Put in a corner somewhere, yelled at, maybe even abused by frustrated parents or teachers. I don't know. I can see it happening. What frustrates me is that this stuff still happens today. We put a label on kids, because that's how our organized scientific brains work, assume it's true, and react accordingly to how we think we should treat the problem. However, a lot of us make the mistake of thinking of the child AS the disorder. For example, we see a kid with a learning disability, and pretty soon that's how we identify the kid. Then, that's all we see when we look at them. And kids are smart; they'll pick up on how you treat them. If you treat them as a problem, they'll act like it. Just speaking from experience, here.