More on Mom
The Story of my Mom con’t
As I got older, the dynamics of my mom’s and I relationship evolved. Since it was just the two of us, and while living in Jasper, we developed more of the mentor/mentee type relationship. And as I reached adulthood, we became more like friends. I loved my mom and she taught me a lot in those years.
During my adolescent years, I never really had a set curfew. It was kind of strange going from “be home before the street lights come on” to “just don’t be too late.” I guess that was because I was mostly a homebody anyway.
One of the things I really didn’t care for was how my mom compared my academic mediocrity to the academic excellence of my siblings. I think she did it to encourage and motivate me, but it tended to make me feel worse about who I was overall. It made me feel like I didn’t measure up. This caused a moderate amount of shame and lowered my self image a bit. I developed this feeling of “being less than” that I struggled with for a long time. But this was how parents of gen x’ers and Boomers parented. Shame and manipulation were thought to be great motivators. Even though I probably struggled with some form of ADD and/or PTSD, it never would have been diagnosed during that time. I never held (and still don’t hold) any of this against my mom. With all that she went through in her life, she was the walking epitome of “you better stuff it all down and suck it up and keep it moving. “
Tragedy Strikes Again
During my tenth grade year, another struggle emerged in our family. My middle brother, Talvin, Sr was diagnosed with brain cancer. For six years he fought as best he could. But the end finally came in January, 1990. I had never seen my mom grieve so hard. The losses were really stacking up in her life. At first her oldest son. Then her husband. Now another son! Not to mention other close family and friends who passed during this time. How much more could she take?? She did her best to carry on.
However, following my brother’s death in 1990, my mom’s health challenges began to grow. The following year, my mother began to have heart problems. She ended up having bypass surgery. However, after the surgery, she had a hard time getting off the ventilator. She remained on the ventilator and in ICU for at least a month. When she finally got out of the hospital and came home, her strength never fully returned. Neither did her voice fully return. I think having that trachea tube from the ventilator as long as she did damaged her vocal chords. She literally bore the scars of someone who fought for their life.
Not too long after, my mom began having mini strokes or Transient ischemic attacks (TIA for short). She then had another surgery on the arteries in her neck to clear out any plaque build up. This helped to stop the TIA’s mostly. As she continued to have health challenges, the biggest was yet to come.
Mom and Cancer
The Final Fight
So let’s back up a couple years. Let’s go back to Thanksgiving, 1995. Kandi and I were engaged and our wedding was just over a month away. We were in Jasper for the holiday. Kandi was hard at work putting the final touches on the wedding programs and I was doing the usual. Eating and watching football.
It was later in the day when Mom began complaining of not feeling well. Her condition quickly deteriorated and finally enough to where she asked to go to the hospital. I took her without hesitation.
We went to the local hospital ER. Once Mom was placed in a treatment room, they began to examine her. They did the usual things like check her vitals, draw blood, do an EKG, and x-rays.
As we waited for the results, Mom and I were left alone in this room. Eventually, Mom began to speak and speak from her heart. My mom said, “Alvin, I’m tired. I’m tired of the pills, the bills, of the needles, all the tests and scans. I’m tired of being sick. I’m ready. I’m ready to go. I’m ready to go “home”. It was in this moment that I realized that pretty soon, I would be losing my Mom. I didn’t say much. As a matter of fact, I don’t remember if I actually said much of anything. However, one thing I resolved in my heart was to see to it that my Mom’s final wishes and final days would be as comfortable as could be.
When I went back and told my siblings what Mom said, a couple of them had a problem accepting what Mom said. I guess they weren’t ready to let her go.
Mom had always been a huge supporter of mine. I remember several years before this, when I was struggling with my grades in college and was thinking of dropping out, she told me, “if you quit, then you will never know if you could do it.” For some reason that really hit me between the eyes. That stuck with me. It motivated me. I stayed in school and was able to get my grades high enough to apply for physical therapist assistant school. I actually applied to two programs and got accepted into both. I chose Houston Community College, and that probably changed the whole trajectory of my life.
Cancer Sucks!
As my mom’s health continued to decline, she spent a lot of time going to doctors, in and out of the hospital, and undergoing numerous tests and procedures. As I said before, she struggled with TIA’s and various other illnesses. As her kids, we all made the joint decision to change her care over to some doctors in Houston. For a while, she was a patient of Dr. Michael Debakey, The famous cardiologist and heart surgeon. This is when she had her surgery on her neck, called a Carotid Endarterectomy, to clean out the arteries in her neck that sent blood to her brain.
Not too long after that, as she was still having declining health, it was discovered that she had liver cancer. This was a major setback to all of us. My mom, though, took it in stride. She never seemed depressed or downtrodden. Other than the one time she told me she was tired, did she give up. Her oncologist decided the best course of treatment was chemotherapy and I think radiation. I don’t remember exactly. However, as she grew weaker, it was harder for her to live by herself. She would have to spend more time in Houston staying with my sister.
After my wife Kandi and I got married, we lived in an apartment for about a year and a half. However, in my heart, I wanted my mom to see me being successful and with a family. To me, this meant with a house and kids. In the summer of 1997, Kandi became pregnant. However, we had to terminate that pregnancy because it was ectopic. This was a major setback for us. But we recovered. We tried again and by the Fall of 1997, she was pregnant with our daughter, Kiana.
Also during this time, we had our house built. Kandi was so gracious. My mom’s health was rapidly declining and it had become very clear that she could not longer live alone in Jasper. So, on the same weekend we moved into our brand new home, my mom moved in with us. Kandi agreed to this without hesitation.
Hospice
By Christmas of 1997, my mom’s health was definitely on the decline. She grew weaker but was still moving around as best she could. She had regular visits to her oncologist to check the progress on her chemo. By January of 1998, the obvious was staring us in the face. She had a visit with her oncologist and he informed her that her prognosis was poor and there were not many options left. With this news, Mom decided hospice was her best option. Those words she told me back in 1995 rang loud in my head now. “I’m tired. I don’t want to fight anymore.”
We made arrangements for inhome hospice. My mom’s health was in a free fall now. Not only that, but because her liver was failing it could not filter out the toxins in her body. Therefore, the toxins went to her brain and mom began showing signs of altered mental status. She began to say and do things very uncharacteristic of her nature. This really scared me. I didn’t know what to do. I had never seen my mom like this! It was breaking my heart.
She became unsafe to leave alone. Therefore, at night, I had to “sleep” on the couch in our living room, which was right outside of my mom’s room to listen for her. She would attempt to get up at night and go to the bathroom, or just wander around due to having hallucinations or thinking there is something she needed to do. She was a very high fall risk. My siblings and I pulled together to pay for a sitter to stay with her during the day. Eventually She grew weaker and was unable to get up on her own or walk for that matter.
The event that really made me know the end was near, was one time, after Mom became bedridden, I heard her yelling. I went into the room and I tried to get her attention, but she continued to yell. She also had this fixed gaze looking straight up towards the ceiling. It was as if she saw someone way off in the distance and she was calling their name trying to get their attention. It sounded as if she was calling names of family members that had passed on. In my mind, I wondered if she was seeing them? Hearing them? At any rate, I knew the end was near.
Soul Food
On the weekends, my siblings would stay with my Mom so that Kandi and I could go out and spend some quality time together. On one occasion, we went to the movies. We saw the movie “Soul Food”. It was about a family grappling with the sickness and eventual death of their mother and matriarch.
The movie hit me between the eyes and the center of my heart! There was a featured song from that movie by Boyz to Men called “Mama”. I remember leaving the movie theater that night barely able to hold it together. And that song was stuck in my head. I loved it and hated it at the same time. I don’t think I’ve seen that movie in its entirety since then.
The End
Eventually, my mom became completely bedridden. She also lost the ability to speak or communicate. As the disease progressed, she was basically left in a vegetative state. We knew the end was drawing close. My siblings and I began to mentally prepare ourselves. My Mom’s sisters were really struggling. This was so hard for them. The losses were really stacking up in my extended family. In 1995, one of my aunts passed away suddenly. In 1996, my grandmother passed and one of my uncles passed. Now, just barely two years later, my mom was transitioning .
My siblings and I decided it would be best that my mom not die in our new home. So we had her transferred to the hospice center in the medical center for her final days. We actually had already started planning her funeral arrangements and picked out a casket. We did this so that we didn’t have to do it while we were in an emotional state.
Someone would be with Mom pretty much the whole time. My brother was with her the bulk of that time.
It was on Wednesday, February 26, 1998 that my mom quietly slipped away. I was at work. My brother was with her. The hospice nurse called me at work. When I heard the nurse’s voice I knew what it was about. She told me that Mom was gone.
The Legacy
Scripture tells children to “honor your father and mother.” I believe to honor someone, is to continue to pay homage to them even after they are gone. To live a life worthy of giving them the respect of the sacrifices and lessons that they taught you while they were alive. In my own, weak and feeble way, I try to do this each and every day as I live my life, as I love my wife, as I love my children, as I love the church body I help to oversee, and as I reflect on all the lessons that Thelma Poole imparted to me.
She was a rock. A quiet, calm, gentle and loving soul that exemplified a Christ-like grace toward all that she encountered. From her own children that she loved and raised. To the hundreds of students she taught during her thirty years of teaching. To her siblings and scores of nephews and nieces that she opened her home and heart to. And to the church family who loved and called her “Sister”.
Mom, Mother Dear was, as all Moms should be, Special. She demonstrated what “Christ-like compassion” looked and felt like. Twenty seven years ago, Mom left this earth. However, her Legacy lives on in the hearts and minds of all the lives that she touched.
Rest easy Mom. I love you and miss you!