Driving to the hospital this morning and doing the whole rambled thinking and listening to music. I had it up loud. I was mostly trying to get a bad dream brought on by guilt out of my head. I am now sitting, watching my mom’s stubborn toddler come out thanks to the anesthesia and opioids they gave her. We told them not to give her certain drugs. We warned them what would happen. But here we are listening to her beg not to have to take a nap.
It is funny how our lives progress in that way. We are babies who do nothing but eat, sleep, and poop. Then, as toddlers, we fight sleep as hard as we can, and we finally get old enough to skip naps, then we fight for a later bedtime.
At some point, we get to become adults and make our own rules (within the rules we need to function and be a good member of society if we so choose). Then, suddenly, we notice ourselves getting older and our bodies telling us we need more naps.
But then, something happens to us, and we flip back to being a toddler, and suddenly, we are fighting again. Fighting everything. The drugs make this worse. With dementia comes confusion and the insecurity of not knowing if you are safe or not. Drugs used to calm and soothe suddenly have the opposite effect.
I would love nothing more than to trade places with my mother and get one of those nice drug-induced naps, sleep for days, and just lie there as others take care of me. That sounds like heaven.
But maybe it would just bring on more overthinking. That is what I was doing this morning. Thinking about what it would take to stop some of that. What would it take to get rid of all doubts in my mind? Wouldn’t that be something? Getting back to the point of just being secure and flowing through life. I had that before. I don’t know where that girl went. I have pockets of time when I don’t worry about it. Knowing I am closer to the end. Only a few more milestones and goals to accomplish. I should just relax.
I could likely do it if I had a few reassurances, but is it really someone else’s job to give them? The war I have with myself is that I like certain things that should be pretty easy to give. When those easy things are taken away, I have to wonder why. What happened? Did I do something wrong? Or are there other circumstances? I understand that it’s likely the other and nothing really to do with me, but that doesn’t stop me from noticing. Not think I am too needy even though I am not. Really, honestly, truly, it is the simple things that go a long way into building security. Other big things can overpower those simple things in a way that makes it harder to feel safe. And with a lifetime of feeling unsafe, the overthinking persists.
One day it won’t. One day, it will all be fine.
Lisa Gray 