So Far, So...

This blog post was first published on meglynchwriter.wordpress.com on July 24, 2014.

I wrote a post a while ago, introducing the fact that my dad has Parkinson’s. At that time, it had been slow going. A few dizzy spells, a little confusion, tripping up the steps every once in a blue moon.

So far, so…good.

The thing about Parkinson’s is that it’s progressive. That’s what everyone says.

So it doesn’t matter what symptoms they get or when it begins, and no one knows what causes it; they just know that it gets worse.

We could kind of tell it was getting worse when he got forced into retirement and put on disability. Luckily, we’d just refinanced and didn’t have to pay as many bills. We could live on mom’s income, and dad was finally able to get the rest he so sorely needed.

So far, so…okay.

I think it’s more like waves. Good days and bad. Waves of confusion, but waves of such strong intelligence we were sorry we had ever doubted him.

But it has gotten overall worse.

Which means that the confusion I talked about in that post I referred to has gotten somewhat worse, not in that he is any more confused, but that it is starting to happen more often, and he has dizzy spells about once a day, as opposed to once a month or once a week or two.

So far, so…we’re still making it.

But another thing about Parkinson’s is that it makes every sickness affect the body about ten times worse than they normally would. Which means that the two UTIs my dad has had this year have both put him in the hospital for days, and during the first one, he had to go to rehab after his stint in the hospital.

That was the really hard one for us. During those twenty days in rehab, mom visited him every single day. She spent eight hours at work every day during the week and went to go see him right after that. And somehow, she was able to throw in a few hours of nursing home research on top of all that.

And there was I, 24 years of age, helping my mom pick a nursing home for my dad…floundering in self-pity and a premature sense of  loss.

So far, so…WTF, God???

So it’s been hard. Of course it’s been hard. Everyone told me it would be hard.

I guess I just didn’t expect it to be this hard. Or, maybe, I thought God would heal him by now or keep it from getting worse. But that’s the thing about Parkinson’s–it gets worse.

But he also gets better. And that makes me better.

Every time he has the capacity to understand his surroundings and everything we do for him, he gets more grateful.

Every time he is able, he does small things for us. When he isn’t able, he tries anyway. His love language is acts of service; we feel super loved by him.

Every time he gets stuck in the hospital, he grins and bears it. He knows they have good intentions, however uncomfortable those intentions turn out to be (or how bad the food is!).

And every time I see him smile or laugh, I smile and laugh right along with him. I can’t help.

That’s the thing about Parkinson’s–when someone close isn’t able to be happy all the time, you don’t take it for granted when that person finally is.

So far, so…content with my [our] lot.