I had to run by Mitzi and Gary’s house yesterday. I still keep trying to correct myself and say Gary’s house but I haven’t been able to break the habit yet. As I was driving through the streets to get to their neighborhood, I had the sunroof open, was listening to music and for at least what must have been 1/4 of a mile, I was just going to pick her up like I always did.
And then I remembered again that wasn’t the reality at all.
Almost like a habit, I said out loud, “Well, it just is what it is.” That was one of Mitzi’s favorite sayings and pretty much the crux of her outlook on her Alzheimer’s. I don’t know if it truly described how she felt deep down, but it’s definitely how she lived her life with this incurable disease. I was always in awe of that. How she could do that in such an accepting way. Not that she wanted to, of course. But it really made things easier on me when she’d start to lose bits of independence as the disease progressed.
When I had to start helping her get her clothes on correctly…I’d say something like, “I know this is hard on you, but I’m happy to help you and I’m not going anywhere. It’s never going to be too much for me to help you. But I do know this is hard on you.”
“It is what it is,” she’d say, “I just have to get used to the new normal.”
When I started walking her to the bathroom because she’d get confused as to where to go in a busy place..That wasn’t so hard. I’d pretend to have to go myself or just need to wash my hands. Then, eventually, she’d start to have trouble with the buttons and zippers on her pants and would come out of the stall for help. So I started just going in with her. I’m sure we turned more than a few heads on many occasions. Once, when we were at the gym after working out, I went in with her because she had to go quickly. I said, rather apologetically as I recall, “I’m going to run in with you just to help you make it in time.”
“It’s OK. I know I need you for that now. It just is what it is. It’s OK.”
I was so grateful for the way she unburdened me with her response and gave me the freedom to help her. From then on until almost the very very end when I would help her to the bathroom, she would hug me afterwards and thank me when she could make the words come out. In the end it was just a knowing hug from her. So then I would tilt her chin up so she could look straight into my eyes and I would say, “It’s OK. You know I’m here because I’m happy to help you. And it’s never going to be too hard on me to help you. It just is what it is.” Often, there would be tears in her eyes when I’d say that.
When we were walking in the park near her house one afternoon when she was having a very teary day, we happened upon this car. Now this was the spring of 2018. She was no longer wearing her glasses because she wasn’t reading any longer and the most she could do was occasionally pick out an easy sight word if it was large print. Her peripheral vision was pretty limited by this point as well. So how she saw this white sticker with smallish black print on this white car, I will never know. But maybe it just wasn’t an accident. She pointed and said, “Hey look! Perfect!” I focused in on what she was pointing at and was amazed. “It is what it is! That IS perfect; and so YOU! Hey, maybe you need one of those stickers affixed to your rear bumper, too,” I joked. She laughed and I told her I, of course, had to get a picture of her with it. Then I remembered something I had seen posted on Facebook recently and I told her about it. The timing was so poignant.
“You know we’ve only been saying half of the phrase. There’s another line that makes it even better.”
“What?”
“It is what it is, but it will be what you make it.”
She smiled, did a thumbs up, and I clicked the picture. The tears were gone and we headed home.
Just like I have to get into the new habit of not calling it “Mitzi’s house”, I am trying to get into the habit of saying the whole phrase, “It is what it is, but it will be what you make it.”
What a great life lesson for her to leave on our hearts…????
