Monthly Archives: July 2022

Recipe for Our Garden

Conversations, Hospice Experience

Ingredients:

  • nurture memories of your mother’s rose garden at the side of the house (when you out grew the swing set), of standing barefoot in the dirt eating warm and dusty cherry tomatoes, of visiting botanical gardens, of discovering sculpture gardens, of walks in the neighborhoods to admire what others are growing (the neighbor who recreates a meadow filled with more flowers than I can count, the one who artfully fills every space with vegetables in raised beds, the one who welcomes pollinators),
  • share page-turning in catalogs for seeds or landscaping and say “ooh…” or “wow!” at the different colors or styles or seasonal arrangements,
  • hear people who know “Jean” well mention that, before the ALS, her strong knowledge and skills in plant care would’ve found her in the yard most of these sunny days of late,
  • read Todd May passage about practice in ancient China of friends from childhood writing to one another over the long years as working adults (when they lived apart) to collaboratively imagine the garden they would one day come together to create and take care of in retirement.

Instructions

  1. Prepare mental model of conversation method: 3 options spoken as a list, then repeat with pauses after each one to monitor for response. Note: Watch her eye gaze for indications that short-term memory has faded and a repetition may be warranted.
  2. Practice consistently with simple tasks: “Do you want to keep watching t.v., listen to music, or something else? Watch t.v. [pause], listen to music [pause], something else [pause].” It becomes a structure I can think in and she knows to anticipate about me.
  3. Talk about the birds at the bird-feeder together. It’s present, so can be referenced directly. Be open about when I did not understand. Laugh together when we are both startled by them abruptly flying off and then their gradual return as they realize it was just a noise. Joke about how flighty birds can be.
  4. Describe the flowers in my yard that I do not remember the name of. Listen and watch carefully. Brown-eyed Susans. Recognize that she is right.
  5. Tell the story about friends designing a garden together and invite what kind of garden we could design together.

“Should we have many flowers everywhere, a few flowers that we can focus on, or something else? Many flowers [pause], a few [pause], something else [pause].” Many flowers.

“Water is nice. Should we add a fountain, a fish pond, or something else? A fountain [pause], a fish pond [pause], something else [pause].” A pond.

“Will there be vegetables in our garden? Tomatoes [pause], carrots [pause], something else?” Maybe.

6. Realize and say that, so far, she is doing all of the actual gardening — we’ve already established that I don’t know much about plant care. “I’m not sure I am contributing. I’m happy to be beside you and learn but I don’t know what I can do for us. Maybe I can pick out the hats we wear so we do not get sunburn.” She smiles.

7. Realize and say that in an imaginary garden, there doesn’t have to be sunburn. We laugh. “Since we can do whatever we want, what else are we going to get rid of. I vote no mosquitos.”

And no bees.

The thing is, me, on my own: I am okay with bees. I am not allergic — I don’t recall ever having been stung. I enjoy their flight and dance, I very much appreciate what they do for the flowers. But this isn’t about me.

This is our garden.

End blip.

Black kitten playing with shoelace

Movement memory.

Hospice Experience

While volunteering at a local animal shelter, my teen and I watched a kitten relate to my shoelace or a rolling plastic ball with a playfulness that had elements of hunting to it (the crouching approach, a pounce, batting it with a paw), but at no point did it ever try to eat these toys. Maybe it had tried at some prior point and learned that these items were not edible. We also realized that we have built up enough experiences with cats that we recognized this kitten’s movement as indicators that it felt safe and we were safe in its company.

I have written before about my interactions with people who have dementia and the varied ways there are intact connections of shared reality compared to situations where we are not as aligned. Two recent experiences raised my awareness of the role of movement and how it may be characterized.

One of the Friends I have known the longest has had a further decline in her hearing. Even using a personal amplifier, she does not register or understand what is spoken to her. Writing my part of our conversations on my phone with the Notes app remains a highly successful way for us to interact. Last week she had just woken up when I walked in, so was more disoriented than is typical. It was only as I was pulling my chair up to be near her head, as I always do, that she suddenly brightened: “I recognize you! You come and sit right there, and you hold my hand.” It was my movement that stirred her memory. It gave her a means of knowing me and the kinds of things we do together.

At the beginning of this week, I went to meet someone for the first time. I had been told she’d had a stroke which impacted her thinking and memory. She was seated somewhat slumped in a wheelchair in the community room with a very loud t.v. nearby. I knelt on one knee at the front of her chair in the hope that she would not have to strain to see or hear me and introduced myself with my badge. She responded, “What church do you go to?” I pointed to the spot on my badge that identifies the hospice group I volunteer with and said, “I’m actually not here from a church, I’m a volunteer.” Her spouse interjected with the name of their church, so I asked if she had a favorite scripture or hymn she would want to hear. Instead she said, “I am not interested in what you have to say. You can go now.”

Certainly anyone can decline to have a volunteer visit for any reason or no reason. I take no offense.

I only bring it up in reflection: I wonder if my movement in kneeling the way I did stirred her memory. Specifically, if what I did too closely resembled a stance she has remembered over her experiences as being unwelcome.

I’ve heard the expression “muscle memory” (that’s the means by which I am typing even now), but these experiences seemed more related to a memory of movement — even in persons who themselves are not moving much.

End blip.