The Last Conversation With My Father
February 6, 2020 • Laurie Newbound
The thing about a final conversation is you often don’t know at the time that it is, in fact, the last one. And this conversation, which took place on May 20, 2017 (two months after my mother died) was no different. I did not know it would be the last sustained conversation I would ever have with my father. He lived another two years and we did have countless short exchanges during that time, about what he was eating or the weather or how he was feeling.
The Most Normal Thing in the World
September 28, 2017 • Laurie Newbound
My mom has been really annoying me lately, and it’s been especially bad since she died last spring. It didn’t start immediately. Initially after her death I felt her presence from time to time, mostly in the condo she had shared with my father the last dozen years of her life. Her presence, but not her voice—it just felt like she was in the room.
Apology
November 17, 2016 • Laurie Newbound
I began posting on this website not quite a year ago, intending to share my experiences with, among other things, my parents as they went through this last chapter of their lives. But a short while ago, as the going got tough, I, I have to admit, got going. I didn’t show up here. The moment shit got real, the moment my mother started to really, seriously fail, I found it almost impossible to sit at my computer and put my thoughts together, to barely even record what was happening.
The Total Flip
June 13, 2016 • Laurie Newbound
My parents moved to Los Angeles from Toronto in their thirties and greeted the sunny lifestyle there like a long lost friend. Both fair and blue eyed, neither of them started using sunscreen until well into their fifties, and even then it was sporadic. In my household growing up, one of the biggest compliments to get or give was to say, “you caught the sun,” meaning you were tan or even working on a sunburn.
Back Into Focus
April 27, 2016 • Laurie Newbound
As my mother emerged from her bedroom, she wore an expression I hadn’t seen on her before — panic. She has struggled with anxiety her whole life but right at this moment I could see that what was behind her eyes was raw, animal, adrenaline-fueled fear. She walked especially haltingly, her caregiver Nette by her side, supporting her extremely shaky, stiff gait.
The Language of Flowers
March 30, 2016 • Laurie Newbound
It was Easter this past Sunday. This particular Sunday I had a planned visit to my parents and didn’t want to go empty handed. Five years ago, I would have brought Peeps and chocolate and maybe even some kind of teacake, and we would have had a lovely tea. But lately, even apart from general health concerns, sweets and particularly chocolate upset their increasingly delicate digestive systems.
The Caregivers
March 2, 2016 • Laurie Newbound
This is what is on the yellow post-it that I slide over to the doctor at my Dad’s appointment. My Dad hates his doctor, hates pretty much all doctors, so getting him there is a big accomplishment. I wait until he looks down for a second and then I put it in front of Dr. Sherman. Doing nothing that could give me away, he glances down at it and then moves the note under some papers.
Ten Things I Wish I Had Done With My Parents Before…
December 7, 2015 • Laurie Newbound
l. I wish I had had more substantive conversations with them about the kind of care they would want as they aged, and especially where they wanted to live and the kind of situation that would best suit them. They lacked an ability to imagine a future life different than the one they were currently having, they couldn’t/wouldn’t see that things were going to get worse.
The Guilty Daughter
November 4, 2015 • Laurie Newbound
My father looks at me, but there is a strange passiveness to his expression, a seeming disconnect between the words and the feeling that should be behind them. He was trained as an actor, did it for over a decade when he was young, but that, along with so much else, has gone away. His ability to act “as if.” When he first started shuffling, freezing up in doorways and getting in and out of cars, I would take him to a neurologist where he would miraculously walk almost normally in the presence of the doctor.