My father-in-law is in the final stages of Parkinson’s Disease and no one knows how long he will continue suffering.
This morning, I was sitting near him and I felt a deep sense of grieving at the fragile nature of our joys and lives. On one side there was a picture of my two children, taken when the younger one was just born and I remembered how happy life was at that point. My dad in law was still suffering from PD but he was mobile and managed to do his tasks by himself, albeit slowly.
Today, he is bedridden, fed mashed or pureed food, cannot shut his eyes when they are open and cannot open them when they are shut. He has great difficulty swallowing and breathing and yet the body continues to live. Thankfully, today we are in a position to have a full time nurse for him who takes care of him. The guy is really very caring as far as taking care of Anna goes (that’s what we call my father in law). I doubt if any of us could have cared for him as much so patiently.
If it hurts me so much to see his silent suffering, I wonder how much more it must be for his wife, Amma as we fondly call her. She is deprived of a companion in her old age. After all, although we are there and the children make enough noise, he has been her partner for so long; it must be akin to watching part of her die. Most days, she feels the pain and comes and talks about it. All I can do is offer a patient ear as there is no other alternative. She is old herself and does not have the energy at times to do stuff for him and it frustrates her.
Old age and illness- I can see why Siddharth became Buddha…
No comments:
Post a Comment