end

I love you mom. Good night.

Update

As I was leaving work my father called me.

"It's bad," he said.

After the nurse visited with my parents yesterday, they went into the hospital because her pain was so severe. Instead of going towards the emergency room, they headed towards the fifth floor of in the inpatient clinic tower. The staff found a room for her immediately.

My mother's pain and swelling had become too severe. Her lungs were filled with fluid, blood pressure was dropping, and her hemoglobin was low. No ascites was found in her abdomen.

The doctors think she has little time left.

"Your mother didn't want me to call you. She didn't want to worry you."

I sat in my car as he spoke, and I wasn't sure whether I needed to fly out to Los Angeles immediately. She refused both the breathing and NG tube.

The doctors were prepping my mother to remove the fluid from her lungs. A small incision will be made in her back and somehow the doctors would remove the fluid from there.

"I'll call you when I get home. I need to get back to her."

"Do I need to come home?"

"I don't know." He sighed. "I'll call you later."

May 27, 2009

Yesterday at work, I received a call from the home health nurse. “Your mother,” she said, “is very sick.” Yes. “Have you considered hospice care?”



Initially we dismissed hospice care because we wondered whether the environment might speed her towards death, and as always, we hanged tightly to our denial and desperate hopes. But after my visit, my mother’s decline was marked different. The jaundice remained and in addition edema had spread to her limbs. Her arms, hands, legs, and feet were swollen. Heavy bags beneath her eyes were formed by months of inconsistent sleep. The skin on her neck was loose, but I could see her veins pulse quick and shallow. I asked to check her ostomy bag and I when I did, I saw the magenta stretch marks that yielded under the strain of the ascites. My poor, dear old mother was bulging and collapsing.



Throughout the visit, I feared she would die in her sleep. Sometimes she would awaken and mumble incoherently. My father and I would share a look of fear and panic.



Hospice care seems to be a viable option considering the state of her condition and the toll of providing care for her has weathered my father. And yesterday, when I came home from work, I wanted to speak with my parents about this. But they have not answered the phone. I tried throughout the night, spacing the calls 15 minutes apart. Both landline and mobile phone rang on end. My heart is hammering through my chest.

search

I’m looking for metaphors everywhere. I’m hoping for patterns, which will emerge from the daily cacophony, and indicate that everything will be all right. I’m desperate for a message and my distractions gravitate towards the worlds of underdogs. I’m seeking the loophole of quantum mechanics when statistically impossible manifests so that entropy could cease, reverse itself, and heal. I’m smoking cigarettes and staring into the clouds wondering whether she’s there already.

Journal Excerpt: Friday, May 22

Some thoughts and moments from my Memorial Day weekend visit.

---

"Your father doesn't know how to do it right." She stood slowly. "Help me."

"Where are you going?"

"To the kitchen, turn the lights on."

My father had left to pick up some ingredients for the sauteed tofu dish, and a block of tofu was left on the cutting board to dry.

"He doesn't know how to do it, so I'll just get it started. A person needs to cook every once in a while or they'll just have no idea. I'll make it delicious. For you. A mother should be able to make her son's favorite dish."

She held onto her IV pole with her left hand, and I hooked my arm beneath her right armpit to steady her as she shuffled to kitchen. Every few feet she paused to catch breath with an audible whew.

"You need to prop me up. I can't stand by myself." She leaned against the counter and picked up the chef's knife.

"What are you doing?"

"Just making it right. He doesn't know." With an unsteady hand she sliced into the block. "You see? Like this. Like this."

The knife plunged into the soft whiteness forming uneven slices. "It's supposed to be even." She paused. "I'm too weak to hold a knife." As her strength flagged further, each new slice was larger than the previous.

"Keep me up, keep me up. I'm too weak."

My eyes welled with tears and the knife appeared to shake as she processed the block.

"This helps it dry... I...I need to sit." She placed the knife down. "Help me...help me get to the couch."

Before she reached for her IV pole, my mother saw a tear fall from my chin onto the cut tofu. "Stop that...they'll never dry if you do that." She turned away from me, and wiped away her own tears.

Distance

Some days ago, I received a phone call while I stepped out from work to pick up some lotto tickets and donuts. The 920 area code was unfamiliar, and the phone recognized the call was from California; so I pulled into a parking lot and answered. I dread calls from unfamiliar numbers that originate from California. Before my mother's illness I couldn't fathom the tragedy that would trigger a call, but now my suspicions are narrowed to a couple of probabilities. (1) She's dead. (2) She'll die shortly, book your flight.

In either case, I take a couple of breaths before answering.

The call was from the oncologist who was seeing my mother for the appointment that day. It turns out there were no Korean translators at LACUSC hospital. That is to say, the hospital in the city that holds an estimated 1.2 million Koreans had no translators. So my father gave my mobile number to the doctor and she called me. In some way, I'm glad she did. I was able to provide the doctor with an update of my mother's condition since I speak with her and my father daily. Plus, I was able to ask about the bilirubin numbers. The onc said the numbers were holding steady at 17, so though her numbers haven't increased, the frail liver continued to deteriorate under the strain. All this, and I knew the liver problems were a red herring to the biliary cancer, which proceeded to march onward, conquering organs.

Over the past few weeks, my mother's nausea has waned, and she's been drinking juice - a mixture of carrot, celery, and sweet potato - that, according to my dad, helps to improve the liver. I'm skeptical, but the small pleasure of her drinking something delighted me. Perhaps she'll be able to engage in some basic joys before the great nothingness pulls on her sleeve.

lost thoughts

It’s been a long time since I posted anything, and each new day without a word on my mother’s condition is a reflection of the recurrent sense of the unknown. That is to say, who the fuck knows. Though I call daily, the conversation finds the well-worn grooves of the previous call. Even my dad, who was elated that I would phone regularly, admits, “What’s left to say?” Have you ever held a conversation with someone who knew 20 or fewer words? How many times can you say hello and goodbye? This is all that I have with my mother and father. Our canvass is always painted with pain, exhaustion, boredom, and fear.



Skype too has become troublesome. In some ways the connection seems to be weak or the laptop left in Los Angeles showcases the inevitable decline of technology. I see her face but she is not my mother.



I read somewhere that a person mourns, on average, for up to six months. News of her cancer was on December 5. My sadness may be precocious.