Cracked Roots & Roses 19: The Cares of Life

I guess it wasn’t enough to deal with the loss of my son, the kitchen sink was airborne and coming my way. The ugly reality of living in the natural world while being new in Christ was beginning to set in. In the span of about three months, my sister was in a bad car accident, my “saved” aunt had a massive heart attack, and my mom had a life-altering stroke. Seemed the devil touched everything that touched me without touching me directly.. MESSAGE. I know why now. I was actively coming his kingdom.

My mom had been working as a housekeeper at a hotel in a nice suburb for about six years. One day, she was cleaning a room and started to feel weird. While making a bed, she went to the other side to tuck the sheet, and all of a sudden, her vision blurred, and she felt herself falling. As she fell, she had the wherewithal to grab the room’s phone cord. When the phone fell, the front desk was alerted to the phone being off the hook. They immediately sent someone up to check the room. They saw her cleaning cart in the hall and alerted emergency services.

She was transported to a hospital in nearby Hinsdale. I was called while at work by her off-and-on boyfriend, who would soon be my stepfather, to tell me the news. He said, “Hi Kim, how you doing? Your mother had a stroke; it’s not looking good.”

I said, “Oh, okay… I won’t get off work for a few hours.”

He paused and then said, “Okay, she’s at the hospital in Hinsdale.”

I hung up the phone and tried to go back to work. I think I was in shock. I still do that to this day. I can’t deal with trauma head-on; I need a minute to process it to react appropriately. I never want anyone to feel uncomfortable because of my reaction, which I now recognize as trauma.

Then suddenly, it hit me—my mother might be dying. Reality hit me. I went to my department lead and said, “I really have to go. My mom just had a stroke.”

Jeremy was there in 15 minutes. I got to the hospital within an hour. I was immediate family of course, so I was let up to intensive care after visiting hours. I can still feel the anxiety walking through that ward to her room. She was hooked up to all kinds of monitors. She was awake but incoherent. Her speech was slurred and her left side paralyzed, which caused her face to droop.

I was in shock. I had never really pitied my mother until now. She looked so frail and old lying in that hospital bed. That wasn’t the woman I knew. How could this be? She was only 50. My mom was a young 50 until this stroke happened. After my father died, she made up the stolen time and I didn’t blame her one bit for doing her own thing. I still couldn’t look at her without crying. I was faced with tragedy yet again. I was thankful that she didn’t die. My mom was also a victim of my father, and dying this young just seemed unfair.

My mom was in that hospital for about a month before she was moved to a nursing home for a few months. She was confined to a wheelchair because she had no use of her left side. I went to see her every other day and told her about the goodness of Jesus. I would open the Bible and just read the Psalms. I didn’t know what else to do; I was still a babe in Christ. This time in the hospital visiting I realized I didn’t really know her. A very small part of me resented her for staying with my father. It wasn’t obvious but there was a thread of hostility in my speech.

The nursing home was the worst part of everything. It was a low-income facility in the worst part of Chicago near the projects. It reeked of urine and feces and was run by the most incompetent people you could ever meet. They would forget to feed her, send me to the wrong room, forget her medication—the list went on. I hated to leave her there but couldn’t do anything about it. She needed care and rehabilitation that I couldn’t render with a kid, husband, and full-time job.

When she was finally discharged, her boyfriend moved in with her to take care of her. This was a relief. He was and is a godsend. He carried her up and down the four flights of stairs for doctor’s appointments and even helped wash her hair weekly. The following year they went to city hall and got married. This shocked me. I fully expected him to bail because she wasn’t the same person. The stroke had aged her and she now needed around-the-clock care, but nope—he stayed, married her, and they’re still married today.

All of this in a short span, I couldn’t help but wonder what was happening with my life? It felt like the bottom had just fallen out. Jeremy and I exchanged conversation for arguments about every little thing. He was out too much bowling and shooting pool. In the beginning he couldn’t stay out of my face but now that we were married with a kid he couldn’t get away from me fast enough. I felt like I was a single mother. I was beginning to resent him and the grief did not help. 

I worked just as much as he did, but when I got off work, I had to come home to cook, clean, and take care of my daughter. He would come home, change his clothes, and leave back out. I can remember one pivotal incident that sealed it for me. We were having an argument, of course. I went to lay on the couch because I was still mad. He came to the entry of the living room to resume the fight, but l ignored him. It was late, and I was tired of arguing. After a few minutes, I felt the end of the couch being lifted up while I was one it. I screamed, “What are you doing?! Put the couch down!” He said, “If you don’t answer me, l’m gonna turn this couch over with you on it.” Then he dropped the couch and it slammed to the floor. I couldn’t believe he did that. He then stormed out and slammed the door. 

It was a progression. I was used to being terrified in the car but not in my own home. What was next? It never occurred to me that he had the propensity for violence. Then I remembered he was accustomed to seeing domestic violence. His father used to beat his mom until one day she stabbed him in the stomach and pulled the knife to his chest. His sister was casually beat by every man she dated, it was like she was a magnet for dirt bags. One guy and his friend threw her in the trunk and tried to drive off with her until Jeremy jumped on the car to get her out.

This was new for me. Gino was not a good guy but he talked to me as delicately as you would a doll. I never thought I would marry a man who tried to gain control over me through fear, but here I was. I knew my father slapped my mom a few times, but we didn’t see him do it. That was reserved for their bedroom before they moved into separate rooms. I would see the marks afterward or the blood on her lip but never really thought about it. I thought his violence was reserved for my sister and I. 

I loved Jeremy. He was my husband.

But I didn’t know how far I could allow him to go. I was getting jumpy-from the speeding to scare me when he was mad, to the punching holes in the wall, and now the couch being slammed down with me on it. What was next? 

The only man in my life who hit me was my father and I told myself no other man in this world would lay hands on me in anger. I was not about to be anyone’s punching bag, and that was period. From that moment, I no longer saw us getting old and gray. I now dreamed about being able to exhale.