Before Mom Moved in with Me

Before mom moved in with me, I had a morning routine. I got up early around 5:30, had coffee and wrote my journal or read a book and then I would take a walk, come home and shower and start my day.

I usually had a lot planned. Each day around the podcast, things have changed.

Hi, I'm Wendy Green and this is Boomer Banter and I bring you short solo episodes about what I'm actually living through, caregiving for my mother and the bigger question of finding purpose at this stage of life. So I still get up early and start with the coffee. But within generally 30 minutes of waking up, I hear Mom.

She gets up, goes to the bathroom and then she walks out to see me. She does not have her hearing aid in, so there's no real conversation. She says good morning, kisses my head and she goes back to her bedroom.

But now the clock is ticking. I need to get my walk in and shower before she gets up again so I can get her breakfast and we can eat together.

After breakfast, mom moves to the couch, pulls probably two blankets over herself and closes her eyes. She's tired. She feels like she has lost her purpose. She wonders why she is still living.

I have not lost my purpose, but I feel like my purpose is not as clear right now as it was before mom moved in. When I had my regular morning routine, I would clarify my day in my journal.

Normally on Sundays I would write out my plan for the week and then in the mornings I would put some meaning and details around the plan for the day. But here's the difference. Mom wakes up thinking, why was I given another day? I'm just taking up space. I have nothing to contribute.

I wake up knowing I am in a transition and will come through this transition to hopefully something that excites me again. That contrast, that gap between our two ways of seeing the day, is what this episode is about.

Transitions start with an ending, which endings are my mojo killers right now. The loss of my independence and the loss of the Boomer Banter format I spent six years building.

No guests, at least for now, just me talking about what I'm actually living through. It was my decision to have mom move in with me and I honestly was naive about what that would mean. Mom is in relatively good health.

She is frail, just 98 pounds soaking wet. And I'm glad she's here. I just did not realize everything else that goes along with having her here.

Working with her caregiver, filing long-term-care monthly expenses, finding foods she will eat, trying to find ways to help her feel useful. And patience, always working on practicing patience.

So there just wasn't time to put into the Boomer Banter format that I had used for the past six years. And yet I was feeling this void.

And I'm trying to fill that void with the Substack and with this shorter form Podcast.

The middle part of a transition is called the Messy Middle. This is the void. In the Messy Middle we try different things or maybe just do nothing for a little while until we start to listen for the things that we connect with. We have to be listening though, or we're going to miss it.

Those doors might swing open, but if you're not listening or being aware, you're going to miss those things. So for me right now the Messy Middle is about clarifying why I am reincarnating this podcast in a new form and what my goals are for the Substack.

But all of that is murky right now, and I have been through enough transitions to know I just have to trust the process.

And eventually in a transition, you get to the New Beginning. I want to believe my New Beginning still includes this.

The writing, the recording, showing up here with you. But I'm going to be honest with you about something that happened yesterday. I ran a quick errand, an hour, maybe two. I don't think so, but maybe.

And I thought that was fine. I had done that before. But yesterday I came home to mom feeling very sick and I ended up calling 911.

And just like that, everything I thought I knew about what my days looked like shifted again. So I don't know what my New Beginning looks like. Not yet. But when we're in the Messy Middle, none of us can really know.

I may need to build a support team around my mom's care. No, I probably need to build a support team around her care. Her needs may increase. The version of my life I'm moving towards is still taking shape.

And some of what shapes it is probably going to be out of my hands. What I do know is that I have been through enough transitions to trust that something does eventually emerge from the Messy Middle.

It may not, probably won't look like what I planned, rarely does, but it will become part of my next chapter. At 73 almost, I believe I have a couple more New Beginnings ahead of me. My mom at 96 says she's done with New Beginnings.

She just wants to feel comfortable and feel loved. And right now, providing that, being present for her, is also part of my transition.

I have not figured out how to reconcile the disconnect. The disconnect of keeping myself motivated and living life while watching her let go of it. And that's really what I want to leave you with today. We, you and I, are in this together.

Whether you have retired, are getting ready to retire, lost a loved one, caring for a loved one, or facing some new limitations, transitions are a part of life. The Endings are real, the Messy Middle is uncomfortable, and the New Beginning is not guaranteed to look the way you hoped it would.

But we get to choose how we move through it. So let's choose life. And if you want to share where you are in your transition, please send me an email. It's Wendy@HeyBoomer.Biz.

Or come join us in the monthly Banter Circle. It's where we talk honestly about the things that challenge us and bring us joy as we age. I'd love to see you there.

Before you go, I want to encourage you to check out the podcast Women Over 70 Aging Reimagined. It's hosted by my friends Catherine Marieno and Gail Zelitsky.

It is an award-winning weekly podcast featuring inspiring stories from women ages 70 to 110. Their stories celebrate women's enduring courage, compassion and contribution and shatter the myth that we become irrelevant as we age.

You can find it wherever you listen to podcasts or on their website, womenover70.com

Thanks for being here and I will be back hopefully very soon.