In our hearts, we struggle between declaring this is no way to live, and realizing that yes, this is a way to live because this is what Hashem has decided
“How’s your mother?”
“Fine, thank you, baruch Hashem,” I answer with the smile I’ve learned to paste on, though my mother has been in the hospital on a respirator for four years.
For the uninitiated, this means that for four years my mother has been unable to talk to us; she can only listen. With the balance problems she has, she hasn’t been able to walk or stand, so she’s been bedridden the entire time. Artificially fed, she hasn’t had food or drink touch her lips for the entire period, if you don’t count the time my brother secretly dabbed Kiddush wine on her lips, or the times we squeezed a damp sponge into her mouth.
And yet, so typical of Mom, she has never complained.
No, my mother is not unconscious, though each new member of the hospital staff doesn’t truly believe us, because Mom is asleep much of the time nowadays. Inevitably, there is one evening when Mom is awake, and with her bright green eyes wide open, she smiles graciously at the new nurse, who is genuinely shocked.
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