My Paternal Grandma, Born 1 Jan 1911
This is part of a series about memories from my youth and childhood.
She drifts in and out of sleep, endearingly opening her eyes to check where she is or who she is with. She has her good and bad days, which is the little game viruses like to play with their hosts. Sometimes she struggles to speak, sometimes she tears, sometimes she lifts her hand to her chest, and I remember her smiling in recognition or looking around, trying to figure out her strange new abode. Her pneumonia means she requires oxygen, and she is literally choking on her phlegm. But lest we get carried away by these dire signs, her wounds are also healing remarkably quickly, and even in the haze of medicine-induced drowsiness and the lack of nutrients Grandma is responsive to touch and grips your hand tightly with her warm hand. If only she had the strength to spit and to swallow.
Without warning, the tears trickle out of my nose or the corners of my eyes, and I quietly wipe them away. I usually cry quietly, without fuss or an audience, and mostly I can will myself to stop as long as I'm not looking at her. I cry especially when I think that 1) she's about to leave us 2) she won't be happy and healthy in her last days 3) she has been suffering for longer than I can imagine 4) she is now so small, so helpless and so insignificant (to some). But I don't cry when she's awake and seldom when others are sobbing. At those times I feel heartened by her fighting spirit. I smile a lot, and talk to her as though she isn't sick at all, which might appear surprising.
Lately I've been recalling the times I spent with her, especially before I sleep or as I watch her sleep. Ward 7B has seen many patients depart. Most of my memories of her are not from adulthood, I am ashamed to say. If anything at all, this whole experience, has taught/reminded me that you really do not want to look back and think that you missed spending time with someone important just because you were too busy or too lazy to. Life REALLY is too short to be callous or ill-disciplined. That is why I visit Grandma often. Even if she cannot feel me holding her hand, or whispering in her ear, or silently willing that she gets well, I hope it makes some tiny difference to her that I'm there.
I remember a plump old lady, almost stout (which is both laughable and heart-wrenching given how she's become skin and bones), with silvery-grey tightly-permed hair, jade earrings and gold bangles. I used to wonder why anyone would favour brown rubber slip-on sandles and bluish-grey patterned blouses. Now I long to see her in them again, and for her to be well enough to totter around, and to tell me smilingly that something tastes good, or to repeat that Mum is an excellent and caring daughter-in-law.
We used to stay on the tenth floor, and I remember her looking out of the balcony grilles, enjoying the breeze, strong and hardy in her seventies. She was so robust that she could eat two bowls of rice (amazing for someone barely 1.5m tall), and her penchant for neighbourhood and clan gossip got on the nerves of many, including my family. Grandma wasn't exactly virtuous. She had spirit, and a temper. She was greedy, and she loved to touch and examine items, curious to know how they worked and how much they cost (she is still drawn to the textures of the hospital blanket, the sheets, Ernie, my fingers, the tubes that keep her alive). She hoarded/guarded her wealth zealously and favoured those who were generous with their money. rather than their time. She could praise you today and make up some untruths about you tomorrow.
As a teenager, I have childhood memories of her generously allowing me to squander coins at the provision shop, spending the entire afternoon on the phone complaining about one daughter-in-law or the other, praising my brother for being so cute and clever (I was evidently less so), waking up early and annoying us with her demands for attention, telling me what a hardworking and intelligent man my father is, advising me to beware non-Chinese men. I distinctly liking her company because I was used to her, but I also remember there were periods of time when I wished she wasn't staying with us, for she could be rather nosy and hard-to-please.
Luckily for me, Grandma was a restless soul. She loved socialising and used to enjoy travelling from household to household. I think it made her feel important and loved to have so many children and grandchildren all taking turns to host her. It made her even happier to inform anyone who cared to listen that relative A had bought a bigger home and relative B was now earning a few thousand a month and giving her pocket money.
As the common tale goes, we all grow up and become absorbed in our own lives--new experiences, new jobs, new partners, and Grandma, who was such a fixture in our growing-up years, got relegated to someone you see once in a couple of months. So long as she was still talking, still eating and still walking, who's worried, right? She groused frequently, but we just happily (conveniently?) put it down to her critical nature, mentally reminding ourselves to visit her more often, so she had somewhere to go and someone to talk to other than Uncle. Whether we did so or not depended on how we prioritised our time.
Chinese New Year was always a rushed affair, so we never got much of a chance to properly chat with her, especially not when so many nameless cousins tumbled in and out to wish her health (and to collect their ang pow). She gradually started losing her memory, and soon she got used to being shouted at, for she started to forget to flush the toilet after use, or that she had eaten, and was too puzzled to defend herself. Care was given since care was due, but as anyone who spends long periods of time looking after invalids would attest to, patience is not a virtue that most have for long spells. What constitutes quality care? It got to a point when it was decided that a maid would be hired to take care of her, the only (unimaginable) option being a nursing home. How convenient for us all. Sure we would visit, but at least Grandma was in good hands right? I think Dad consoled himself as such--no matter how great his guilt he could not give up his job to visit her more than once a week.
Studies have shown that many elderly folk suffer from depression. As I listen to Grandma's shallow breathing, I know that it is foolish of me to wish that I could give her some years of her life, and perhaps selfish too. There are seasons in life, and one reason why life is precious is precisely because we only have this one shot at it. One of my favourite phrases is that retrospect offers one 20/20 vision. I should have stood up to my aunt's bullying of Grandma, I should have visited Grandma more often, I should not have conveniently allowed myself to believe that everything was fine and dandy. I have thought about these, but they get me nowhere, and do her no good. It is incredibly painful and cruel to think that the closest person Grandma had in the past two years was perhaps the maid, a young girl who had to give up girly pursuits and pleasures, mature overnight and, in exchange for very little money and almost no freedom, travel to a foreign land to take care of an old lady when she has never known her own grandparents. What has our moneyed, comfortable, hectic society done to us? Time and again I am reminded that we must not wait til death makes an appearance before we spend our time meaningfully and often with those we hold dear. Yet time and again, modern life keeps me busy (and dizzy) as I hurtle from one activity to another, choosing to spend whatever spare time I have by myself or shopping (after all, Person X/Y/Z will be there next week, right?)
Wrong. Before my wedding, I visited Grandma with a box of traditional Teochew kueh. She really enjoyed eating them, and I felt a twinge of guilt as I held her skinny wrist. Later, sitting on the sofa, she whispered to me fiercely that my aunt had been incredibly mean, but I comforted her using a few stock phrases, limited by my rusty Teochew and cautioned by advice from elders that Grandma was difficult to please anyway. She also commented on how fat my thighs were. After the instinctive embarrassment/annoyance, I brushed it off by saying that I was fattening myself up while I had the chance to. She didn't say anything else, but all I could think about for the rest of the day was how much weight Grandma had lost. Was she even eating? Did anyone chat with her on a daily basis? I resolved to buy her her favourite foods regularly.
Little did I know that her condition would deteriorate rapidly as January rolled round. She started smiling and focusing only vaguely, spending periods of time staring into space (I now know amnesia is made worse by neglect and old age). She peed and pooed involuntarily, and started sleeping on a rubber mat instead of soft cotton bedsheets, and was eventually relegated to a plastic chair as Aunt did not care to wash soiled cushions. At the wedding, she did not seem too sure who I was getting married to, and Aunt refused to dress her up or to hand her any jewellery. I am not a vindictive person, but I will admit that it was a struggle keeping my emotions in check that day (for all the wrong reasons). But I have a happy photo of her smiling on that day--she has a lovely smile and beautifully neat false teeth. She used them to chew and to smile and to swallow and to form vowels, but now they lie unused soaked in a plastic container. When you are old and you slip and hit your head, the prognosis is bleak.
Although I do not like Grandma's caregivers, I tell myself that it is difficult to live with an elderly person and anticipate their every need. Even the nurses look so harassed. Even my parents could not shoulder the constant responsibility. Even I could only drop by to visit her on Saturdays. Although I am filled with rage and disgust at the apparent display of callousness and insincerity, I am no paragon of virtue myself, and I really cannot claim to know them well, so I can only hope that whatever good karma I have possibility accumulated benefits Grandma in some way. Maybe it isn't her fault that she could not better educate her children, seeing that she never went to school herself, and spent her life as a typical woman of her generation, giving birth repeatedly and managing a household on less than enough. She was also a widow with eight children for more than twenty years, and I never heard her cry or complain about her lot in life.
It is too easy to point fingers at others and feel virtuous about myself. What can or should I do about a situation that I find wrong or am uncomfortable with? Better that I offer time, money and support, and hope that my gestures comfort or aid my parents in some way. If it is a trying time for me it must be far worse for them. As I work on my character, my one wish is for Grandma to get better, failing which, she leaves at the right and peaceful time for her, secure in the knowledge that she has been loved and is going to a place filled with gold rings and roast duck. I think Grandpa is there.
It is 2010. Grandma is thin and frail, and the bed and pillows seem to swallow her, or keep her artificially propped up, depending on your interpretation. She has lost a large amount of weight, being on first a diet low in nutrients, fats and proteins, then a liquid diet, and now, just water. To expect her to get better is a little like expecting pigs to fly, to put it crudely. It would actually make me deliriously happy to have her get strong enough to be discharged and to be able to eat, so I could buy her siew mai, roast pork, durian and fresh fish.
Written June 2009 before I decided to take a year off work to be with her and to travel after we passed on.
x
Written June 2009 before I decided to take a year off work to be with her and to travel after we passed on.
x
She drifts in and out of sleep, endearingly opening her eyes to check where she is or who she is with. She has her good and bad days, which is the little game viruses like to play with their hosts. Sometimes she struggles to speak, sometimes she tears, sometimes she lifts her hand to her chest, and I remember her smiling in recognition or looking around, trying to figure out her strange new abode. Her pneumonia means she requires oxygen, and she is literally choking on her phlegm. But lest we get carried away by these dire signs, her wounds are also healing remarkably quickly, and even in the haze of medicine-induced drowsiness and the lack of nutrients Grandma is responsive to touch and grips your hand tightly with her warm hand. If only she had the strength to spit and to swallow.
Without warning, the tears trickle out of my nose or the corners of my eyes, and I quietly wipe them away. I usually cry quietly, without fuss or an audience, and mostly I can will myself to stop as long as I'm not looking at her. I cry especially when I think that 1) she's about to leave us 2) she won't be happy and healthy in her last days 3) she has been suffering for longer than I can imagine 4) she is now so small, so helpless and so insignificant (to some). But I don't cry when she's awake and seldom when others are sobbing. At those times I feel heartened by her fighting spirit. I smile a lot, and talk to her as though she isn't sick at all, which might appear surprising.
Lately I've been recalling the times I spent with her, especially before I sleep or as I watch her sleep. Ward 7B has seen many patients depart. Most of my memories of her are not from adulthood, I am ashamed to say. If anything at all, this whole experience, has taught/reminded me that you really do not want to look back and think that you missed spending time with someone important just because you were too busy or too lazy to. Life REALLY is too short to be callous or ill-disciplined. That is why I visit Grandma often. Even if she cannot feel me holding her hand, or whispering in her ear, or silently willing that she gets well, I hope it makes some tiny difference to her that I'm there.
I remember a plump old lady, almost stout (which is both laughable and heart-wrenching given how she's become skin and bones), with silvery-grey tightly-permed hair, jade earrings and gold bangles. I used to wonder why anyone would favour brown rubber slip-on sandles and bluish-grey patterned blouses. Now I long to see her in them again, and for her to be well enough to totter around, and to tell me smilingly that something tastes good, or to repeat that Mum is an excellent and caring daughter-in-law.
We used to stay on the tenth floor, and I remember her looking out of the balcony grilles, enjoying the breeze, strong and hardy in her seventies. She was so robust that she could eat two bowls of rice (amazing for someone barely 1.5m tall), and her penchant for neighbourhood and clan gossip got on the nerves of many, including my family. Grandma wasn't exactly virtuous. She had spirit, and a temper. She was greedy, and she loved to touch and examine items, curious to know how they worked and how much they cost (she is still drawn to the textures of the hospital blanket, the sheets, Ernie, my fingers, the tubes that keep her alive). She hoarded/guarded her wealth zealously and favoured those who were generous with their money. rather than their time. She could praise you today and make up some untruths about you tomorrow.
As a teenager, I have childhood memories of her generously allowing me to squander coins at the provision shop, spending the entire afternoon on the phone complaining about one daughter-in-law or the other, praising my brother for being so cute and clever (I was evidently less so), waking up early and annoying us with her demands for attention, telling me what a hardworking and intelligent man my father is, advising me to beware non-Chinese men. I distinctly liking her company because I was used to her, but I also remember there were periods of time when I wished she wasn't staying with us, for she could be rather nosy and hard-to-please.
Luckily for me, Grandma was a restless soul. She loved socialising and used to enjoy travelling from household to household. I think it made her feel important and loved to have so many children and grandchildren all taking turns to host her. It made her even happier to inform anyone who cared to listen that relative A had bought a bigger home and relative B was now earning a few thousand a month and giving her pocket money.
As the common tale goes, we all grow up and become absorbed in our own lives--new experiences, new jobs, new partners, and Grandma, who was such a fixture in our growing-up years, got relegated to someone you see once in a couple of months. So long as she was still talking, still eating and still walking, who's worried, right? She groused frequently, but we just happily (conveniently?) put it down to her critical nature, mentally reminding ourselves to visit her more often, so she had somewhere to go and someone to talk to other than Uncle. Whether we did so or not depended on how we prioritised our time.
Chinese New Year was always a rushed affair, so we never got much of a chance to properly chat with her, especially not when so many nameless cousins tumbled in and out to wish her health (and to collect their ang pow). She gradually started losing her memory, and soon she got used to being shouted at, for she started to forget to flush the toilet after use, or that she had eaten, and was too puzzled to defend herself. Care was given since care was due, but as anyone who spends long periods of time looking after invalids would attest to, patience is not a virtue that most have for long spells. What constitutes quality care? It got to a point when it was decided that a maid would be hired to take care of her, the only (unimaginable) option being a nursing home. How convenient for us all. Sure we would visit, but at least Grandma was in good hands right? I think Dad consoled himself as such--no matter how great his guilt he could not give up his job to visit her more than once a week.
Studies have shown that many elderly folk suffer from depression. As I listen to Grandma's shallow breathing, I know that it is foolish of me to wish that I could give her some years of her life, and perhaps selfish too. There are seasons in life, and one reason why life is precious is precisely because we only have this one shot at it. One of my favourite phrases is that retrospect offers one 20/20 vision. I should have stood up to my aunt's bullying of Grandma, I should have visited Grandma more often, I should not have conveniently allowed myself to believe that everything was fine and dandy. I have thought about these, but they get me nowhere, and do her no good. It is incredibly painful and cruel to think that the closest person Grandma had in the past two years was perhaps the maid, a young girl who had to give up girly pursuits and pleasures, mature overnight and, in exchange for very little money and almost no freedom, travel to a foreign land to take care of an old lady when she has never known her own grandparents. What has our moneyed, comfortable, hectic society done to us? Time and again I am reminded that we must not wait til death makes an appearance before we spend our time meaningfully and often with those we hold dear. Yet time and again, modern life keeps me busy (and dizzy) as I hurtle from one activity to another, choosing to spend whatever spare time I have by myself or shopping (after all, Person X/Y/Z will be there next week, right?)
Wrong. Before my wedding, I visited Grandma with a box of traditional Teochew kueh. She really enjoyed eating them, and I felt a twinge of guilt as I held her skinny wrist. Later, sitting on the sofa, she whispered to me fiercely that my aunt had been incredibly mean, but I comforted her using a few stock phrases, limited by my rusty Teochew and cautioned by advice from elders that Grandma was difficult to please anyway. She also commented on how fat my thighs were. After the instinctive embarrassment/annoyance, I brushed it off by saying that I was fattening myself up while I had the chance to. She didn't say anything else, but all I could think about for the rest of the day was how much weight Grandma had lost. Was she even eating? Did anyone chat with her on a daily basis? I resolved to buy her her favourite foods regularly.
Little did I know that her condition would deteriorate rapidly as January rolled round. She started smiling and focusing only vaguely, spending periods of time staring into space (I now know amnesia is made worse by neglect and old age). She peed and pooed involuntarily, and started sleeping on a rubber mat instead of soft cotton bedsheets, and was eventually relegated to a plastic chair as Aunt did not care to wash soiled cushions. At the wedding, she did not seem too sure who I was getting married to, and Aunt refused to dress her up or to hand her any jewellery. I am not a vindictive person, but I will admit that it was a struggle keeping my emotions in check that day (for all the wrong reasons). But I have a happy photo of her smiling on that day--she has a lovely smile and beautifully neat false teeth. She used them to chew and to smile and to swallow and to form vowels, but now they lie unused soaked in a plastic container. When you are old and you slip and hit your head, the prognosis is bleak.
Although I do not like Grandma's caregivers, I tell myself that it is difficult to live with an elderly person and anticipate their every need. Even the nurses look so harassed. Even my parents could not shoulder the constant responsibility. Even I could only drop by to visit her on Saturdays. Although I am filled with rage and disgust at the apparent display of callousness and insincerity, I am no paragon of virtue myself, and I really cannot claim to know them well, so I can only hope that whatever good karma I have possibility accumulated benefits Grandma in some way. Maybe it isn't her fault that she could not better educate her children, seeing that she never went to school herself, and spent her life as a typical woman of her generation, giving birth repeatedly and managing a household on less than enough. She was also a widow with eight children for more than twenty years, and I never heard her cry or complain about her lot in life.
It is too easy to point fingers at others and feel virtuous about myself. What can or should I do about a situation that I find wrong or am uncomfortable with? Better that I offer time, money and support, and hope that my gestures comfort or aid my parents in some way. If it is a trying time for me it must be far worse for them. As I work on my character, my one wish is for Grandma to get better, failing which, she leaves at the right and peaceful time for her, secure in the knowledge that she has been loved and is going to a place filled with gold rings and roast duck. I think Grandpa is there.
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