He looks at his reflection in a window panel at deck level and attacks, again and again and again.  It is a wonder he hasn’t knocked himself out.  Coincidentally, just last week the Kansas Birders discussed this problem in a thread titled “Crazy Cardinal.”  An explanation on the Audubon site said that Cardinals and Robins are almost the always the culprits when this happens.  There is so much testosterone flowing at this time of the year that they will even fight with themselves for territorial dominance.

When I watched this strange behavior going on, I couldn’t help but remember the quotation by Pogo, which ended up the title of a book,  Pogo: We Have Met the Enemy and He Is Us.

If I have read this correctly, there is a paragraph quoted in the forward to
The Pogo Papers, Copyright 1952-3, that comes from “Quimby’s Law (passed by the Town of Quimby after the Trouble with Harold Porch in 1897) on which the quote was based.  Whether or not I am correct, the paragraph includes an expansion of those words.

“There is no need to sally forth, for it remains true that those things which make us human are, curiously enough, always close at hand. Resolve then, that on this very ground, with small flags waving and tinny blast on tiny trumpets, we shall meet the enemy, and not only may he be ours, he may be us.”

Watching that Robin expending so much energy fighting against his own reflection struck a chord with me about some of the battles I fight, battles that I suspect other Caregivers fight.  I have little doubt that this painful truth lies in the experience of most of us, Caregivers or otherwise.

It seems to me that sometimes I expend more energy and experience more frustration dealing with my reactions to problems than the problems themselves.  The problems themselves are just facts of our circumstances.  I have no control over them.  They just are what they are.  They have no sentience.  They aren’t seeking to make me miserable.  They are just the harsh realities of living with any other human being, let alone one with Parkinson’s Disease and Parkinson’s Disease Dementia.  Some of those realities are just stuff that comes with daily living.

We have been impacted by Parkinson’s for over 23 years now.  That is just a fact of our lives.  Everyone has something to deal with, most often lots more than one something.  It is a waste of time to try to determine whose trouble is worse.  The issue is not who has more or who has less to deal with, the issue is, what will I do in the face of my problems.  I have a finite amount of time and stamina.  I can’t afford to waste a whole lot of it battling my own reflection.

Let me try to make sense of that.  When something happens, Mary Ann falls, I can pull the transfer chair over, pull her up, see if she hurt herself when she fell and then get on with whatever is next.  That takes some time and physical effort but nothing of major consequence.

Other alternatives for responding include the response just described plus wondering what possessed her to get up in the first place when she knows she is vulnerable to falling; is she just trying to make it difficult for me; why is she so stubborn, how many times do I have to do this; what if she hurts herself badly, that will mean hospital or rehab or nursing home; she will hate it there and so will I, will I have to spend my days at the nursing home doing all the things the staff doesn’t have time to do, should I have changed the dosage on a medication to help reduce the falls, is there something that I should have done to anticipate the fall and stop it from happening, if she would just stay in her chair, I could get something else done, Volunteers would be more willing to stay– the more she falls the less likely they are to keep coming to be with her.

I don’t go through all that every time she falls, but when anything happens, there can be all sorts of reactions that use up precious energy that would be better used just doing what needs to be done.  Too much time gets wasted fighting against imagined enemies that are created in my own mind.

Mary Ann slept well last night, and we both ended up sleeping late this morning — much needed.  Hospice Aide Sonya came and helped Mary Ann with the morning prep tasks.  There was some fainting later that resulted in a nap, but it was a fairly short nap.  We ate out at McFarland’s.  She allowed me to help her after a while.  We had some of Maureen’s spaghetti and Kroger’s brussel sprouts from the freezer.  Next came the promised trip to Baskin & Robbins.

Mary Ann is in bed now, but I am not sure yet how well she is sleeping.  There seems to be some restless movement.  Hopefully, we will both rest well enough to enjoy the beautiful day predicted for tomorrow.

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