That Visit Anxiety
I found a parking spot along the very back row, facing the vacant field. As I pushed my car in to park and checked the time, I calculated how long I would get to be with him.
About 45 minutes.
I looked at my eyes in the rearview and bit my bottom lip. All that laundry, I need to get to the market. Oh, and I need to fulfill the teachers wishlist by Friday and… I caught myself. All of that can wait. I’m here now and that list of to-do’s will be there tomorrow. Really, I knew I was just trying to distract myself from walking in. That, or trying to “prove” that I couldn’t stay longer than 45 on the dot.
All of this to avoid walking in.
It was never about NOT wanting to see my dad. Never, ever. I looked forward to our weekly visits and although it was nerve wracking and anxiety producing, I knew I wanted to see him as often as I possibly could.
This anxiety was triggered by the awkwardness that our visits could potentially hold. I never knew what I was going to get when I walked in to his facility (please don’t be fooled that each visit was sugar plums and rainbows. They weren’t all pleasant).
Would he be asleep? In bed? Would he be in the “rec” room? Or situated in the front lobby, a place where they frequently positioned him. Beyond all that - what I feared the most was that he wouldn’t perk up at the sight of me or holler out after I said hello.
That would absolutely CRUSH me.
The anxiety was always overruled by tangible desire to see him, to sit next to him and feel his gentle presence. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there. It just means that my love was stronger than my fear.
So in I went. Time and time again.
Losing my Dad to a disease that took him piece by piece caused a lot of internal upheaval. At the beginning and as his behavior grew more erratic, my anxiety grew with it. Throughout my dads battle with FTD, the presence of that little anxiety voice was always there. Sometimes it roared, and other times it was quiet and I had to strain to hear it. But it was always there.
My visits down to his facility usually took place on a Wednesday. Both my kids were in school and I tried to get all the to-do’s checked off either before or made a plan to tackle them the following day. I did my best to be present with him and with myself.
Now that I’m on the other side, I realize how normal all of that was. The distraction of actually getting out of the car, the “what if’s” and the fear of what was awaiting me behind his door. This disease really pulls the carpet from underneath you and makes you question things that you thought were solid. It especially makes you question yourself.
If I could pass on one piece of advice it would be :
Go in. Always, always go in.
