Tag Archive | deaf

Caring For An Elderly Parent: Everyone’s Deaf But Mom

Blog - Pic 95“This is supposed to be the time of my life – the nest is empty; but now Mom needs me.”

It’s Sunday evening; my husband and I are having a wonderful time relaxing in our cabana, listening to the serene sounds of the night…. oh, and my cell phone ringing for the 4th time! Yes, it’s my mom. I let it go to voice mail enough times so I better pick up because she must truly be dieing this time. Sorry…. a little stressed!

Nope, not dieing….. just hearing noises in the garage. So while I’m talking to Mom my husband walks around to the garage to check things out. Mom must have caught a glimpse of him because she started called his name. Well, my husband knows that if he answers her she’ll talk his ear off and try not to let him go – and did I ever mention “the list” she has for him? YIKES! There’s always something she needs done around her house – I’m sure it’s just her way of having company – I get that.

So as Mom calls my husbands name I see him walking back to the cabana, realizing I’ve already told her that he was out there…. oops! So now my mom starts going on about how deaf my husband is because he never seems to answer her when she calls him. Hmmm, I wonder why? So I just agree with her about my husbands hearing problem – it’s so much easier.

Speaking of “the list”…. while I’m talking with Mom she mentions that her back door knob is making a funny noise and could my husband look at it – she’s afraid it’s going to get stuck or fall off and she won’t be able to get out (hello…. front door?). Even though my husband just tightened it about a week ago, I told her I’d have him look at it – then quickly said “but it won’t be tonight”, because I knew she’d be waiting at her door for him.

So tonight I’m visiting with Mom and she asks me if my husband is feeling better. I questioned what she meant (because he wasn’t sick or anything) and she said, “Well he must be sick if he didn’t come over last night to look at my door knob.” So when I got home I told my husband what she had said, so he decided to go over and look at her door knob – knowing full well that it was fine.

With tools in hand and a smile on his face, my husband looks at Mom’s door knob. She says to my husband, “Your wife must be deaf because she can’t hear the “clicking” noise the door knob is making.” Really Mom??? So my husband tightens it, he un-tightens it, and sprays it with WD-40 (which fixes everything, by the way!) and now everything is ticketyboo (as Mom says). For now, anyway.

Cross one item off the list!

What I Learned: Being lonely isn’t any fun – I guess fixing door knobs isn’t so bad after all.