Mama, my Nicaraguan partner and I bought a flat on Christophe Colombe long before it became fashionable, and renovated it extensively. My mother moved in and instantly had a lot to complain about. Every time my mother said anything the least bit negative, I simply picked up her telephone and told her that the complaint department was in Toronto, and then I would start dialing. She must not have wanted to bother my older brother, because she never waited for the ring to start. Other times when she sighed her five octave sigh, I simply said: “Oh dear you must be in a terrible mood, I will return when you are better.” Then I would leave the room and no amount of kvetching would get me back. In limited and select cases, behaviour modification does work.
About six months into this happy co-existence, my mother fell and broke her thighbone in two places. Someone came and got me from a guild meeting I was attending, and I found myself at the emergency room at Notre Dame Hospital. She had been there for about three hours, and as a sufferer of angina, she was at a terrible risk from all the pain. I asked the orderly when the doctor would see her. I asked again in an hour. A young man, who came in after I had arrived, had been seen and assigned a room. My mother was turning an unpleasant colour of gray.
I tried one last time to get some information from the orderly and he ordered me to leave the room. I was shocked and assumed he wanted me out because either he had done something wrong and did not want me to find out, or he just hated non-French people. There were several other patients in the room and all had friends and family members with them. My mother was a very frail eighty-eight years old and I told him that he was being ridiculous and that I couldn’t leave her. He jumped up from his chair and told me he was going to get security to throw me out. I said they better be extra tough security, because I was staying.
Two men showed up wearing security uniforms; one black and one Latino. I asked in French whether they would even think of leaving their mothers if they were in my place. They looked very embarrassed by the whole thing and just turned and left. Then the doctor arrived, and he sent my mother to the eighth floor. When we got there, a room with four beds and two other patients, I couldn’t find a single empty chair. I politely asked one of the other patients whether I could move some things and use one of the chairs near her bed. She said absolutely not, at which point I started to cry. I guess it was the stress of having to deal with all these seemingly horrible people all by myself.
I finally headed home for a few hours sleep and when I returned in the morning, the same rude woman said she had something droll to tell me. I couldn’t even imagine what it could be. She told me that an orderly had come in during the night to bathe my mother and that he had been rather brusque. I didn’t think that was the least bit droll. She said that my mother had risen on her elbows and yelled at the rude orderly in flawless French that she had read all the works of Victor Hugo over seventy five years ago. I said that my mother had had a good education and had indeed read all of Victor Hugo. The woman started laughing. “Yes, yes I believe you. But the poor guy didn’t understand what she was getting at because he had never heard of Victor Hugo!”
(PAGE THREE – Guerilla Tactics for the Care Giver)