Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Hi, everyone. This is Dawn Clem, and you are on my podcast, Milkweed and monarchs.
[00:00:08] Today, I'm going to be sharing another story that was given to me by my patient, Cindy, when she was going through treatment. And if you heard episode 14, then you'll know that she's. She was having anxiety going through treatment. She was an incredibly intelligent woman, and she liked to write. So we made a little pact that she would send me stories periodically. And then when she came to the office for her visit, we would talk about how her MRI went, but then we would also talk about the story. In the end, she would come every three months for a follow up MRI. And so she was able to give me six stories, four of which I am going to share with you.
[00:01:09] Three, maybe four. I'm going to think about it.
[00:01:14] But anyhow, she was an incredible person and an incredible writer. And this story is very, very, very moving.
[00:01:24] It's called flowers for mom. And since we just had Mother's Day, I thought this was an appropriate story to share with all of you.
[00:01:34] But also, it made me think about my own daughters. I was unable to have my own children, and I had gone through in vitro four times, unfortunately, and actually did get pregnant the last time, but then I ended up having a miscarriage.
[00:01:55] And then we went in, went through the whole adoption. I mean, it's just such a long, drawn out story. And anybody who has suffered through infertility would completely understand my hesitancy in even talking about it. But we tried first to adopt in the United States, and believe me, that was just one of the most horrible experiences I've ever been through in my life. And I actually got to the point where I'm like, I don't know if this is even going to be worth it. Talking to my husband and one of the physicians that I had been working with, an oncologist, was also trying to adopt at that time, and they had decided to adopt internationally, and they had actually gotten a baby boy from Romania. And she was encouraging me to try and adopt from Romania, and I was pretty much over all of it. As a matter of fact, my husband and I were still living in Maine at that time, and we made a trip back every year in the spring and the fall to see my mom.
[00:03:15] My dad had passed away, and so we always made sure to go back during that time. And we went back in the fall, and we had decided that we were going to tell her that we were not going to pursue having children anymore.
[00:03:32] And so we got there and, you know, we told her it's so funny, too, because I had saved, like, all of my Nancy Drew books.
[00:03:44] I still have them, by the way. And, you know, just some personal things that I thought having children, they might get a kick out of seeing later on in their lives. So I had saved a bunch of stuff. And when I went home and we told her that we were not going to have children, I said, go ahead and give the stuff away. You can give it to goodwill, or there's a family in Ohio on a farm that we drove by all the time. And I said, they look like they could use some stuff to just take it down there and give it away. My mom was like, oh, my God. My mom was completely mortified, really, that I was giving this stuff away. And she was sad, of course, that we weren't going to have kids. Cause she always wanted me to be a mom.
[00:04:29] And she told me that she was praying for me every Sunday when she went to church.
[00:04:35] So when we said, no, we're not gonna have kids, you know, put an end to it, get rid of this stuff, and let's just move forward in our lives.
[00:04:45] She was heartbroken. So we drove back to Maine, and when we got home, I had a message on my answering machine, and it was from the doctor who I had been working with. Actually, it was from her partner. I said, oh, we found a little girl for you. You have to call us. So I'm like, ugh.
[00:05:11] So I call her and I go, hey, just to let you know right up front, we're not going to have kids. We decided we're not going to have kids. I just went home and told my mom. She said, well, we heard about this little girl over there. She's nine years old. And they were really telling us how wonderful she was. They said, there's only one drawback. And they said, what's the drawback? And they said, there's two of them. She has a younger sister who's seven.
[00:05:42] So I said, well, I mean, that's great, but we're not going to adopt. She said, let me just send you the pictures.
[00:05:49] So I'm like, okay. So she sends me the picture of these two adorable little girls.
[00:06:00] And my husband got home from work and I showed him the picture and he goes, we're not going to adopt. I go, I don't know. They look just like us. Maybe we should think about it. The oldest one looks so much like my husband, and the youngest one looks so much like me. It's like looking in the mirror sometimes. So to make a very long story short, we found out about them in September. In October, we were able to adopt them. It became legal on October 16 in the country of Romania. And in November, we went to Romania to pick up our daughters.
[00:06:44] So we spent the last, we adopted them in 2022. So we've had, you know, had them as our daughters for 22 years now, going on 23 years.
[00:07:02] It was really so great. My mom was so happy, and my mom actually came and lived with us during the school year so that my husband and I could continue to work, you know, and everything really was going great.
[00:07:20] And then, you know, life changes, right? Life changes. And my mom became sick. They both went to college. They graduated from college, and my oldest daughter ended up getting married to someone who, I don't know how this worked out, but she married someone from Venezuela. Their family's very nice, but they, they really are not fans of my husband and myself. So we don't have a very good relationship. And then my youngest daughter has been through a lot of trials and tribulations just trying to grow up. And so we don't really have a very good relationship with either one of them, actually.
[00:08:10] And it's just so heartbreaking to see how all that good intention turned out to be not so good after all. And my husband and I have struggled with trying to work this out, trying to make this the best possible relationships for us. But it seems like whatever we do or whatever we say, it's never taken with positive intent. It feels like we're being judged. And so it's just gotten to the point where we really don't have a relationship with them.
[00:08:50] And my mom died in 2019.
[00:08:55] So when I went back over the papers that I had gotten from my patient Cindy, the one paper was called flowers for mom, like I told you. And when I read it, I'm just like, you know, this is what you're hoping for in your life, but sometimes things just don't work out that way. But I hope with all of you listening to this that you have great relationships with your children.
[00:09:28] And Craig and I, my husband and I feel good that we did the best that we could for two little girls from another country that really would not have had the life that they have today. So we can feel good about that.
[00:09:46] So here is the essay from cindy.
[00:09:51] My mother liked to garden.
[00:09:54] When we visited her mother's garden, we stepped through the dirt and flowers as delicately as any child could.
[00:10:03] The flowers growing there were for picking and for placing them into vases for grandma's kitchen table.
[00:10:12] Mom identified the flowers by name.
[00:10:16] Daisies, black eyed susans, snapdragons, bachelor buttons, pansies.
[00:10:23] She taught us to smell them without crushing them in our little hands.
[00:10:29] After our new house was built, a fence was placed between the property lines separating our backyard from the empty lot and the busy street where the buses filled the air with diesel exhaust and squealing breaks. The fence became the backdrop for mom's flower garden.
[00:10:51] Other gardens appeared within the yard, separating the play area from the more formal yard. A rose garden, a pear tree, an apple tree, and yet later a grapevine.
[00:11:06] I don't think I noticed the flowers on that vinegar, but I always noticed the clumps of grapes that appeared every fall.
[00:11:16] My mother liked to store applesauce and jellies in glass canning jars.
[00:11:22] She would buy the bruised apples from the grocery store in the fall.
[00:11:27] We dumped the bushel into the sink, cleaned and pitted the apples and cooked them down, skin and all. We loved the smell of the apples as they pushed through the sieve. Generous amounts of sugar was added and stirred in. I don't remember storing up the applesauce. The nine of us quickly consumed that which was made.
[00:11:53] The jams and jellies were always made from fresh fruit.
[00:11:59] The glass jars were sanitized in the dishwasher and then placed on one counter. The berries, usually blueberries, but sometimes there were thimble berries, were gently placed into the kitchen sink, cleaned, and picked through a huge soup pot used to cook the berries down to a sauce that was then ladled into the glass jars.
[00:12:25] Paraffin was melted and poured over the surface of the jam. Lids were sterilized and placed on the clean rims. Bands tightened. The summer harvest was then carried to the basement.
[00:12:42] My mother liked candles. She had a tall skinny one for the candelabra on the dining room table.
[00:12:52] These were lit for special thanksgiving meals or on the occasion of the teacher appreciation lunch she held each year for many years, but not all. She had stout candles sitting on round plates with no edges. There was one that maintained a place of reverence at the end of the stove, dirty, dusty, and greasy.
[00:13:18] Mom no longer saw the candle at the end of the stove, and no one lit the candles lest the flaming wick would would set something on fire.
[00:13:29] She no longer made the sauce and jams, but rather led us in making barking out the exact steps of how we were to act.
[00:13:42] Mom no longer worked in the garden. Others did the weeding. Others did the planting.
[00:13:50] One year she ceased to attend the violet club meetings.
[00:13:55] Others watered the violets in the living room where they received the north light, a light which would not burn their leaves or dry them out too quickly.
[00:14:08] Now I am a mother, and I, with children of my own now living in another city, began to send her cut flowers for her birthday and for Mother's Day.
[00:14:22] Buy me flowers while I'm alive, not after I'm dead. She told us this after her mother had died, a death which visibly left my mother changed.
[00:14:35] As her vision diminished. It seemed that her sense of smell increased. Truly, her sense of smell had always been great. It may have been that, lacking the ability to talk about what she could not see, she would now include the descriptions of smells. She mentioned a beautiful, delicate aroma from one of the bouquets I had ordered. I called the florist.
[00:15:06] The scent came from the freesia flowers. From that day on, I asked for freesia to be put in the banquet in the bouquet, so that as she smelled, she would see the flowers that were given to her. I enjoyed the smell of freesia, too. The freesia potpourri innocuously covered the smell of dust from my office's carpet. I applied sparingly the freeze your body lotion I found at the mall. I became a freesia aficionado, searching and sniffing everything freesia, when I shopped, the sniff test, was imperative. I have my mother's sense of smell. Too many scented items often contain an undercurrent not unlike bug spray.
[00:16:06] At the hospital, the years went by quickly.
[00:16:10] Now my mother was dying.
[00:16:13] I was in my second week of the family watch, weary and tired. I was unable to think quickly or clearly. I was directing my life from a to do list that as much like that of a takeout, the gar like much like that of take out the garbage, wipe down the counters, put away the dishes. The list for those two weeks was wake up, visit mom, eat a meal, visit mom, take a break, visit mom. Go back to the motel.
[00:16:52] During my visits, she told me she heard birds and that Jesus had entered her room. She called the Cindy bloom. She called me Cindy Bloom. She remembered my first name close enough. She asked me to take care of her sister, my dear Aunt Shirley. I offered visions of Lake Superior as seen from her cottage, glistening in the sunlight, waves lapping up on the rocks. It was all I had to offer, other than tears. As she lay unmoving with the paralyzing arthritis in her back and joints, it was now time to take a break. She was sleeping.
[00:17:40] I will leave the room, get some fresh air, and feel the sunshine on my face, I thought. I walked down the corridor, found a place in the elevator and went to the first floor floor and left the building through the main lobby. Passing the gift store that was located, as always, near the front door, I wondered if the intent was to encourage visitors to purchase a last minute gift for the hospital guest.
[00:18:11] My stress and tiredness wore on me as indecision, anxiousness, and impatience.
[00:18:20] I should get back to the room. She might have awoken by now, I told myself. No, you need more time for yourself, I replied. I passed from the fresh smells of wintry snow into the darkened interior lobby where my eyes once again wandered towards the gift store. Should I go in? Should I not get back to my mom?
[00:18:48] My feet went into the store. My mom was. My mind was entering the elevator.
[00:18:55] It was obvious from the placement of the checkout counter that folks were encouraged to turn right as they entered the shop and then move in a counterclockwise fashion through the displays and racks of the predictable.
[00:19:13] What was unusual, however, was the displays of candies of all sizes, candles of all sizes, on the wall immediately to the right of the door. The habit of looking for freesia now took over. I scanned the racks for freesia on a label, found one, lifted the jar off the shelf, removed the lid, placed it under my nose, and began my sniff test. The cinnaphresia in my nose was heavenly. Somehow the flour had been melted into wax, and as I inhaled, my eyes were scanning the labels of the shelved candles. I discovered that each had been given a name much like one would find on lipstick. I remember one being called hot rod.
[00:20:07] It must have been a red cinnamon scented candle. I wondered what was the name of the freesia candle? In my hand.
[00:20:19] I took the jar away from my nose and held it out to read its label.
[00:20:25] The name for this candle was mom.
[00:20:33] I kept the candle in my hand and continued my journey around the store. I purchased the candle. My mom died a few days later. I packed my gift into my suitcase and drove home. The candle, unlit in its jar, still smelling like newly cut freesia, sits on my shelf. My gift of flowers for mom are now the gift of memories for me.
[00:21:07] That.
[00:21:10] That reminded me so much of my mom and my grandma because my grandma had a garden too, and my mom did too. And it was just like reliving that whole experience for me and then you. I think about where I am with my daughters and that was so painful. And I guess it was just a reminder to me that the simple things like that, maybe they're not the same anymore. I don't know. I don't want to think that.
[00:21:45] I know that things are changing and things are troublesome now, but I still don't want to give up hope that things will come back to the simpler pleasures in life, that we won't be so troubled or so annoyed or so frustrated that we'll remember how we used to love flower gardens and smells and being outdoors and caring for each other.
[00:22:17] Those are the things that matter so much and make so much of a difference in our own lives.
[00:22:27] And of course, I always hope that maybe my daughters will get enough years on them that they'll look back and they'll remember the things that I did and that my mom did with them and for them.
[00:22:48] I hope you enjoyed her story today. I was. It was a tough one for me. I was having a hard time reading it without crying, just remembering her. She was just one of the most magnificent people I have had the opportunity of meeting in my life. She definitely impacted me, and she made me think about things in a different way.
[00:23:14] You know, that's important. It's important for us to be surrounded by people that don't think like we do that stretch our brain a little bit and make us maybe think outside the box. Right? I think that's really important.
[00:23:31] I know that I had three patients.
[00:23:36] I had so many patients that I loved every single one of them. But there were three patients that impacted me the most, and she was definitely one of them. And I hope one day maybe I'll be able to meet one of her daughters and let them know how much their mother meant to me.
[00:24:01] That concludes my episode for today, and I hope you enjoyed it.
[00:24:10] If anyone you know, or if you yourself would like to share a story with me, please go to milkmon.com. milkmon.com. There's a form on there. You can complete the form. Or there's also my contact information should you want to talk to me directly. I would love to start sharing other people's stories, or I would love to interview you. If you live in the state of Michigan, we'd have to make arrangements, but I'm sure we could.
[00:24:46] Until the next time, take care.
