“Your granddaughter needs to go to a hospital in Nashville for her depression,” I told my 95-year-old mother. “She’ll be away a few months.”
I began checking in on her several times a week. When I’d get up to leave, we often hugged a long time, rubbing each other’s backs while whispering “I love you.” We never talked about what was really going on with my daughter, but I could tell my mother sensed there was more to the story than I’d provided.
After we talked for a while, I hung up the phone and went to visit my mother. Mom was weak and often tired, taking more naps than usual. And she had been having more mini strokes. The day before I was to leave the hospital and return home, a nurse brought in pain pills and waited by the bed with a cup of water. I watched my daughter pretend to swallow the pills and then hide them next to her hip, away from the nurse.My daughter sighed and looked out the window.We sat together on her bed in silence. I couldn’t believe the excruciating leg pain she was willing to endure just to get high.
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