My Mom had a stroke in July and one in November. About four hours ago, I figured out why she has been apologizing to her relatives for this happening. I figured out why she's afraid to be alone. I figured out why she wakes up in the middle of the night calling for help.
It's not because she feels bad about being a burden. Her night terrors are not an effect of the stroke, at least not directly. And her calls for help are more profound than you might think.
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My Mom has been thinking her strokes were punishment for something, though she can't say what it would be. This has been very distressing for her because she cannot believe in a God who would punish. This was an issue she had whenever she would go to church with her boyfriend, Stan. Stan preferred at hell-and-brimstone Baptist church, right down to a pastor who would use the word "liberal" and nearly gag.
So the idea that she would be punished for any reason was distressing, at best, and she felt a responsibility to apologize to her relatives for whatever she had done.
My Mom has been afraid to be alone because she's afraid she might die. What I thought was a crisis in faith (Mom has never, ever, had worries about the afterlife before) turns out to be part of this stroke as punishment concept. Think of what a stroke does; now think of something worse after death.
Why does she wake up in the middle of the night, calling for help? Sigh. If you thought you might die and you woke up in the dark without your full faculties...She's been telling me how glad she is to see me because she knows I'm "real." She's been afraid that she's dead and has been lost in the dark. She always wonders where her "help" is, where her guide is, where the warm, welcoming light is.
After discovering the source of her fears, we had a long discussion about purpose in life. Why do these things happen?
I have left my Mom with a written list:
You are not being punished.
You did nothing wrong.
Many people are able to do things because you convinced them they could and gave them tools to work with.
Purpose is not revealed in a flash of lightning or a clap of thunder. It comes in bits and pieces.
You have a purpose now.
There's a reason you are still here.
Maybe you are not finished teaching.
