Don't Fall Behind!

Posted by Terry McNichols

My 86-year-old father recently got very excited about a catalog filled with pictures of World War II aircrafts.  He taught flying during that war and had piloted many of the airplanes in the catalog.  His major occupation these days is talking about his flying days and reminiscing about all the accidents and near-death experiences.  I have made mailing labels for my dad for years with clip-art pictures of airplanes, but this time my dad wanted me to put the actual pictures of the planes he had flown on the labels (we're talking very small, return address labels).  So my dad was busy cutting the pictures out of the catalog and mailing them to me to see what I could do.  I realized immediately that there was a much quicker way to handle this task and went online to the catalog and downloaded the pictures myself.

This task, however, opened up my eyes to the wealth of information online about said airplanes that could keep my father involved and excited for the next several years.  The problem?  My father doesn't own or know how to operate a computer.  I am saddened by his inability -- or unwillingness -- to take the steps necessary to put the information world at his fingertips.  In defense of myself and my siblings, we have tried several times to set my parents up with a computer.  The one someone donated ended up in the dumpster and the one I set up for them sat idle for a year before I donated it to a school.  My parents do use WebTV for email, but getting on the internet is painfully slow.  I have begged, nagged, cajoled both my parents to use the computer in the community center or the library.

But this time, I started copying entire web pages and emailing them to my father.  I also signed up for the blogs of grandchildren to show up in their email inbox.  And I introduced my father to the google search engine.  Even on WebTV, he was able to read about some of his airplanes and became very excited.  "I never heard about google before," said my dad.  (Seriously, we all tried!)

My point, once again, is the importance of keeping up with the medium of the times.  If you are reading this blog, you can't imagine not knowing about google.   And you can't imagine what the next technology wave will be and how behind you will get if you refuse to keep up.  I must admit that I'm having a hard time getting excited about Twittering, but I at least know what it is, how to access it, and will keep an eye on it to see if it is going to be important in my life.  May we never stop learning....

And dad carries on....

Posted by Terry McNichols

Today's surgery is over and deemed "successful." Apparently another stent was inserted inside original stent and the leak has slowed to a trickle. Hopefully this will stop at some point, as well, but isn't considered "life threatening" at this point. My friend, Donna, of the beautiful words, (here, here, and here) said it so sweetly in an email to me: "More lessons on how parents own a piece of our hearts whether we've sold it to them or not."

Based on the lessons we learned at the event of my dad's last surgery, one sibling has been present the entire time and is now able to extend his "sick leave" to continue caring for mom and dad. Yes, my dad does own a piece of my heart.

My dad's surgery

Posted by Terry McNichols

Many of you have emailed and asked about the outcome of my dad's surgery. My dad made it successfully through the surgery and is up and walking today. He will have a CT scan tomorrow to find out if the leakage of his aneurysm has stopped. But he seems to be in much better spirits and much better shape physically this time around as the surgery was not as complex.

Thank you for your prayers and support.

My dad's surgery revisited

Posted by Terry McNichols

I have posted often about my father's past year, including his surgery to insert a stent in his aorta and bypass a nasty aneurysm. We are saddened that today my dad will be returning to surgery to repair a leak that has developed from that surgery. Read about his surgery here, here and here. He has been doing very well and we are hopeful that this will not be a major setback. I thought I would rerun this 2008 Father's Day post in his honor. Prayers heavenward appreciated!

My father has always been a crusader for nasturtiums. He is the Johnny Appleseed of the world of nasturtiums, harvesting seeds every year and packaging them up in homemade, hand-colored seed packets and sending them off to relatives around the country. Last year my seeds only sprouted tiny little lonesome nasturtiums, but this year I have a whole mound of them starting to appear. My children, my siblings, my friends have all planted dad's seeds and we all try to remember to send him pictures of our successes and even of our failures. My father has loved flowers as long as I've known him. I recently came across a picture of myself at about 3 or 4 years old surrounded by his flowers, and didn't realize that my own love of flowers must have started at that moment. My daughter loves flowers and my two sons both garden with extreme passion and blog about it! Oh that all the things I wanted to pass down were so enduring! When my parents moved to a retirement community in Arizona, my father defied the rules and planted and tended beautiful nasturtiums for many years, until the management finally required that he stop. Is the love of flowers or gardening hard wired in the family genes? Thanks, dad, for the seed packets -- and the genes!

Nasturtiums Here Too! (From Leona!)

This year I finally found a place to plant nasturtiums! So I planted Rudy's seeds from 2007 and 2008! Here they are...poking their little heads up in the Seattle sunshine. Stay tuned for blooms! Thanks, Rudy! We hope they do you proud.

Making Choices

Posted by Terry McNichols

My father finally turned the corner and has begun to collect seeds from his nasturtiums, poppies and calendula. When my dad starts collecting seeds, we know he's feeling like his old self again. But it has been a long recovery, and there were many times we worried that he might continue his post-surgery decline.

At one point, when it seemed as though my father was making some choices that were keeping him depressed, such as being unwilling to get up, get dressed, take short exercise walks, I reminded him of a statement by Harry Stack Sullivan that I heard many years ago and find very helpful. I post it here in hopes that it might be useful.

It is easier to ACT yourself into a new way of FEELING than to FEEL yourself into a new way of ACTING. Harry Stack Sullivan

In case this needs any further explanation, many people want to wait until they feel like doing something. Often that feeling never comes and it is easy to sink into deeper and deeper depression, waiting for the good feelings to return. In depression, the best way to counteract the negative thoughts and feelings is to begin doing the things that used to make you feel better, even though you don't want to. This often stops the downward spiral of thinking negatively, doing less, feeling worse and can turn things around dramatically. In case you need any ideas about how to start acting, follow this link for some great ideas!
(Photo by hale_popoki, posted via Flickr)

The patient

Posted by Terry McNichols

My father successfully made it through his aneurysm stent graph repair. He has not, however, followed the path that the YouTube videos of similar operations predict. "The patient will eat lunch, go home, and be up and about by the next day," or some such wording. Unfortunately, my 86-year-old father has not only not gotten up, but has not been eating, is depressed, and has taken a fall. Fortunately, he wasn't hurt in the fall, and was willing to borrow a neighbor's walker and begin taking walks around his condo area. That resolve lasted for one lap, and except for one other short outing, I don't think he's been out of his chair/bed for more than a few minutes.

The line between nagging and encouraging is very fine. I am very discouraged when I call daily and he still hasn't gotten up, still isn't eating, and is sleeping most of the day. It makes sense that his weak legs won't hold him, after 2 or 3 weeks of disuse. I've even resorted to trying to guilt him into realizing how much money the insurance company was willing to pay to get him a few more months or years of quality life. We are unsure whether there is something else going on or whether he is being stubborn, refusing to take the steps that would help him to feel better, choosing instead to sink further into inactivity and despair.

So there you have it. I don't have much energy for blogging at this point, so must blog about the issue most closely on my heart.

Rerun Wednesday - Dad's surgery!

Yesterday, my father made it successfully through a very risky surgery to insert a stent in his aorta and block a huge, growing aneurysm. This has been a concern since it was discovered in July. After his own doctor suggested the surgery was too dangerous and wanted my dad to sign up for hospice and wait to die, my mother would not relent. A couple of weeks ago, she convinced my dad to switch insurance companies and he was able to then have the surgery performed by an internationally renowned cardiovascular surgeon in whom he had great trust. I thought it would be fitting to rerun this guest post by my brother, Leona's husband, in dad's honor.

Posted by Richard Bergstrom

My father, Rudy Bergstrom (back row, center) was a flight instructor during WWII. Though he never flew in combat, he trained many pilots who did. His flying career began with a flight over his hometown of Somers, Montana when he was 21 years old. He took an immediate interest in flying and enrolled in flight training. As the war heated up, there was a great need for pilots, and he answered the call. Just as he was about to embark on further flight training, his career was almost cut short by the loss of part of one of his fingers, when it was crushed between two railroad cars in Somers. As was typical of so many of the WWII soldiers, he didn’t talk a lot about his experiences while we were growing up, but he did continue flying, and even survived three crashes, none of which were due to pilot error, however. Here is he after landing an army reserve plane on the ice in front of our home on Flathead Lake, MT. As he grew older he seemed to be more willing to talk about his flying experiences, and collected quite a scrapbook with photo albums of his flying days. As the years have gone by, our admiration for our father has grown as we have come to realize the full extent of who he is and what he did during those years.

A few years ago, we toured the Boeing Museum of Flight in Seattle, and were amazed to find that so many of the planes in that museum he had flown. The list is impressive: Aeronca L-38; BT-9; Piper J3 Cub; L-38 Kaydet; Fairchild F-24; Stinson SR Reliant; Stearman PT-13; and even a B-17. But his favorite airplane had to be the B-25, which he incorporated into his email address later in life. This summer, he and my mom, Ruth, managed to hitch a ride on a private jet flying from Kalispell, MT to Seattle, WA. He described that experience as “the highlight of my life.” Now, at age 85, he faces his greatest challenge. A risky surgery lies ahead. There is no certainty of the outcome. Each of us five siblings is seeking to grab precious moments with our father and hear the stories one more time of his adventures in flying. Each of us has discovered, at midlife, a hero in our father, a veteran of WW II.

(That would be my brother and me standing on the ice with the airplane! Thanks, Bro, for the guest post! Terry)

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!

Posted by Leona Bergstrom

This week my parents-in-law (Terry’s parents) celebrate their 65th wedding anniversary. Wow. That is remarkable. So few people mark such a milestone that Hallmark (or whoever it is that assigns such things) hasn’t identified a symbol, flower or stone to the 65th year. Everything over 60 is just “diamond.” Well, I would like to come up with my own symbols in honor of Ruth and Rudy.

Symbol: A strand of three cords.
As described in Ecclesiastes 4:12, Ruth and Rudy have lives that are interwoven with each other but supported and reinforced by God, the third strand. Their faith in their Savior has never wavered, no matter the season, the difficulty, or the joy.

Flower: Nasturtium.
What other flower would best symbolize Ruth and Rudy? Not only has Rudy nurtured them and watched them grow all around him, he has harvested millions of seeds and sent them all over the country. This fast growing, indomitable, beautiful flower reflects Ruth and Rudy’s impact on thousands of lives. Not only did they raise five incredible children, they've welcomed grandchildren, great grandchildren, and recently celebrated the birth of a great-great grandchild! They have always shared spirited love and extraordinary compassion with family, friends, neighbors, pastors, missionaries, and hundreds of strangers they have met in RV parks and McDonalds.

Stone: Diamond
OK, I’ll go with Hallmark on this one. The marriage of Ruth and Rudy is strong, invincible and scratch –resistant, just like a diamond. Through the years of joy and pain, new facets and new sparkles have emerged. On the surface you see the bright glow radiated by a long life of love. But the individual facets reflect an unconquerable sense of adventure, invincible work ethic and unshakable faith.

Happy Anniversary to my “other” parents. You have modeled for your son and me what it means to persevere in love. I hope we get to celebrate 65 years of marriage. Maybe by then Hallmark will come up with their own set of symbols for such an extraordinary milestone!

Dad's phone

Posted by Terry McNichols

One of the great difficulties at this stage of my life journey is to watch my parents age. My siblings and I were concerned about my parents making a very long drive without a cell phone. So we banded together and hurried to make sure they had one before their trip. My father called me crestfallen to tell me that as he was packing up his car, he dropped the phone on the pavement and now it wouldn't work. I too was disappointed and discouraged as it was impossible to troubleshoot the problem by long distance.

I received the phone in the mail a few days later, expecting to return it to my local phone store. I opened the package and turned on the phone and voila, it worked just fine. I decided a miracle for which I had prayed had indeed come to pass. The truth of the matter is much more down to earth, however. My dad dropped the phone on the pavement and the screen went blank. He reinstalled the battery, and was devastated that it didn’t work. When I called him tonight to tell him that it was now working, I told him I thought the problem was that the button you use to turn the phone on needs to be held down a very long time before the phone comes on. His response? “I didn’t even try to turn it on. I thought it was always on.” I didn’t know if he’d feel better or worse, knowing the only thing wrong with the phone was that no one tried to turn it on.

In my dad’s defense, the phone system isn’t intuitive, with a red button for turning on and a green button for sending calls. I had told him to leave the phone on all the time. He had turned it on in the very beginning, but had forgotten. So today I sent the phone back to him and we’ll try again.

It is not only the elderly who have trouble with their cell phones. Many of us are technologically challenged. It is embarrassing to have the younger generation so far ahead of us in such matters. But my challenge to myself is to keep up for as long as possible!
(photos by JonJon2k8 and wka, shared via Flickr)

Addendum: My father is now very adept at using his cell phone. He sits on the patio at his Arizona condo and calls his children when he is lonely or bored. The cell phone that at first proved so challenging, is now a major lifeline, connecting him in a way that wasn't possible years earlier.

Veteran's Day - a guest post

Posted by Richard Bergstrom

My father, Rudy Bergstrom (back row, center) was a flight instructor during WWII. Though he never flew in combat, he trained many pilots who did. His flying career began with a flight over his hometown of Somers, Montana when he was 21 years old. He took an immediate interest in flying and enrolled in flight training. As the war heated up, there was a great need for pilots, and he answered the call. Just as he was about to embark on further flight training, his career was almost cut short by the loss of part of one of his fingers, when it was crushed between two railroad cars in Somers. As was typical of so many of the WWII soldiers, he didn’t talk a lot about his experiences while we were growing up, but he did continue flying, and even survived three crashes, none of which were due to pilot error, however. Here is he after landing an army reserve plane on the ice in front of our home on Flathead Lake, MT. As he grew older he seemed to be more willing to talk about his flying experiences, and collected quite a scrapbook with photo albums of his flying days. As the years have gone by, our admiration for our father has grown as we have come to realize the full extent of who he is and what he did during those years.

A few years ago, we toured the Boeing Museum of Flight in Seattle, and were amazed to find that so many of the planes in that museum he had flown. The list is impressive: Aeronca L-38; BT-9; Piper J3 Cub; L-38 Kaydet; Fairchild F-24; Stinson SR Reliant; Stearman PT-13; and even a B-17. But his favorite airplane had to be the B-25, which he incorporated into his email address later in life. This summer, he and my mom, Ruth, managed to hitch a ride on a private jet flying from Kalispell, MT to Seattle, WA. He described that experience as “the highlight of my life.” Now, at age 85, he faces his greatest challenge. A risky surgery lies ahead. There is no certainty of the outcome. Each of us five siblings is seeking to grab precious moments with our father and hear the stories one more time of his adventures in flying. Each of us has discovered, at midlife, a hero in our father, a veteran of WW II.

(That would be my brother and me standing on the ice with the airplane! Thanks, Bro, for the guest post! Terry)

Nasturtiums - Terry speaks

My father has always been a crusader for nasturtiums. He is the Johnny Appleseed of the world of nasturtiums, harvesting seeds every year and packaging them up in homemade, hand-colored seed packets and sending them off to relatives around the country. Last year my seeds only sprouted tiny little lonesome nasturtiums, but this year I have a whole mound of them starting to appear. My children, my siblings, my friends have all planted dad's seeds and we all try to remember to send him pictures of our successes and even of our failures. My father has loved flowers as long as I've known him. I recently came across a picture of myself at about 3 or 4 years old surrounded by his flowers, and didn't realize that my own love of flowers must have started at that moment. My daughter loves flowers and my two sons both garden with extreme passion and blog about it! Oh that all the things I wanted to pass down were so enduring! When my parents moved to a retirement community in Arizona, my father defied the rules and planted and tended beautiful nasturtiums for many years, until the management finally required that he stop. Is the love of flowers or gardening hard wired in the family genes? Thanks, dad, for the seed packets -- and the genes!