As you have probably noted from my past posts, I come from the type of family that is always into your business and life. They are sometimes loud and opinionated, but they are also what I feel is one of the most important things in life...Family. Whether it is your chosen family or your blood, I believe that family is at its core is fundamental for a healthy life. Obviously, no family is perfect, but I don't have a whole lot to complain about. At least not today.
To begin this story, I should let you know a little bit about my Grandma M. She is a slight woman who stands about 5 feet tall (if that) and all through my childhood she would dye her hair colours like "Fire-Engine Red" or "Magical Mahogany", which was always a sight to see. She had long nails that I never could understand how she kept that way and to describe her personality would be to compare her to a firecracker. She is small, but you definitely know when she enters a room. Just listen for the high-pitched cackle of a laugh and quite possibly an inappropriate comment. For example: Once, while visiting her with my first boyfriend, she decided to suddenly grab my breasts and ask, "Where the hell did you get these?" I was mortified at the time. Now though, I think it's hilarious and it wouldn't phase me.
Now that you have a small image of Grandma M. I can tell you the story of the "Bikinis, Grandmas and Other Horrors."
When I was about 28 years old, I went through a phase where I was spending a lot of time working on myself physically. I was spending approximately 3 hours per day working out or running. I have never been a small girl and definitely never a slim young woman. I was determined to change this, and I did gradually. It was around this time that my Grandma M. required heart surgery. She had always had heart problems and at that time it had resulted in her having to undergo a couple of surgical procedures that meant she had to be in the hospital for a couple of weeks.
The first time I saw her in the hospital she looked totally changed, she looked old for the first time in my life. In fact, my aunt who had entered the room before me had gone up to someone who she thought was grandma and started to talk to them. Suddenly, she heard a voice calling from behind her that sounded like grandma, who it turns out was in fact, in a bed across the room. Opps! After we apologized to what ended up being a very nice elderly gentleman and stopped giggling, we went over to the correct bed that grandma was lying in. They had given her some very good sedatives, because while we sat beside her talking, she kept sitting up and trying to talk to what she called little green men or leprechauns. It was quite funny to witness, but not surprising as grandma is far from your cliched quiet granny. Of course she would see little green men!
I visited grandma again a couple of days later and noticed that pungent smell that occurs in people who have sat in bed for too long. You know, the kind of scent that makes you back away from a baby with a dirty diaper and say, "Not mine!"? That smell. I asked the nurse when the last time was, that she had been bathed and was told "probably a couple of days ago." Yeah, more like before her surgery, which was 3 days prior. Ewww. They also stated it was non-urgent and therefore she would be bathed "when they could."
**Sidenote - This is in no way me stating that nurses and the healthcare system has neglected my poor granny. I recognize they have a tremendous job to do, and I very much appreciate them. **
Realizing I couldn't just leave my grandma sitting in her own filth for another day, I asked at the nurse’s station if there was anything I could do. They said I was welcome to use one of the bathing rooms along the hallway to bathe her myself. Great, just what every grandchild wants to see, her granny naked! The horror! I racked my brain for another solution. Any other solution. Perhaps my aunt could do it...no, she had her own health issues and would not be able to assist if grandma slipped or started to fall. In my family there are a lot more boys than there are girls, and the options were limited. I couldn't ask anyone else to do what I knew I would have to do. "It's family, right? No big deal...a body is a body." Well, at least I tried to tell myself that. So, I went back into grandmas’ room and told her I would be back later to bathe her.
I ran home to get everything she would need and a bathing suit to wear in the shower with her. All I could find was this teeny tiny Corona bikini that I had recently got on a trip to Mexico, when my not so teeny bikini had been lost while cliff diving. (Different story). I packed up everything and ran back to the hospital, armed with the knowledge that there was no turning back. I could never unsee what I was about to see.
By this time my grandma had gotten herself out of bed and was waiting in a wheelchair for me to take her for a bath. She was back to her upbeat and perky self and was cracking jokes all the way to the bathing room. When we got there, I assisted her in removing her almost petrified hospital gown and placed her wrinkled ass onto the bath chair in the shower. I quickly put my bikini on and prepared myself for the horror show that was about to begin.
In an attempt to cut the awkwardness, my grandma decided to proclaim "What's the big deal?! Now you know what you can look forward to in 50 years! " Ahhhh....... Of course I replied "Oh God, please no! Dear Lord, if this my future, please take me now!" at which point we both started crying and screaming with laughter. That went on for a couple of minutes with grandma comparing her body to a sagging bag of potatoes and me trying to bathe her, while wiping away tears of laughter. It was at this time that we heard a voice coming from outside the door. "Mrs. M, can you and your grand-daughter keep it down, please? You are disrupting the other patients on this floor." Of course, this caused us to laugh even harder and I quickly finished bathing her and then drying her off.
When we finally emerged from the bathing room and into the corridor, there was a nurse standing by ready to invite me to leave. Yes, I had been kicked out of the hospital for laughing too hard and being too loud while bathing my sickly granny. Who'd have thought! I didn't have much choice and left the hospital shaking my head and still giggling over the whole situation.
In the years since I have had the "privilege" of bathing my grandma, each time she introduces me to someone new she always states, "This is my grand-daughter. The one who got kicked out of the hospital for laughing too hard when she bathed me and had to see my old saggy body.”
Yes, grandma, that's me. The "privileged" one! Love you!
Much love.
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