Dear Sullivan friends and family,
Please forgive the bulletin style of this letter, but so many folks have asked about so many things, I want to get them all in one GD letter before my hands fall off from typing individual emails and writing letters. So here we go, The News from the PNW Sullivans:
Mom things: Marianna Sullivan was diagnosed with dementia a few years ago and was in Dad’s care until his death. She has moved from the Sullivan home in Port Townsend to Golden Hill Adult Family Home in north Seattle. The vibe is friendly and warm, and the location is pleasant. They give her meds, feed her home-cooked meals, clothe, bathe and groom her. They also provide lots of soft touches and kindness, which goes an immeasurably long way in soothing her grief and confusion. She is there full-time. She is so sad and misses Phil in a way that I can’t even fathom, and I know that right now this is her biggest challenge. Despite having unique insight into this state of mind, I’m also at a loss for comforting words. I mostly just ask what she’s feeling today and listen closely to her answer.
I am working towards getting her into more activities. We spend three to five afternoons a week doing “stuff.” We window shop, walk, stop at a cafe for hot chocolate or soup, pop in to pick up mail, and go to the gym. Wherever we go, she is WAY more popular with folks than I could ever hope to be. She especially loves to chat up small children, and then she introduces me… perhaps thinking one day I will be fully socialized. Sigh. We sometimes spend time at my place watching old movies, cooking or cleaning (I absolutely love having mom help me with my chores… so sue me!). Soon we will be making day and possibly overnight trips to Port Townsend to do paperwork, see friends, make plans for mom’s vast art collection, and general house-closing activities. In the not too distant future, I’ll probably rent the place out, but that’s back burnered until we get the house in order. One project on the horizon that I’m excited about is her collaboration with my friend Karen Luke Fildes, who is a gifted artist and caretaker. She will be working with mom on doing some new artwork, and maybe even working in a new medium, oils. I am not sure who is more excited about it, Karen or mom, but they are definitely members of a mutual admiration society, and they are already making magic together.
Right now, M and I are spending a lot of time together writing cards and updating her address book. We pick up our mail most days at the Sip and Ship in Greenwood, where she can have a hot chocolate and read your letters. Please send any correspondence to Marianna Sullivan or Lesa Sullivan-Abajian to:
7511 Greenwood Avenue North
PMB # 312
Seattle WA, 98103
There has been some confusion about this, as it’s a private mailing box and not my actual home address. It’s a necessary luxury right now, because there is simply so much mail coming in for me, mom, Dad and my late husband, Chris, that my tiny mailbox can’t handle it. I also felt like it was safest for all the documents I was mailing back and forth. My home address, should you need it, is
8832 A Midvale Ave North
Seattle, Wa 98103
If you’d like to chat with M, my phone number is 206-478-0562, and I can either take a message for her or hand the phone over. The number for Golden Hill Adult Family Home is 206-529-5108 and the director’s name is Gratiana Scrob. If you happen to be in town and M’s not with me (or heck, if you want to send her some flowers… she loves that...) the address there is
16744 Ashworth Ave N
Shoreline WA 98133
We are about five minutes apart by car, straight up the Aurora corridor or I-5, which is MOSTLY great. I have now become mom’s chauffeur, which is some kind of giant karmic turnaround.
She has had a full checkup at her new clinic, Swedish Physicians at Cherry Hill. It’s all the way across town from where I live now, but I’ve been going to that Central District facility since I moved here in 1996, and I love the place. It’s a bit of a mixed bag for the two of us, as it’s also the place where a team of cardiac specialists performed a life-saving operation on Phil, giving us more time to visit and josh with him, and tell him we loved him. It is also the hospital where he passed away several weeks later. Mom and I now have the same primary care physician, waaaaaaaay on the other side of the building, Thank God. His name is also Phil, which rocks. M and I have had a handful of appointments scheduled back to back with him, which causes no small amount of confusion considering our last names are the same and our birth dates are six days (and 33 years) apart. J Doc Capp (Phil) noticed a very high blood sugar count, and for the time being mom is cutting way back on chocolate. This is sad news, but we’re hoping it’s temporary. Besides a little wobbliness from her meds, she is in good physical shape. She has also had two mental evaluations, one by her PCP and another from a Gerontologist. Both were frank with her about not being able to be alone safely, and what that would mean for her future living situation. Mom didn’t enjoy hearing this, as you can imagine. However, last week we went to get her eyes examined and I filled out her form, noting “dementia” in the symptoms section. Mom picked up the form and, after correcting my cursive, wrote in “mild” before the “dementia.” She put down the clipboard, picked it up again, and made another correction, adding “-medium” after the “mild.” So there’s some understanding that’s sinking in. This is also confirmed by the assistants at Golden Hill, who are always careful to give her the facts as straight as they can, because “she knows.” And she doesn’t know. And she does. And that’s how it goes.
For those one or two of you who haven’t been personally affected by someone with dementia, the bad news is that it’s irreversible and sadly, fatal. There are treatments and courses of action to take and ways to ease her daily routine, but there’s no getting out of it alive. Yes it’s a brain disease, and therefore affects mental cognition, but it’s not a “mind” disease. Here’s the hard part that has had metaphysicians and ministers and lawyers and layfolk alike scratching our heads… the brain is the primary organ of the body, and when it goes dark, so goes the body. She will eventually succumb to some kind of major organ failure due to the slow atrophy in the brain. I don’t mean to make this letter more somber than it already is, but that’s the reality of her condition. I mean to enjoy her presence here, in whatever way it manifests, as long as I can. I hope you can join me in being present with her however you are able, whether it is with a visit, a note or a phone call. While she can still recognize your name and/or face (sometimes with a little help), it makes this period of her life a lot more pleasant.
Dad things: Dad’s birthday is May 5, Cinco de Mayo. As some of you know, I am in the early (earlyearlyearly) stages of planning a memorial for Dad in Salt Lake City, Utah on or around his birthday. It lands on a Tuesday this year, and I’m not sure yet if we will do it on the weekend before or have an observance that Tuesday evening. Locations and activities are TBD, but I have already wrangled a few friends to help me make some serious chile verde! Please send me a note if you would like to participate. I’m imagining some music, some reading, and some remembrances. There will surely be some bitchin’ food!
Lesa things: I am now mom’s legal guardian, and as such have a whole lotta business to take care of. My late husband, Aram Christian Abajian, Jr.’s, estate still has business to attend to, and Dad’s as well. I’ve taken some time off of work. I’m glad I can do it, and I have my sights on returning to my career as a personal chef and culinary instructor as soon as I can. I’m working on other creative projects, mostly germinating ideas at this stage. Before Dad’s death, I was able to hit some personal milestones, which included returning to competitive sports. I completed my sixth triathlon, third half-marathon and a few fun runs for good measure. I visited Utah and went X-country skiing in the Wasatch Mountains, climbed Angel’s Landing in Zion, took a four-day river trip down the San Juan, and nearly ate my weight in Nielsen’s Concretes. I learned how to paddleboard, and play a ukulele (sorta). I also took a giant leap of faith and travelled by myself to Greece this summer, where I cooked and ate and wrote and swam and hiked and napped. This January I travelled solo to the Virgin Islands, where I did pretty much the same thing. This time I was with this nice guy… Gosh, it’s kind of a long and romantic story.
Hopefully you will all get to hear more about him soon. J My stepson, Xander, is in his sophomore year at Brandeis, studying math and physics. He will be doing an internship with CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) this summer, smashing atoms and trolling the deep Web. (Or something like that. Anyone else know a teenager who only texts? Intermittently? At 1 am? To discuss J.D. Salinger??). He’s a million feet tall and just as broad; he’s funny and smart and sensitive and I’M JUST SO PROUD OF HIM, DAMMIT.
When I think I’m worn out, I think of X. He’s my hero. I’ve learned these last few years to sink into the comfort of the love other people have to give, and I’m happy to be able to pass that on to him, and to mom, and right back to my loving family and friends.
Well, if you made it this far I thank you ever so. If you just skipped to the end, I forgive you. Love to you all, and my deepest thanks.
Lesa Sullivan-Abajian/[email protected]/lesacooks.com
Seattle, WA March 10, 2015