Wild and Precious Life

by Deborah Ziegler

  20

  Changing Her Mind (A Woman’s Prerogative)

  End of 2006—2008, Ages Twenty-Two to Twenty-Four

  A woman’s mind is cleaner than a man’s: she changes it more often.

  —Oliver Herford, Saturday Review of Literature, Volume 26

  After six months of working in sales, Brittany decided it wasn’t for her and went back to nannying. In early 2007, she became the sitter for twins, a boy and a girl. The boy had mild Asperger’s syndrome. The mother was absolutely devoted to her children. Britt was a natural at working with both kids, and enjoyed thinking about better ways to communicate with the boy, who had social limitations in interacting with peers that led to loneliness. He was very bright yet intense, and Britt was adept at encouraging him to explore ways to calm himself down. Over the next year and a half, Brittany became deeply attached to the family. She truly was their Mary Poppins and to the kids it felt like the wind snatched her away for a while after Britt left. However, the family stayed in touch and remained friends. They attended Britt’s wedding and were in touch with her until her death.

  In the spring, before she left the Bay Area, Brittany dated an older guy named Dan for a few months. Although she’d dated quite a few guys since Ellis left, this was the most attention she’d paid to another man. I met Dan once when I visited. He took Brittany and me to eat at a lovely restaurant.

  “I liked the way he talked about his family,” I told Brittany after dinner. “He spoke of them with great pride and respect. It was refreshing.” Though they only dated a short while before Brittany moved back to Southern California, it was the start of a very important relationship in her life.

  I had planned Britt’s graduation trip to France for the summer of 2006. Now I was determined that we would take the belated graduation trip in the summer of 2008. But a couple of months before our scheduled departure I became very ill. I went to the doctor multiple times and was put on various antibiotics. I felt as wobbly as a ninety-year-old, at the age of fifty-two.

  Finally Gary arranged for me to see an internal medicine doctor, who discovered that I had polymyalgia rheumatica, an inflammatory disorder that causes muscle pain and stiffness. She put me on a low dose of oral prednisone, and within two days, I felt better. The trip to France was on.

  Britt and Dan broke up before she moved out of her apartment in Berkeley and in with us. We were going to take Britt’s friend Helene with us on our trip. We would cover her room and board, and she paid for her airfare. Gary and I flew with the girls to London for a couple of days, and then we all took the Chunnel to Paris, where we rented a car for our French adventures.

  Gary and I headed for Utah Beach, where my father landed in 1944. Utah Beach was eerie. I remembered my father talking about the smell. He said that there were so many bodies still unburied, that you could smell death for miles. I imagined my father, young, green, from the dusty fields of Oklahoma, landing in the stench of the dead bodies. I imagined his thumping heart when six days after landing, he was ordered to command a jeep and go into the French countryside on reconnaissance. Britt and Helene were more interested in attending a lunch that the mayor of Villaines-la-Juhel had invited us to. We were being honored because this was the town where Dad had been captured by the Germans and his jeep driver killed. My father had jumped up to pull the driver, Corporal Baker, out of the jeep, and got hit four times in the leg and groin. Dad rolled back into the ditch just as the Nazis tossed a grenade.

  We stopped in Saint-Lô and bought flowers to put on the memorial of Corporal Baker. Brittany had comforted my father one Thanksgiving when he’d broken down and cried in telling this story. Now we were here on the very road where the attack occurred. The local press met us at the memorial in honor of Colonel Baker. The next day we drove to Dieulefit, a peaceful village on the banks of a river surrounded by lush hills. The small homes were painted in pastel pink, blue, and green. Each day we set off to explore something different: vineyards and wine caves, medieval towns, a twelfth-century castle, and the Pont du Gard, an ancient Roman bridge.

  Next we headed to the Loire River Valley. For the next few days, we explored the surrounding countryside. “Brittany doesn’t seem to be able to see the beauty,” Helene said in a wistful voice one afternoon. “She’s so miserable about Dan.”

  “Isn’t it strange how women can long for a relationship that we ended?” I said. That night I watched Brittany and Helene, their sweet young profiles against the yellowing hazy twilight as a summer evening fell on the river. I wondered why my daughter seemed so unable to settle down, so inherently unhappy, involved in a search for love when what I felt she needed was to love herself. She had everything a girl could ask for: beauty, brains, and a strong work ethic. Brittany could pursue any subject in school and do well. She could choose any career and succeed. By now, she had to know that meeting guys wasn’t going to be an issue. Yet she seemed unable to be in this moment, here in France where the rest of us were utterly hypnotized by the country’s beauty. She seemed incapable of seeing how gifted she was, how blessed she was. Perhaps that was the problem: all the choices one had to make when met by success no matter which way one turned. Was life actually more stressful when there was no natural paring down? When all of life lay open and available to you?

  Our last stop was Paris. We toured several landmarks and had some amazing meals. Brittany and Helene went out on the town one evening. My daughter seemed to forget her latest breakup and just enjoy the “City of Light.”

  Gary and I left the girls and flew back home. They were heading off for Bruges, Amsterdam, Luxembourg, Bern, Milan, and finally several days at Cinque Terre National Park. Cinque Terre was Brittany’s favorite part of the trip. She loved the beach, the cliffs, and the lack of hustle and bustle. The turquoise water and the locals hand weaving fishing nets intrigued her. She loved the feeling of being transported back in time. After the frenetic pace, this was a much-needed slowdown.

  By the time the girls flew to London, Britt was ready for change. She had a salon cut her hair shoulder-length and dye it a glossy reddish-brown. For Britt, there was something cathartic about the post-breakup dramatic crop and color change.

  When Brittany returned to California, we took her house hunting in downtown San Diego and found her an apartment in an old house with character. She and I had so much fun combing the thrift stores for furnishings. Within weeks, Brittany adopted a small beagle named Bella from the local shelter. The dog never outgrew her neediness. She would climb fences, dig, or howl when left alone, but she was Britt’s baby.

  Brittany started an audiology program when she returned from Europe. Her decision to go into this field had surprised me. I’d asked her if she was prepared to spend the better part of each day looking in people’s ears. She wanted to get her AuD at a joint program offered through San Diego State University and UCSD. Brittany talked about working in pediatric audiology. She liked the idea of a less stressful schedule, compared to other medical practices. She felt it was a career that she could handle along with being a mother, which she definitely wanted to be one day. There were ten openings for the program, and Brittany was accepted and granted a partial-tuition scholarship,

  Though Gary and I couldn’t imagine Brittany in the role of an audiologist, we knew that hearing loss was going to be a huge problem for a generation of young people who were listening to personal audio devices at unsafe volumes. It seemed like a very practical, if somewhat boring, choice. We agreed to financially support her while she acquired her doctor of audiology.

  Toward the end of her first semester in the AuD program, Brittany called me, very upset. “I hate the program. I don’t want to be an audiologist. I’ll finish the semester, but I can’t do this for the rest of my life.” She knew we’d paid her rent, car insurance, health insurance, and expenses, and she’d just signed a one-year lease.

  “If this isn’t for you, then withdraw now. What do you plan on doing? Have you thought it through?”

  “
I’d like to tutor part-time and study for the LSAT.”

  “I always thought you’d make a great attorney. You can argue with a wooden stump. You’re on a roll: new hair, new house, new pet, and new career goals,” I said.

  “You’re taking this a lot better than I thought. I guess I might as well tell you: I also have a new boyfriend. I’d like you to meet him. His name is Mark.”

  “Well, bring Mark over for dinner Saturday night. What does he do?”

  “He works in high tech—a senior position—and he wants to take me to Paris for Christmas and New Year’s!” She sounded excited. “Imagine ringing in 2009 in Paris.”

  “Wow. Isn’t he kind of moving fast? How do you feel about going to Paris with someone you’ve only just started dating?”

  “Well, we have a couple of months to figure it out.”

  When I hung up, I thought of the money Gary and I had wasted on Britt pursuing a degree that she ultimately didn’t want. However, I also thought about the wisdom of Brittany cutting her losses before she was in too deep. My daughter was changing gears yet again, but she sounded focused and happy.

  I’ve always believed that when students graduate, they embark on a journey to eventually find the field of work they want to be in. It isn’t always a first—fit situation. People unwittingly put a great deal of pressure on new grads by assuming that their first job will be their career.

  When Britt graduated from Berkeley, I said that if people asked her what she wanted to be, she should answer simply, “I want to be happy.”

  21

  Making a Nest to Die In

  June—July 2014, Sixth and Seventh Months After Craniotomy

  Love should not cause suffocation and death if it is truly love. Don’t bundle someone into an uncomfortable cage just because you want to ensure their safety in your life. The bird knows where it belongs, and will never fly to a wrong nest.

  —Michael Bassey Johnson

  The first thing Brittany did when she returned from Alaska was cancel her second craniotomy, stating that she was exhausted, and might reconsider the surgery in a month or so.

  The doctors at UCSF seemed displeased. They began talking about treatment. “I’m not doing chemo, and I’m not doing radiation,” I heard her say on the phone. “No, I’m not having another surgery right now. The last craniotomy just aggravated the tumor and made it grow faster along the cut line.” There was silence while whoever she was speaking to argued their case. “I know what I’m doing,” she said. “I’m moving to Portland to die.”

  June in Oregon was beautiful. It got warmer as the month went on, with daily temps in the seventies, and the sun set at around 9 p.m. June was also when Portlanders affirmed their “Keep Portland Weird” slogan by having the Naked Bike Ride. We didn’t plan to join in, although we liked the “keep it weird” mentality. If Portland’s traditional progressive stance in protecting our civil liberties was part of being weird, we were in.

  We started the month in a moving-in frenzy. Creating a warm, cozy environment had been important to me as a single mother, and Brittany shared that characteristic. Though her energy wasn’t what it used to be, she threw herself into making a new home. Dan and Gary were in charge of hanging the pictures, which took extra time because they had to be hung from the quaint picture rails. But Brittany was impatient and rude. More and more she harshly criticized the three of us, although Dan and I bore the brunt of it.

  Even though I told myself over and over again that my daughter had a tumor and that she didn’t mean to sound so harsh, it began to wear on me. Unfortunately, at no time did any doctor or social worker say, “We need to discuss how her brain tumor and the medication she is taking might affect daily life.” Although it is well known that steroids can cause “ ’roid rage,” this was something I associated with bodybuilders, and unfortunately I didn’t carry that knowledge into my relationship with my dying child. Dilaudid, Britt’s painkiller, was a medicine that caused agitation, constipation, changes in behavior, and trouble sleeping. The problem was layered. The tumor, stress about a terminal diagnosis, and medication all came together in a crescendo of moodiness and eruptions of anger.

  Dilaudid is opiate-based and leads to drug tolerance, which means the patient needs more of the medicine to achieve pain relief. Were the times that Brittany’s anger was most out of control those hours when she didn’t take the Dilaudid on a structured timetable? It’s counterintuitive. Once a patient is dependent on the drug, not taking the drug causes extreme irritability, anxiety, and muscle pain. Sometimes Britt’s speech was slurred from the medication. Other times her speech was sharp, clear, and harsh. It seemed there was no place in the cycle of medication that was calm and safe.

  I knew that my physical and emotional health had been impacted by the high level of stress, and that my coping skills were being stretched to their limit. I’d talked to Dan briefly about this, explaining that he, Gary, and I might have to spell each other. What confused me and Gary was that Brittany seemed to be able to control her temper around friends. This made her callous remarks to us more hurtful.

  Dan, Gary, and I were still in shock about Brittany’s diagnosis. We drifted in and out of that shocklike state. Financial strain didn’t help the situation as Gary tried to keep his business moving forward and Dan worked hard at his job. However, what we didn’t factor in was that Brittany viewed leaving her as abandonment. Brittany expected us all to be there, 24/7.

  I dove into my cleaning mania. Again, there was a feeling of making things well. If I cleaned this old house, Brittany would be pleased with me. If I could clean it perfectly, there would be world peace . . . or at least peace in our home.

  In early June, Britt filmed a piece for the UK. The British media sent a man to interview Brittany and Dan about her decision to move to Portland. The piece included interviews with British doctors and politicians who were against Britons having the right to doctor assistance in ending life for someone with terminal disease.

  They filmed Brittany, Dan, and me in our spit-spot-clean little yellow house. Flowers from my sister Sarah were used in the background. Brittany looked beautiful and composed.

  She was outspoken, and her words flowed articulately. She seemed to be crystal clear about everything. I, on the other hand, felt conflicted, slow, and overwhelmed. Nothing was built into the process for the caregivers. There was nothing to help us cope with the angry, impulsive, and frightened woman we loved as she faced death. I hoped that Brittany’s young, smart friends could fill in all the holes where I was so clearly failing.

  On June 13, Brittany gave me a huge compliment on Facebook.

  I have never met anyone in my life who works as hard as my mother, Deborah Ziegler. Sometimes I can hold a candle to it, but no one else really even compares.

  I read this in my bedroom at ten o’clock when I turned in after mopping the downstairs floors. As I sat in bed, just down the hall from Britt’s closed bedroom door, fat hot tears rolled down my face. I wrote back, “Hard work feels good. Sometimes. For you, I would move mountains.”

  On June 16, I was awakened by an early morning phone call. It took a while to orient myself and realize that I was talking to a friend calling from Los Angeles. “Deb, it’s Rachel. I’m sorry to call at this hour but it’s about Tyler. Sherri’s coming, but she’ll never get there in time. I know she won’t call you . . .”

  Befuddled, I tried to understand. “Sherri’s coming to Portland?” I sat up in bed. Sherri was my best friend. Why wouldn’t she call me?

  “Tyler is dying. He’s at Providence St. Vincent. An ambulance brought him in. He’s not going to make it. His heart is failing, and also his kidneys.” I knew that Sherri’s son had been battling a drug addiction that had weakened his heart. “Sherri doesn’t want to burden you with anything else . . . but Deb, it’s our Tyler boy.”

  “I know that hospital. It’s only a few minutes away from our house. I’m leaving now.” I hung up, woke Gary, and told him to quietly get ready.
“I don’t think we should wake Brittany,” I whispered.

  As we crossed the landing at the top of the stairs, Britt stepped out of her room and asked what was happening. I told her, and she insisted on coming with us.

  Gary started the car and Britt climbed into the backseat. “Did he have a heart problem?” Gary asked.

  “He had a murmur, even as a child. But the drugs probably caused cardiovascular inflammation. It damages their blood vessels.” I sighed and blinked back tears.

  “I knew this phone call would come one day. I just didn’t think it would be before I died,” Britt said quietly.

  “Poor Sherri. This is going to break her heart.” I wiped my eyes.

  Only Britt and I went into the hospital room. Tyler was tangled in a mass of IVs and tubes. The worst part was that he had a large piece of plastic in his mouth, part of endotracheal intubation, and couldn’t talk to us. His eyes didn’t follow movement, but he seemed to recognize who I was.

  “Tyler, honey, it’s Debbie. Brittany is here, too.” I leaned over and spoke into his ear. “You are loved, Tyler. I know it has been hard. We are here, and you are loved. Your momma is on her way. She loves you so much.” I backed away and let Brittany have some time with Tyler.

  He still looked much like the big, handsome, good-natured boy I’d tutored in high school. As Britt whispered in Tyler’s ear that she loved him like a brother, I watched his eyes staring ahead, unmoving. The hospital chaplain arrived and offered to have a harpist play soft music.

  I got on the phone with both my dear friend Sherri and her ex-husband. I told them that we were doing the best we could, and that we were relaying their love. The harpist played as we stood near Tyler, telling him repeatedly that he was loved. Eventually the nurse told us he was gone.