THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 2, 1995 TAG: 9511020046
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARIE JOYCE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 134 lines
TOWARD THE END, it came down to a fight over morphine.
A tearful confrontation in the den. A mother who was going to pick up the prescription for suppositories of the drug, determined to stop her daughter's pain, even though the powerful dose might hurry along the end they knew was coming. A father who couldn't bear to let his daughter go.
Finally, they went to the drugstore for the medicine. Together.
It was like that the whole time Arline and Harold Jarashow cared for their daughter Yvette, who died of AIDS six months ago at age 34. A collaborative effort of two parents who became nurses, doctors, counselors, dietitians and spiritual guides to their daughter.
Now they're hoping to share what they learned with other parents. The things they would like to teach are philosophical and practical: that you must embrace children with AIDS, and that mint chocolate chip ice cream may entice them when they won't eat anything else.
Yvette was a pistol, hard-headed and soft-hearted, the kind of person who wanted what she wanted - now. The kind of person who would do anything for someone who needed her.
When she learned she was sick, in 1991, she was living in Florida, working as a teacher at a Hebrew school and doing occasional gigs as a stand-up comedian.
She quit her job immediately. She stayed in Florida a year longer. Arline knew Yvette would never just give up and come home. So Arline, who was having back surgery, asked Yvette to help her. Yvette was there in a week.
Yvette moved into a little one-bedroom house attached to her parents' home in the fall of 1992. It had been built years ago for Arline's parents, so Arline could take care of them before they died. They never expected to use it for one of their children.
Yvette was weak, but she could still drive herself around a bit. She missed her students and saturated herself with her four young nieces and nephews.
There were bad days, when Yvette's temper flared and she would drive her parents crazy. Arline would say. ``Hey, it's not my fault you're sick. . . don't do this to me.''
Yvette drank carrot juice and herbal teas and took lots of vitamins. Eventually, she rejected most medication. Her parents didn't like it, but it was Yvette's decision.
But the disease took its toll, and last spring, after a long stay in the hospital, she came home one last time.
Arline remembers the first very bad day. She came home from work - Harold is retired - and sailed into Yvette's bedroom smiling. She had picked up a bunch of hospital gowns in bright colors, taking the money out of the food budget, because they were the only thing Yvette felt comfortable in anymore.
She was showing the gowns to Yvette, here's the yellow one, here's the seersucker one, here are the ones trimmed in lace.
Yvette gazed at her and whispered, ``Tell me your name again.'' She had started her episodes of AIDS dementia, was taking medication to control the psychosis.
At first, Arline thought she was joking. It was just the kind of thing they might say to each other. You know, ``I love you, I love you, you look so gorgeous - What did you say your name was?''
``Yvette, knock it off,'' Arline said, ``Tell me my name.''
Another whisper: ``I can't remember.''
``It's Mommy, right? It's Mommy.''
Yvette said, ``If you say so.''
The family got used to these episodes after a while. They always passed.
They had trouble with the first home nursing service they used - some of the aides didn't want to touch an AIDS patient. When they fired them, Arline and Harold went 72 hours with no help at all, sleeping in shifts, feeding her, helping her go to the bathroom, dressing, bathing, taking care of equipment.
Then they got help from Personal Touch Home Care, a home nursing service. But it was still an endless round of work. Arline couldn't take time off from her job - Yvette's illness was draining their finances. Arline walked with her head drooped, she was so tired. And she worried about Harold. He was 78, she was 59. When a noise came over the baby monitor from Yvette's room, Arline would try to jump up first.
They gentled her into accepting things she had to accept. She wanted to use a potty chair, not diapers. But she still weighed more than 100 pounds, and Arline has terrible arthritis and back problems. Yvette agreed to wear diapers.
They found support when they needed it most - from their synagogue, from Personal Touch, from Full Circle AIDS Hospice Support.
From a friend who used to be a military corpsman, Arline learned the trick of putting a ``draw sheet'' under Yvette to move her about when changing diapers. They cajoled her to eat as her appetite faded. Once, when she got a craving for Chinese food, Arline got some chicken and cashew nuts and ground the whole thing up into the blender. Most of it went into the garbage, but what the hell.
They banished anything from their kitchen that might harbor bacteria - wooden utensils, leftover raw vegetables. They stocked up on mint chocolate chip ice cream, almost the only thing Yvette would eat.
Yvette lost most of her motor control. The fed her with a demitasse spoon. It got harder and harder for her to swallow her pills. The doctor said she could stop taking most of them, and he sent the family a prescription for the morphine suppositories.
He warned Arline: She might die quickly as the morphine suppressed her nervous system.
Yvette's family members each talked with her privately, to make sure they had said everything that needed to be said. But she lived for weeks after. She got to visit with her closest friends from college, who flew in from various cities. She made it out of the bed, briefly, for a family Passover celebration.
One night in April, Arline noticed that Yvette was congested. By now, Arline was an old hand at using the suction machine to clear fluids out of her daughter's mouth. But it didn't seem to be working, and, through a hand laid gently on her daughter's chest, she could feel a rumbling. The congestion was in her chest. Arline knew it was over.
She gathered Yvette into her arms. Her daughter looked up. Arline said, ``Yvette, give yourself a break. We didn't win.'' Yvette put her head on her mother's shoulder and died.
The six months since then have been hard. Arline was laid off from her job. And this summer, Harold had a stroke, although he's doing very well. Their children moved them out of their house and into a condo in Virginia Beach.
But even though they still haven't unpacked everything in their new place, the Jarashows are already volunteering for Full Circle and Personal Touch's hospice. Some friends have expressed surprise at that, so soon after Yvette's death.
But the Jarashows want other parents to know the secrets of demitasse spoons, blenders and draw sheets to save your back.
And, through a local support group, they've met many young people with AIDS whose parents have rejected them. The Jarashows want to tell those parents what a terrible mistake they're making.
``If I had a wish,it would be that I could show people the way to reach down inside themselves and pull out what they felt the first day they held the child in their arms. That's the kind of love they need when they're dying,'' she said. ``You've got a long time to be angry, cause they're going to be a long time dead.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
L. TODD SPENCER/The Virginian-Pilot
Harold and Arline Jarashow cared for their daughter Yvette, 34, who
died six months ago.
by CNB