Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
His Dying Mother & One Last Chance | Mark Steven Porro Interview
30 Plays18 days ago
For nearly three decades, Mark Steven Porro built a life in Hollywood. Then one phone call sent him home to say goodbye to his mother during what everyone believed were her final days. What was supposed to be a last visit turned into years of moving back into his childhood home at 55 and learning, hands on, how to care for the woman who once cared for him.
In this conversation, Mark takes us all the way back to a big, strict Jersey family of six kids, a night shift mom who championed the arts, and a frugal father he only truly got to know as an adult. From there we follow the road to Hollywood, the 2011 hospice call that changed everything overnight, and the small, funny, human moments that became the heart of his memoir, A Cup of Tea on the Commode.
This one is about family, dignity, and why Mark believes more men should stop running from caregiving and start seeing it as an honor. It gets emotional, and it lands somewhere unexpected: the person you set out to rescue ends up rescuing you.
If this conversation moves you, do yourself a favor and pick up Mark's book, A Cup of Tea on the Commode. It will make you look at your own family a little differently. Go support Mark's work at https://acupofteaonthecommode.org.
#Caregiving #ElderCare #AgingParents #Caregiver #FamilyCaregiving #HospiceCare #MenAndCaregiving #CaregiverSupport #ACupOfTeaOnTheCommode #MarkStevenPorro #UnsolicitedPerspectives #Memoir #sandwichgeneration #endoflifecare
Chapters:
00:00:00 A Hollywood career changed forever by one phone call about mom 🎬📞
00:02:10 Why elder caregiving is quietly becoming a global family crisis 🌍👵⏳
00:06:42 How his mother's love sparked a lasting Hollywood acting dream 🎭✨🎥
00:08:43 A night shift mom, a frugal dad, and becoming real adult friends 🌙👞🤝
00:13:28 Asthma, bedwetting, and the fifth kid fighting to be noticed ⚾😔👦
00:16:22 The one childhood mistake that broke his mother's whole heart 🚲💔😢
00:19:17 One hard conversation that finally healed years of family pain 🗣💬❤
00:23:58 The 2011 hospice phone call that changed his life overnight 📞🏥⏳
00:28:12 The rebel hospice nurse who broke rules to feed his dying mother 🔔🍽💪
00:29:31 A slice of pumpkin pie in March brings his mom roaring back 🥧✨😊
00:33:32 Choosing at 55 years old to move back into his childhood home 🏡🔑❤
00:35:13 The tea on the commode ritual that became his own book title 🍵📖😌
00:39:38 The hard days, the humor, and gutting the whole family house 🔨😂🏠
00:46:32 Why he thinks more men should embrace the honor of caregiving 🚹🤲💯
00:51:27 Restoring her dignity and the quiet mirror moment that undid him 💄🪞✨
00:59:33 Still mom: the deep empathy caregiving carved into him for life 🫶👵🌍
01:02:05 His real, honest advice for the men too scared to even begin 💬🙏💪
01:04:32 The quiet twist where his mother actually ends up rescuing him 🔄❤🥹
01:11:36 The uncomfortable truth about what actually remains in the end 🕊❤🙏
This isn't just content. It's a conversation. Subscribe, hit the bell, and drop a comment. What you think matters here.
Want the unfiltered version? The takes we don't soften, the extra conversations, the behind-the-scenes?
🔓 YouTube Membership: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCL4HuzYPchKvoajwR9MLxSQ/join
💸 Patreon: patreon.com/unsolicitedperspectives
Full episodes, clips, merch, and everything Unsolicited Perspectives in one place:
🌐 www.unsolicitedperspectives.com
See you in the next one. #UnsolicitedPerspectives #BlackCulture #BlackPodcast #SocialCommentary #CurrentEvents #PopCulture #Podcast
Beat Provided By https://freebeats.io | Produced By White Hot
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to 'Unsolicited Perspectives'
00:00:00
Speaker
What happens when the person that raises you needs you the most? We gonna get into it. Let's get it.
00:00:18
Speaker
Welcome. First of all, welcome. This is Unsolicited Perspectives. i am your host, Bruce Anthony, here to lead the conversation and important events and topics that are shaping today's society. stay Join the conversation and follow us wherever you get your audio podcasts. Subscribe to our YouTube channel for our video podcasts, YouTube exclusive content, and our YouTube membership.
00:00:37
Speaker
Rate, review, like, comment, share. Share with your friends, share with your family, hell, even share
Exploring Family and Caregiving with Mark Steven Porro
00:00:44
Speaker
with your enemies. On today's episode, we'll be talking about family, caregiving, and how one unexpected chapter completely changed a man's life with Mark Steven Porro.
00:00:55
Speaker
But that's enough of the intro. Let's get to the show. How are you doing today?
00:01:04
Speaker
good you One of the things we try to do on this show is look beyond the headlines and the hot takes to have conversations about experiences that shape who we become. Sometimes those experiences happen on stage, in a boardroom, or in front of the camera.
00:01:20
Speaker
Other times they happen quietly inside a family home where nobody's watching except for the people who matter the most. Today's guest knows exactly what that's like. Mark Stephen Pearl spent nearly three decades building a career in Hollywood before life unexpectedly took him in a completely different direction.
00:01:38
Speaker
What began as a trip home to be with his family during what everyone believed were his mother's final moments became years of caring for the woman who had once cared for him.
How Did Caregiving Lead to a Memoir?
00:01:50
Speaker
That experience became the foundation for his memoir, A Cup of Tea on the Commode. It's a story about family, responsibility, humor, loss, and the unexpected growth that can come from showing up for the people we love when they need us the most.
00:02:08
Speaker
Today, we're going to talk about that journey, what it taught him about himself, why he believes more men should embrace caregiving, and how one season of life changed the way he sees family forever.
Family Dynamics and Upbringing in New Jersey
00:02:21
Speaker
So without further ado, Mark Stephen Pearl. So as I said at the top, I'm here with Mark Stephen Pearl, author of A Cup of Tea on the Commode. Mark, it is my pleasure to have you on the show. This is a very, very interesting story.
00:02:38
Speaker
Yeah. And something that I've seen my parents deal with. And unfortunately, I'm probably coming up on this on that age where I'm going to have to deal with it personally. And I know a lot of people in the audience are either dealing with it now, have dealt with it or will deal with it in the future. So I really wanted to hear your story because I feel like it's an interest story, interesting story that's going to resonate with a lot of people. So thank you for coming on the show.
00:03:05
Speaker
My pleasure.
Career Journey and Hollywood Aspirations
00:03:06
Speaker
So, yeah, I think it's something, know, we're all living longer. And this is going if it's not already, it's going to become a crisis. I think they say by 2050, there's going to like 426 million people around the world, 80 older.
00:03:21
Speaker
And so, yeah like you said, we're goingnna to have to deal with this sooner or later or not deal with it, but ah it will affect your family and stuff. So yeah, I was, you know, i I ended up, I was very fortunate to do what I did and have that opportunity. And yeah, so that's what my my story is about. So we'll get into that.
00:03:40
Speaker
We're going to get into the book, but I like to introduce the audience to all of the guests by starting from the beginning. So let's go all the way back. Tell me about your life growing up because you're a Jersey boy, right? You got three sisters. Tell me about what that house was like growing up growing up in New Jersey. And let's go with that. And then your connection with your mother at a young age.
00:04:06
Speaker
Okay. So I grew up, yeah, i had ah three sisters, two older, and actually two older brothers also. There were six of us. Okay. And I'm the fifth, the tallest. And yeah, I have still some payback to my two older brothers.
00:04:20
Speaker
and I grew up bigger than them. So it's coming because, boy, they they they did a number on me for many years. and And my sisters also, they tried to tickle me to death. Yeah. Several occasions, and my brothers did other things to to try to kill me.
00:04:34
Speaker
And then I think when my younger sister came, she was four years later, and then I took it upon myself, I think, to exact some revenge on her, unfortunately. But now we're like best friends, so it worked out well. but Yeah, so I grew up in a pretty strict Catholic family in northern New Jersey, about 20 miles outside of New York City, a little village, what they call the village. It's ah the village of Ridgewood, and it was a great place to grow up, a nice upper-class community. suburb of the city, so 20 minutes away, depending on traffic, could be 20 hours. You had New York City and all that culture, and then you had a a beautiful, quiet suburb to grow up in with a really good educational system and stuff. And so my father was a chemist, and my mother was a proofreader for the largest newspaper in New Jersey, and she worked the night shift.
00:05:25
Speaker
And so the six of us, I think because of that, the six of us grew up very independent because we were kind of left on our own a lot. We weren't quite latch-clean kids, but we grew up very independent. At one point, we all had our own businesses. And I wasn't sure if but you know if we were that ambitious or people were afraid to hire us. And I think coming from Jersey, it's a little bit of both. little bit of both.
00:05:47
Speaker
So yeah, we knew best and we and and and in fact, all the the siblings. I mentioned that if you put one or more of us in a room or two or more of us in the room, the frictions get to ensue because we'll argue about how the best to approach a problem. and so's But mostly in good fun. And yeah, so I grew up in New Jersey and then I went to school at The Ohio State University and got a degree in industrial design.
00:06:15
Speaker
And I worked for a couple of very good design firms. And then I got the acting bug. And part of that was in my in my youth, my mother was a, we call her the champion of the arts. She got us all into the ballet. And so I grew up in the ballet. My three sisters did it um almost all their lives. I did it for a couple of years. And my older brother was like a big star. in his childhood and stuff like that. And so we danced. My my first performance was actually in Lincoln Center, New York with the Royal dinna that Danish Ballet when I was about seven years old. Wow. And that was my first pro gig. So got a great costume, got paid for each performance, and that's how I got started. So I said, hey, this is pretty cool.
00:06:59
Speaker
And I like to hang around with all the girls. My brother and I were the only guys in the entire studio. So that was a lot of fun. But I had a ah I guess a pretty strong will and stubborn, and I butted heads with the the Irene Fokin, which was our Russian ballet teacher.
00:07:15
Speaker
So she was a tough cookie, and I was a tough student, and so I retired at around 11.
00:07:23
Speaker
But later on in life, I guess this performance thing came back, and so I moved out to Hollywood in 1984 to pursue acting, and because I did some modeling and some commercials in Ohio,
00:07:35
Speaker
While I was designing I had an agent contact in LA and ah so that lady ended up being my first agent and Her advice was start studying you want to be a good actor. So as soon as I moved out there, I started acting classes and studied straight through almost for 20 years.
00:07:53
Speaker
And my goal was to get on a quality show like Hill Street Blues. yeah okay And so I studied hard and and with less than two years, I got on Hill Street Blues. There you go. And so that was my my Hollywood start.
00:08:07
Speaker
I want to get a little bit more into the Hollywood, but I want to rewind a little bit. With your mom working nights, Does that mean that she wasn't there? Because you were Lasky kids. Does that mean that she wasn't there in the morning to like get you guys up, get you ready for school, cook breakfast, things of that nature? Because what you're describing, I guess, for for that time, which would be the 70s when you were- 60s. 60s and seventy s Yeah.
00:08:33
Speaker
Working moms was wasn't the norm. Maybe in New Jersey it might have been, but nationwide it wasn't the norm. When I think of the 60s, and I wasn't alive during that time, I think of Leave it to Beaver, and his mom was at home. So what was that relationship like with your mom being a working mom as opposed to a that 60s television stay-at-home mom?
00:09:00
Speaker
Well, she had a career before she got married, so she was she went to, I guess, proofreading school for that. So she worked for Doubleday on Long Island before she met my dad.
00:09:11
Speaker
and And also she was a shopaholic, so she had to she had to feed that addiction. And so that I think that was part of it. so Seven years into her marriage, she had six five kids.
00:09:23
Speaker
And and i know from talking with my dad early on that that was ah you know, he was a chemist and he had an okay salary, but raising five and then soon six kids on a chemist's salary was very concerning.
00:09:37
Speaker
And he was a bit frugal with money. He provided, or both of my parents, they provided very well for us, but, you know, he had shoes older than me.
Building Adult Relationships with Parents
00:09:46
Speaker
and And he had like two cars in my lifetime, and they were Volkswagen Beetles.
00:09:51
Speaker
So he he certainly didn't enjoy any comforts for himself. and And I think that's kind of sad. It's admirable, but I think kind of sad. So that might have had something to do with me.
00:10:03
Speaker
wanting to treat both of my parents a little better in my adult life because I got to know them more as people and as friends, actually, because one of the benefits I had is I moved out shortly after I turned 18 for school and never really moved back home. And so when my parents would come see me, I had them one-on-one,
00:10:23
Speaker
or if they both came out, I had them to myself. And so we got into some conversations that might've been unique for the other siblings. And I was a curious kid and and I know we talked about earlier and a bit sensitive, but more curiosity about family history and certainly their relationships. So I got them both to open up about things that I don't think the other kids ah dealt with.
00:10:46
Speaker
And you know they came from that generation, the depression era, and they didn't talk about feelings. They didn't talk about pain. They didn't really talk about struggling too much. I mean, once in a while, there if there were some arguments in the house, we heard we heard some things. But other than that, they kept everything pretty much to themselves. And so I got them to, it took some time, especially for my dad, a long time to get him to open up and feel comfortable. But I think those trips, especially when I moved out to l L.A. and and started getting really into my acting career, I really got into digging into character and And and all that stuff. And I got him. It was very surprising.
00:11:25
Speaker
He opened up and revealed a lot of things to me. And and at first, some of it was a little shocking. But then it was like, boy, I really appreciate this because, yeah, I'm I was learning a lot more about this man. So it certainly made him more three dimensional to me. And yeah so that was very cool.
00:11:42
Speaker
It's always fascinating as we get older and we we can establish what is a new relationship with our parents, right? Because we become adults. They're still going to always be our parents.
00:11:54
Speaker
We're still going to be their kid. But there's a shift because we're adults now. So we have adult conversations, conversations that they wouldn't necessarily have with us as a kid. yeah Before we get into...
00:12:08
Speaker
the phone call that you got in 2011. I want to talk about your relationship with your mother as a kid and then, as you say, getting to know your parents as adults before the phone call. So to to describe to me what that relationship was like when you were a kid, and then as you got this alone time as an adult when you were studying, when you were acting in l LA, and how that dynamic changed.
00:12:39
Speaker
Yeah, I think as a kid, being being the fifth kid and and certainly the third son, I think I was probably fighting for attention more than the others.
00:12:50
Speaker
And i you know, I had asthma as a kid and apparently almost died maybe more than once. So I was the, I guess, the invalid of the family. I had had the asthma. I was a bedwetter and a thumbsucker. I don't know if the other kids went through that stuff. And my dad was a baseball coach and he was really into baseball. And and my brothers were were good ballplayers and I ended up being a good ball player, but as a kid, I hated practice.
00:13:17
Speaker
He would always take us out. Even, you know, he dealt with his own team, and there was no nepotism with my dad. If you weren't good, you wouldn't make his team. didn't even get to try out for his team once.
00:13:28
Speaker
There was one time where I became an all-star, and this is in Little League, and so I was eligible to try out for his team. He was in the majors, and it was like another coach said, I really like your son's playing. My dad said, yeah, go ahead, take him.
00:13:42
Speaker
It's like, wait a minute. And so that, that was, so we had that kind of relationship, I think. So my dad and I had some issues, I think early on, because with my mom working at night, he had to deal with the bedwetting issues. So I'm sure that wasn't very pleasant for him. a lot of the stuff i I don't really remember other than, i do remember the bedwetting, but not so much the aftermath, were dealing with my dad and stuff. And mom was was great. You know, she had unbelievable stamina. So she would work all night.
00:14:13
Speaker
She would come in the morning, come home in the morning and get us ready. she I remember her getting us breakfast. There were cinnamon rolls, those pilberries, cinnamon rolls. I still smell those. And and at that time, we were all in a parochial school. So we had to get the school bus at the end of our street. And so ah she was great. And then If there was a shopping day, again, she would work all night.
00:14:37
Speaker
She would come home, get us up, and take us out for like an eight-hour marathon shopping. I have no idea. I couldn't keep up with this. My back hurt so much. and It was like, are you kidding me? So if anybody went with her, i remember my Aunt Flo went once and only once because she could go.
00:14:55
Speaker
And she got great deals. She was pretty good with money. she got She searched for good bargains. and And a lot of times, like she would buy winter coats in the summer because she got a great deal on that. But by the time Christmas came, we outgrew them. you know So those kind of things happened. So there was a...
00:15:12
Speaker
Not so much a win-win with some of those bargains, but but ah I think she was great. I know we had an issue one time where I i hung out with some bad kids when I was young. And i remember there was a a time I stole a bike.
00:15:27
Speaker
Okay. didn't it Really bad kids. Okay. like Bad kids. Now wait a minute. I mean, they're stealing bikes. How old were you when you stole this bike? there was I think 12, 11 or 12, probably 12. Yeah, you know what? Out of Catholic school, I got out of Catholic school after third grade, and I went the opposite way.
00:15:45
Speaker
And part of that was rebellion. you know None of those teachings stuck, huh? Well, they they you know what? They did. After. After. Okay. Yeah. There was a time I didn't appreciate him. I i learned to appreciate him much much later. But during this, it's so I stole a bike. And I was influenced by some of the bad kids I was hanging out with.
00:16:07
Speaker
And i came home and i I saw a police car outside my house. And so I waited until the cops left. And I opened the kitchen door and my mom's sitting in there the kitchen. And she asked me, she said, did you steal a bicycle today?
00:16:22
Speaker
And I looked her straight in the eye. I said, no, I didn't. And she believed me. And I left the room and was wracked with guilt. I never lied to my mother before.
00:16:34
Speaker
And I i just i I couldn't stand it. So I i went down ah and and I confessed. And she handled it so well. But I saw i saw her heartbreak. I write this story. I broke this woman's heart, and she said, you lying to me hurt more than you stealing a bicycle.
00:16:54
Speaker
a And that killed me, and I never lied to her again. and And this is where the appreciation of the Catholic catholic school comes, because Monsignor Kelly was on...
00:17:05
Speaker
Something to do with the police board. And I had to go up for an incident, again, another incident. And i i had to go in front of the police and Monsignor Kelly and confess.
00:17:18
Speaker
And Monsignor Kelly saved my butt. I got no you know no criminal record or anything like that, mostly because of that. So I think my my appreciation of the Catholic Church started coming back after that.
00:17:30
Speaker
And yeah, so those are interesting things. But again, my mom never let me down. She never like shunned me or anything from that incident. I think it was, okay, you did it.
00:17:42
Speaker
I forgive you and let's move on. And I think it was maybe a turning point in our relationship, but it certainly... Again, that lie and and ah watching how much that hurt her was just too much. so And then I think with my parents, you know, they had a pretty contentious relationship for a number of years. And with with Catholics, you know, divorce was not really going to be a possibility, though my father bandied it about.
00:18:08
Speaker
occasionally But so I think at those incidents, you know, you hear your father and he had a pretty loud voice. And and so i I think I sided more with my mother. And so I became kind of a protector of my mother, I think, from those early. And those were my early teens.
00:18:25
Speaker
And I don't think it ever stopped. and And then once I got to a certain point with my father to learn his side of the story, which was very important. Again, this was on one of our one-on-one stories.
00:18:36
Speaker
visits I think this particular one was in Los Angeles, and I wrote a monologue ah for auditions, and and I ah wanted to write one close to home because I know I could tap into the emotions. Right. And and it was fiction, but it was based on us my dad's relationship with my younger sister, which was not good.
00:18:55
Speaker
And I let him read it And at first I thought, oh my gosh, what did And you know I saw his head drop and he was quiet for quite a while.
00:19:07
Speaker
And then he opened up about everything. And it was beautiful. And we talked about his meeting my mom and the honeymoon and the difficulties in the relationship. and And then the difficulties with my younger sister, and it changed everything. It changed everything for our relationship, but I think it really helped and improve the relationship with my younger sister, which I think was very important, and my sister was very, i think, happy after that.
00:19:38
Speaker
I don't know if she quite credits my my my part in that, but things really did change because he he admitted his faults as a father and his difficulties in the marriage.
00:19:50
Speaker
And that's when I kind of realized that it takes two. It's not, he's not the bad guy. Mom's not the bad guy. They both had a ah equal part in this thing. And so I started to, I think, and my one older sister did as well, we tried to get them to open up and go to marriage counseling and things like that. And they actually did and tried that for a while. And so they were they were open to that. They were open to their their kids trying to help them.
00:20:19
Speaker
And also, I think at that time, I was in my late 20s, and that was the first time my father had the sex talk with me. Yeah. I think that that's yeah look a decade too late, but better late than never, I guess. was it was It was pretty funny, you know. And then it was ended it ended up where it was I'm coaching him because I was asking him how he treated my mother. and oh okay. And if he was a ah a good participant in that relationship and in the the sensual and sexual way. Whoa. Yeah. we got it was It was a complete role reversal.
00:20:55
Speaker
Okay. You know what, Mark? I could go down this road. I could ask you a million and one questions. And I know the audience is going to like, Bruce, ask, ask. But I want to get to your book. Okay. Okay.
The Life-Changing Call and Transition to Caregiving
00:21:10
Speaker
okay mountain vivid but didn you So take me to that call from your brother in 2011. Okay. okay What went through your mind? And when you heard that hospice was coming for your mom, how did that feel internally?
00:21:28
Speaker
Right. Well, that that was the the the key word. So in 2011, I was in my mid-50s, and I had a snack food business that my brother and I started to honor my dad. He had a great half-popped popcorn invention that remained a family secret. And I ended up bringing it to the market, and it was a nationwide product for a while. ok And so that was my main focus. So my my acting career at that time was starting to dwindle.
00:21:56
Speaker
was petering out because I didn't have a great agent. And I was i had a pretty good career, but but my focus really was on the snack food company at the time. And i was never married, had no children, and I had no girlfriend at the time.
00:22:09
Speaker
And my brother calls me and says, and I'm trying to think of, I hadn't been home for several months. Usually I'd go home at least twice a year. And then my mom, at this point, my father had passed 14 years earlier. So my mom would still come out and visit me in LA.
00:22:24
Speaker
But it had been several months. And, you know, last we heard it everything's fine. She's living in the house we all grew up in. We did hire a family ah to to keep her company and to do the grocery shopping, the cooking, and things like that, taking care of the household, doing it. She could still walk and and pretty much take care of herself. But ah she was home. We wanted to, you know, get lonely. And and she had a ah dog at the time. And so this family is supposed to take care of that kind of stuff. And...
00:22:54
Speaker
But shortly after her 89th birthday, I think she suffered from some depression throughout her life, but she kept it pretty well hidden from us. But as the years went on, the you know the filters fade and more of this stuff sort of coming out. And that was one of the reasons I stopped visiting her so much, because I said she became this grumpy old woman and didn't care about anybody else except she just wanted to If she went into this mood, she would just phase out, even in a restaurant, and be impossible to deal with and not very pleasant. So that's what kind of kept me away. I would make, you know, we would have phone calls and things like that, but I hadn't visited. So my brother calls me and says, Mom just shut down.
00:23:36
Speaker
And I called her doctor, and the doctor said she's going, so call hospice. Now, the doctor never even went and saw her. They just said, give up. She's out of here.
00:23:46
Speaker
And so Michael put her to bed. She was nonresponsive. I called it a semi comatose state. i don't know if that's medically accurate, but but hospice was the the thing that shook me because 14 years earlier, i only had eight days with my dad.
00:24:02
Speaker
But during those eight days, we took care of him. But when it got to a point where we felt we needed some help, we called hospice. And then two days later, he died. So I hear hospice and you think, OK, she's going.
00:24:13
Speaker
Right. And usually when hospice is called, the end is not a happy one. Right. And so I flew home, all the kids flew home, and we had the priest come in and deliver the last rites.
00:24:25
Speaker
She's laying in her bed. She didn't look like she was in pain, but she was barely opened her eyes, didn't speak a word, and she would respond to touch a little bit, but that was basically it.
00:24:36
Speaker
And so hospice was on duty. And my sister, younger sister and I hung out with hospice because at that point we didn't know. You know, we believed hospice assessment was where she's transitioning. So no food, no medication.
00:24:51
Speaker
Give her a little moisture on the lips for comfort, but that's it. And so we hung out with hospice and said, teach us everything because we want to care for her as much as possible for as long as she wants to be here at that point.
00:25:04
Speaker
We didn't know if it was going be hours, days, weeks, or whatever. And they were great. They were very generous and taught us the tips and tricks. At that point, Mom had some bedsores that we had to learn how to take care of. We had to learn how to sponge bathe and change the diapers and, at that point, change the bedding with the helpless patient in bed. It gets a little tricky. But those things were all very helpful. And I think after while, my mother sensed that love was back in the house. And about three weeks later, again, we had a steady stream of hospice nurses in.
00:25:36
Speaker
and And again, like they let us work side by side. But we were there most of the time. And we find out that some of these nurses like to take, I guess, prescribe their own medicine. And so they would break the rules. and And some of them were not a big deal. But this one, and we had a directive from the supervisor, the list of this, this, this, this. No food, no medication.
00:26:00
Speaker
Don't get them up out of bed. They're transitioning. And so this this one nurse looks at the directive it goes, uh-huh. And she walks right into my mother's room. She says, Mrs. Poro, are you hungry?
00:26:13
Speaker
and it was, but my mom's eyes shot open like a dinner bell rang. And then this lady accuses me and my sister of trying to starve our mother to death.
00:26:24
Speaker
yeah Okay. So, Mark, I do have a question. She never went to the doctor. Now, did any of the six of you say, wait a minute, shouldn't we get this confirmation from the doctor there before we decide that she needs to go in hospice?
00:26:44
Speaker
Well, you know what? I think if hospice had a problem with that, they would have let us know. they don't They don't really want to be doing this. They don't they they don't want to deal with someone transitioning who's not ready to transition. And that was one thing good about this rebel nurse because she looked at my mother and said, this woman's not ready to die. She needs some food. Even though my mom was not saying a word, her eyes were closed and stuff. So anyway, this, we told her to go to call her supervisor because she broke the rolls and the supervisor said, go home, we're going to send another nurse.
00:27:15
Speaker
But in the meantime, I'm thinking maybe maybe hospice was wrong. So I went in, again, I was wracked with guilt and I asked my mom, are you hungry? And she goes, what do you got?
00:27:27
Speaker
Her first words in weeks, probably at least three weeks. Wow. I said, well, anything you want. At this point, this happened like started in the first week of February. Now we're into March. And she says, how about some pumpkin pie?
00:27:40
Speaker
And I said, it's March, okay. So I went out in the living room. My brother, who lived locally, was there. I said, go see if you can find some pumpkin pie. That's what she wants.
00:27:52
Speaker
He came back in less than, probably around 30 minutes with two fresh pumpkin pies. Mm-hmm. I don't know where he got them. i don't know if we baked them or whatever, but that's what my mom wanted, and that's what she got.
00:28:02
Speaker
And so I gave her a spoonful. Again, this was her first food in weeks, so she spit spit up the first one. And I said, well, that didn't go so well. So we tried again, and the second spoonful went down, and she ended up downing half that pie, and whether it was the sugar rush or whatever, she was back.
00:28:20
Speaker
Half the pie or half a piece of pie? Half of the pumpkin pie. Yeah, I mean, if you haven't eaten for three weeks, that that yeah that would make some sense. Yeah. So she woke right up.
00:28:32
Speaker
And I knew she was back because, I mean, the color came back in her face. She's sitting up. She's alert. Her eyes are are wide open. She looks at me and she says, well, I haven't seen you in a long while.
00:28:44
Speaker
So she was right back to guilt tripping. And I said, yeah, she's back. And I said, I know, mom, sorry. and And that might have been part of the catalyst to me coming back and wanting to take care of her. Anyway, so the next day she downed the other half.
00:28:58
Speaker
And the next day, I think she downed the entire pie. And then she moved on. It was a high sugar diet for quite a while. She went to sherbet, bowls of sherbet, probably eight bowls a day.
00:29:12
Speaker
New Jersey was running out of sherbet. We had to keep running to the market to find sherbet. And it was it was crazy. And then we got her at least start eating oatmeal, some solid food and things like that. And so that's how it began. And and I think I stayed there for a number of weeks.
00:29:30
Speaker
until I knew she, or at least felt that she was back on the mend. And I knew hospice was going to be there for a few more months. I think in New Jersey, when they when they contract hospice, they say for at least six months.
00:29:43
Speaker
Mm-hmm. if the patient lasts that long. And so I had to go back to LA and take care of some business and we kept in touch. and And then I came back in September for my nephew's wedding at the Jersey Shore.
00:29:57
Speaker
And that was gonna be my mom's first outing since February. And so I got, you i again, learning from my older sisters and my younger sister, they all had long hair,
00:30:08
Speaker
I learned a lot from being a brother with three girls in the house and my mom, and learned a lot more than just put the toilet seat down. And so I knew how to take care of hair and do nails and things like that. And so I got my mom all dolled up for this wedding, and it was great. i saw her reaction and the reaction of everybody around her, and it was lovely. It was it was great to treat her like in a royalty, and she responded very well to it.
00:30:35
Speaker
And she had a great time at this wedding and she wanted to get, know, at that point she's in a wheelchair and she almost stood up out of that wheelchair. She wanted to dance with everybody and it was fabulous. And so during that trip, I think I stayed two weeks and I asked her at that time if she wanted me to come back and, and do this full time.
00:30:55
Speaker
And so I got her permission. And so that was a big deal. And so I moved back a couple of months later and moved back into my childhood home. And and that's where it starts.
00:31:07
Speaker
Okay. So, Mark, you ask your mom, you want me to move back, you get her permission, and you decide at the age of 55 to move back into your childhood home to help take care of your mom.
00:31:23
Speaker
What was that like to suddenly change your life? You're living out in LA, you're running a business, you're still acting to completely change your life to come back to New Jersey, live in your childhood home and take care of your mom.
00:31:36
Speaker
You know, I didn't think of it as that big of a deal. It just seemed to be the right
Full-Time Caregiving and Maintaining Dignity
00:31:41
Speaker
thing to do. And there was no, ah the decision was easy. Working out the logistics took a little but work because I still had the business.
00:31:50
Speaker
I wasn't really worried about the acting career. I let that one kind of go. And the business I could still handle at that point. Whether it was my mom, Kismet or what, we lost our national distribution shortly before this. So the business was slowing down and I was able to handle it on my own, at least the production. production I built a factory and out in L.A.
00:32:13
Speaker
So if I went back every few months for one week, I could produce enough to handle our current. stores on the east and west coast and so that was fine and we worked that out and then when i would go back to l la i had a sister who lived in california and she would swap out so she would we were always had a family member there so she would come in for that week and and take care of mom and and so that's that's how it worked for the three and a half years okay The title of your book is very interesting, but it literally comes from a true story.
00:32:49
Speaker
How did that little ritual of handing your mom a cup of tea while she's on the commode develop into this whole story and the title of your book? Well, again, i think that this is one of the things I learned early on. We take a lot of things for granted. And as we get older, things like wanting to wanting to feel pretty does not fade with age with women, nor with men.
00:33:15
Speaker
A couple of days before my dad passed, He was always clean shaven, always had his hair perfectly combed. And we knew that he wanted to look his best when he met Jesus. And so my sister and I gave him a a clean shave and combed his hair. And I knew he appreciated that because he wanted to be as as handsome as he was, you know, ever was but when he saw Jesus. And so with my mom, the same kind of thing. And we'll get into that a little bit. But so one of the ritual, we would come up with rituals. So one of my goals when I... first started doing this was to make my mom laugh at least once a day. A sense of humor was a big deal in our family. Both of my parents were very funny people. And so if I could make her laugh, that would at least, that was an easy goal to try to do. Because you you do these little steps
00:34:05
Speaker
And also, if you put the focus on your loved one or your patient, if it's not a relative, it it it takes so much weight off off your shoulders of responsibility. You say, okay, how can I make them laugh? You're not sitting there going, oh, my back hurts. I'm so tired. I haven't slept. Right. In three days, it's no, let's let's focus on that. So one of the rituals was sometimes, you know, we had a commode bedside because getting mom in and out of the bathroom was a little dicey at that point because she she couldn't walk and the wheelchair would not fit through the narrow hallway and doorways in my mom's house. And so sometimes Mother Nature took a little longer than was comfortable for either the one of us. And so kind of as a joke, I just, you know, her favorite beverage was a cup of hot tea.
00:34:50
Speaker
skim milk, no sugar. And so I said, would you like a cup of tea while we're waiting? And she said, sure. And so it it became a hit and it it made the time on the Komodo little more pleasant for her.
00:35:03
Speaker
and And so that became one of our morning rituals. Another one was it's it's tough. And again, this is another thing we take for granted is hugging. Hugs are so important.
00:35:14
Speaker
And as they get older, they can hurt. You know, our our loved ones a little more fragile. If they're lying in bed, it's very difficult to do ah good hug at that point. And so during this routine that I worked out with my mom, after I would sponge bathe her and get her ready for the day, she would sit on the edge of the bed and she would pick out her wardrobe and And once I got her dressed, I'd say, okay, you get a stand. And she had remarkably strong legs for not walking in several months.
00:35:44
Speaker
So she would stand, and of course I would help her, steady her, and I said, okay, morning hug time. And we would hug before I put her in the wheelchair. And it was great because neither one of us wanted to let it go. you know and And it was just lovely. So morning hug was another ritual.
00:36:00
Speaker
And we'd come up with these little things like that that just made made it special. I think. And she loved kissing. And so I always knew if she puckered up for a kiss, she was in a good mood and I was doing something good. You know, so those little things or those little clues to let you know that you're doing a good job.
00:36:18
Speaker
And yeah, so so that's where a cup of tea. And so while writing the book, actually had a different title in mind. And as I got to the chapter about where this this this whole...
00:36:29
Speaker
ritual came out of, i said, boy, that's catchy. And let me run that by some people. And it was catchy. And eventually my publisher who became my publisher loved it. And so that was it, a cup of tea in the commode.
00:36:43
Speaker
You're doing these rituals. You're using your humor to make your mother's experience a little bit brighter. What did you do on your hard days? Because you're there taking care of your mother every single day.
00:37:02
Speaker
So what were your rituals for yourself to give you a little bit of light on some of your dark days? Well, I have to say the advice from the pros is take breaks.
00:37:14
Speaker
And because it's it's physically, emotionally, and mentally, it's it's a tough job. It's twenty four seven Even if... When mom was in bed, ah you're still lying in your bed wondering if she's gonna be breathing when you wake up in the morning.
00:37:29
Speaker
So it's always weighing on you, this whole thing. I even put a ah video monitor in her bedroom. And she was a night owl. I was born in in the evening also, I think the only kid. And so I was used to staying up late.
00:37:42
Speaker
And since she worked the night shift for 30 years, she was certainly used to staying up. But boy, I put that video in there and i it didn't have sound, but i would this woman would have conversations with somebody.
00:37:56
Speaker
and something was going on there, and it was better than anything on TV. I would be upstairs watching my phone, and and it was fabulous. I wish I could have heard some of the things. Now, she had a lot of interesting visions. She did suffer from a little bit of dementia, and so she had some interesting visions and interesting conversations that I did hear, but boy, this stuff at night was just fascinating.
00:38:19
Speaker
And so I knew that I needed to take breaks, but and and we took breaks when we were dealing with hospice. Originally, my younger sister and I would go walking around our town and things like that.
00:38:31
Speaker
But when I took it on, thinking, I'm a guy, I can handle this, no big deal. And and it it does creep up. There were a couple of times where i I did rage a little bit, but also I had some design and building skills.
00:38:45
Speaker
And so my mom slept a lot, like a baby. She slept many hours of the day. So I said, you know what? I'm not only going to, let's say, return dignity to my mother. I want to return dignity to her environment.
Using Humor and Creativity in Caregiving
00:38:58
Speaker
So I ended up renovating the entire house that I grew up in. And the first floor I did was the basement. That was absolute disaster. So I renovated the basement, and I knew I had to...
00:39:09
Speaker
I put a man cave in there. I bought a rowing machine. i bought weights. And so I knew I needed some stress relief and stuff like that. I always pretty much exercise my whole life. But this was maybe a little bit different. So but even with that, stress stress would get to me.
00:39:24
Speaker
But renovating was very fun. So this is where some of this sense of humor comes in So my mother, after getting her ready for breakfast, I would put her in the living room. She had one of those motorized reclining chairs.
00:39:37
Speaker
So would' sit her in that chair. And, you know if you hit the buttons, it would stand her up basically. And so she loved to watch the animal planet. She was a big animal person. And so I would sit her in front of the TV and then go off to Home Depot to buy things for the basement.
00:39:52
Speaker
And because of her dimension, when I was coming back, so I'd be carrying two by fours through the living room down to the basement. And she'd be watching me go past. and And for about seven days in a row, she was sitting there go, what is going on?
00:40:07
Speaker
I said, Mom, I'm making your house more beautiful. She goes, well, who is paying for all that? I said, you are. So cheer up. You may have to go back to work. It's... And so for like seven straight days, same conversation. The third, will maybe somewhere in the middle there, I remember coming back from Home Depot, pass the McDonald's, and I know she liked those smoothies, raspberry smoothie.
00:40:32
Speaker
And so I would buy her a smoothie. So that would shut her up. So as soon as she's saying, what is going here? And it should be done. So it should be fun. But one of the funny things is so I finished the basement. And I involved her in all of it. I said, what colors would you like for the walls?
00:40:49
Speaker
What are we going to do this? and This is how I plan on doing this. What do you think? And so the last thing to do was to get the carpet. So I had carpet samples. So they were a little three by three inch square carpet samples.
00:41:01
Speaker
And I put two of them on her breakfast tray ah one morning, and then I went out to fill up her sippy cup with juice. And I came back, and she's got one of those carpet samples in her mouth and a scowl on her face.
00:41:14
Speaker
And I said, what are you doing? She goes, this is not a cookie. I said, no, Mom, it's a carpet sample. Which one tastes better? And she chose well.
00:41:25
Speaker
So we went with the one that tasted the best. So you know you have to have some fun because, again, there was another time where she, out of her six children, I'm the only one there 24-7. So I'm not only doing everything else, but I'm wiping her butt several times a day.
00:41:41
Speaker
And I'm the one whose name she couldn't remember. Yes, it has to bother you to no end. well ah you come Again, you got to roll with it, right? So she comes in.
00:41:52
Speaker
I come in one morning and and I give her sippy cup. That was the the early morning ritual. And she'll look at me she goes, now, what is it I call you? And this is several months in. And I said, you're kidding, right?
00:42:05
Speaker
She goes, no. I said, name your children. Laurel, Michael, Carol, David, Deasy. And? Nothing. I said, I'm Mark. She goes, oh, Mark.
00:42:16
Speaker
With a K? I said, yeah, with a K. You named me. I said, I'm your favorite son. She goes, I don't have favorites. I said, well, you have a favorite to forget. Now, i I could have taken that personally, but I didn't. You know, i think it's my mom, and I know she loves me and stuff like that. So I wrote my name in big block letters on a piece of paper and taped it to the ceiling because when I would go in in the morning, she'd be laying in bed.
00:42:40
Speaker
So I would go in and say, good morning, and she would look up at the ceiling and say, good morning, Mark. And she was very proud that... So after a while, she didn't need the visual aid. But, you know, that could have been really, you know, ego damaging. and and But listen, they're still your loved one. They're a little slower. and They're a little more fragile. They mean well. They may forget your name and stuff like that. But yeah you you just got to roll with it. Roll with the punches.
00:43:08
Speaker
Two things here.
00:43:11
Speaker
Caregiving typically falls to women. I'm not saying it's a woman's job, ladies and gentlemen. I'm just saying typically... It falls to women. yeah You, being the forgotten son, did it 24-7.
00:43:27
Speaker
One, how long were you there before your mom's home going? And why do you think so many men fail to step up?
00:43:39
Speaker
well Well, this thing started in 2011, so it I didn't move in right away, so but our journey started, it was three and a half years. So in February 2011, and then she passed in August of 2014.
00:43:53
Speaker
And yeah, so I don't know about the men. That's what i'm I'm hoping to inspire more men to do it, because I think it's just more natural for for the the ladies. They're more the nurturers, you know, being mothers and and and that stuff. But it was a little awkward in the beginning, I have to admit. I think my acting certainly helped because you're seeing your mother naked for the first time. Yeah.
00:44:15
Speaker
And she's 89, and you're seeing what the years have done to her and what gravity has done, and neither one is kind. and But i you know I jumped in and said, listen, if I'm going to do this, I'm in 100%.
00:44:28
Speaker
So I got to get over it and on with because I got a job to do. I am now a caregiver. And so I got over it very quickly. and And I think that could have been awkward, I guess, with my sisters having their brother
Sibling Support and Restoring Mother's Dignity
00:44:41
Speaker
do this stuff. But my siblings were great.
00:44:43
Speaker
They all, they had no issue with me taking over, which, you know, I guess if someone's going to volunteer to do it, great, please go ahead and do it. But there is...
00:44:55
Speaker
I've heard and read there's a lot of sibling rivalry, whether people you know thought that, oh, since I'm going to now be her real favorite, I'm going to get more parts, you know, that inherit the house and things like that. And that was never on my mind and hopefully none of my siblings' minds either. But i yeah, I just think it's more natural. But we're catching up. It's about 60-40 split now. Oh, okay. And I'm learning more more and more men who are doing it.
00:45:23
Speaker
And, you know, yes, it can be awkward. I would say if if you are, even for the men and for the women, if you're uncomfortable doing any part of this, because with my mother, there was no line we didn't cross. so I did everything.
00:45:36
Speaker
And I learned it was great to learn all that stuff with hospice. And there's um a lot of messy things and all that stuff. Again, you got to get over it and get on with it. But if you are uncomfortable, you don't want your loved one to feel guilty and and feel like you're a burden or they're a burden to you in your life.
00:45:52
Speaker
I didn't want my mother to ever think that I gave up anything to do this. this This was my choice. It ended up being such a a gift to me. ah But ah ah any time that I felt uncomfortable, i kept it out of the room.
00:46:06
Speaker
And whether that was my acting training or whatever, I didn't want her to feel strange or or a burden whatsoever. There were times, and again, you know, Mom's ah originally a New Yorker but became a Jersey girl for many years. ah you know, one morning I woke up.
00:46:22
Speaker
And I hear bell ringing. And I'm like, that? And so I go down to her room, and this is really early in the morning. And and again, I'm not getting to sleep till late at night.
00:46:34
Speaker
And she's sitting in bed with a little brass bell between her fingers. And I'm like, Please tell me you did not ring that to summon me. And she said, I most certainly did. And I said, well, now I'm going to take that little brass thing from you. So we'll never hear her again. and she's like, for heaven's sakes, why? i said, because I'm here out of love.
00:46:57
Speaker
I'm not here out of duty. you do not need to ring a bell. And so, you know, I let her be a queen for that one moment, and that was about it. But those again, those were funny things. I don't know where that bell came from.
00:47:10
Speaker
I never saw it before, and I don't know where where where it lives now, but oh my gosh, that was so funny. And then, you know, I said, you don't need to, you don't need to ring a bell, I'm here.
00:47:22
Speaker
And there are other times, I think, with the dementia, one time I went in there, she goes, why is it I always call you and you never call me? I said, Mom, you call me, I come running.
00:47:33
Speaker
I call you, what are you going to do? I don't know. And then she would fall back asleep. you know So we'd have these little conversations that were pretty funny. Yeah. So I want to tell you this one thing. Do we have time for this?
00:47:46
Speaker
Any time, yes. OK. So one of the first things, again, I wanted to do is return dignity to my mom. and not only to to her but her environment and i felt it was whittled away by these these people that lived upstairs did not get along with my mother and my mother did not like them and they both kind of kept quiet because they had a good deal and my mom didn't want to go to assisted living or or nursing home or anything so she kept quiet and kind of dealt with it but i think that was the catalyst that helped her want to leave this earth she was i think looking around saying this is going to be the rest of my life i'm out of here
00:48:20
Speaker
And so one of the first things I wanted to do is she had these old tattered day dresses and they looked drab and and her hair wasn't cared for.
00:48:31
Speaker
and she had beautiful nails. That was the one thing that I saw that she still had. She had these gorgeous nails. She was a ah nail model or hand model in her youth. And so she was very proud of those. They were like the frickin' crown jewels. I mean, you had be very careful with those nails. But I said, oh OK, we're done with these. I don't want my mom to look like a sad old woman. So we're getting you a new wardrobe. So that was one of the first things.
00:48:54
Speaker
And you want to cheer anybody up at any age, a new wardrobe's going to do that. Mm-hmm. So, and there is a market block of this thing. There's nothing, but maybe now, because this was years ago, it was hard to find something good looking for day dresses and night dresses. And so I went out to department stores originally because I am my mother's son and did a lot of that stuff growing up. But it's a little creepy, the looks I would get. You know, you have a middle-aged guy shopping for yeah lot not quite lingerie, but, you know, old lady section. there was give obviously
00:49:28
Speaker
It gives a lot of Norman Bates feel in that situation. It's not for me. yeah Anyway, so it got too uncomfortable, so I went online because, you know, it was the 2000s. And so I went online and looked for senior nightdresses and senior nightwear that looks good.
00:49:44
Speaker
and nothing. So then I took off senior and then then I started seeing some stuff. So there's there's ah a void in the marketplace for this. And so we need somebody to fill that. That's a free free tip. You're gonna make your millions. And so went online, bought her some things and and and that looked good. So I got a nice pink,
00:50:05
Speaker
and And blue and i say in the book, dare I say sexy black? And yes, and they were all on the short side because she still had pretty good legs at the time and she loved them. And everybody you know around her loved their you know her reaction to them and stuff like that. And then again, with my sisters, I don't understand this and hopefully they're not going to listen to this, but you know I would get there and her hair looked ah unkempt.
00:50:31
Speaker
And her nails are good, but, you know, there was no makeup or nothing to make her look pretty or special. So the wardrobe was the first step. And my mother, with the six kids and working full time, she did treat herself to a weekly beauty salon treatment where she got a shampoo and set and had her nails done.
00:50:51
Speaker
And I grew up knowing this. And then when she would come out to Los Angeles, I would take her to my friend's salon in Beverly Hills, and she got the movie star treatment. And I knew she loved that. And so I decided to try to recreate that at home. I don't know the last time she was at a salon or had her hair done. And now we're actually, she used to like a shampoo and said it was short kind of curly or had a perm. Now she had long, beautiful hair again and it was great. And so I created what I called the day of beauty.
00:51:19
Speaker
And so normally I gave her sponge bath in the morning and the evening. and then got got her ready for bed and then ready for the morning and breakfast and stuff like that. So on Day of Beauty, I added some things. So while she was on the commode, I soaked her feet in Epsom salt, I shampooed her hair, and and conditioned it if it needed it, and then gave her a full body massage, and...
00:51:44
Speaker
lotion and then she got new diaper every time and a new diaper. Then she picked out the wardrobe she wanted to wear and then I got her up in the wheelchair but first the morning hug and then put her in the wheelchair then blow dried her hair.
00:51:58
Speaker
and put it in a ponytail or for bonus points, I i would braid it because I i learned this, you know, for hanging out my sisters and stuff. and And then I would do her nails. Again, I'd be very careful with the nails. And then I would ah give her lipstick to match the usual bright red nails and bright red lipstick.
00:52:16
Speaker
And I thought, this is just a nice thing, pampering my mom was cool. And then I would wheel her into the kitchen for breakfast. And I did all the cooking, too. I always tried to make very healthy meals and stuff like that, and and that was lovely to do. Again, it was an honor to feed your mother good food, and and and most of the time she liked it. She could be a little picky. For a lady who did not have any taste buds, she had a very picky palate.
00:52:41
Speaker
I have to admit. So, but on the way to the kitchen, we parked, I parked her in front of this, we had a big round mirror in the dining room. And I parked her in front of that mirror and she's just staring at herself.
00:52:52
Speaker
And I leaned in cheek to cheek and I say, who is that pretty girl? And she just beamed. And I said, oh, my God. I had no idea. I thought I was doing just a nice thing for his mother.
00:53:04
Speaker
That was profound, the effect on her and certainly the effect on me and the effect on everybody that saw her. Because every day in between Days of Beauty, I would park her in front of that mirror.
00:53:17
Speaker
and ask her the same question because I wanted her to know she was beautiful. And again, we don't know when the last time our loved ones looked in a mirror or when the last time they liked what they saw, if they did look in a mirror.
00:53:30
Speaker
But what she saw that day was beautiful. And very it was a very special treat for her, but I think it had a more profound effect on me. And so, again, that was the lesson I learned, that wanting to feel pretty does not fade with age.
00:53:45
Speaker
And as I've talked more about the book with various people, people have told me that in nursing homes they're starting to do more of this, where they're bringing in beauty people and hairdressers and things like that. And I think that's great, and they should do more of that because it was lovely.
00:54:01
Speaker
Yeah, it's giving them their big knee back. Yeah. Yeah.
00:54:08
Speaker
mountainary bill good you You talk about how this whole process made you a better man.
Personal Transformation Through Caregiving
00:54:17
Speaker
Can you give me some examples after your mother passed how the experience of taking care your mother made you better leading up to the current day?
00:54:30
Speaker
Well, I have to say, be what was fortunate for me for this whole thing is I think ah my life experience really kind of trained me for this. In, in my design business, you learn M because you have to take into consideration the end user, the person you're designing for. And you have to put yourself, let's say in their shoes to see how they're going to react to whether it's a product, a photograph.
00:54:53
Speaker
a logo or brochure or something like that. And also certainly in acting, you got to get into the other character you're playing. So you really have to get into them and try to understand them. With, let's say, with this experience with my mother, she's still my mother.
00:55:07
Speaker
That relationship, even though, let's say, I was the boss at that time, she's still mom. And you've got to still treat her that way. and But you realize, again, they're a little slower. They're a little more fragile. They may forget things, but they're still mom.
00:55:22
Speaker
And if you could tap into that to really understand where they're coming from and not dealing with you and what you need and what you expect, that's very important. And that certainly has carried through my life since. I am very empathetic of any older person that I see. a lot of my friends here are retirees.
00:55:44
Speaker
Here in France today, actually, i saw two people probably in their 80s. And I was walking in the street and they said something me And my French is still terrible. But I understood that they seemed a little lost. And so I was trying to help them find out where they wanted to go.
00:56:00
Speaker
and And so I gave them directions and then left. I went on my own way. And I said, no, wait a minute. I don't know if they got that. So I'm going to go back. And I walked with them and I took them closer to where they wanted to go.
00:56:14
Speaker
and And yeah, that pull was there. And that's not just some taking care of my mom. That's the way we were brought up. Our family, especially my parents, really taught us to care for others and to do the right thing.
00:56:27
Speaker
And certainly with the with the Catholic Church and the Bible and the commandments, honor thy mother and thy father. This is no better way to do it than... didn't care for them. They cared for us for many years and and and sometimes way too many years. And this is the right thing to do. So again, ah when I first made this decision, it it was not a big deal because again, I felt it was the right thing to do. My mother deserved better.
00:56:52
Speaker
And whether I thought this at the time, but I probably did. I don't think anybody could have done better than what I did. And I think my siblings would agree. But part of that was my upbringing, you know, not only with my parents, but my with my siblings as well.
00:57:07
Speaker
We really care for each other, even though we have, you know, there's the religion and political differences and all that stuff. When it comes down to it, we're family. Yeah. And there's nothing more important than that.
00:57:19
Speaker
Before I let you go, i feel like your story is so important because even though the the you said that the numbers are changing, that it's 60-40 of men starting to care for their aging parent, it's still kind of a new phenomenon. And there are going to be some men out there that are watching, listening to your story, reading your book.
00:57:43
Speaker
that's still scared to do it. What's some of the things that you hope that those people take away from this conversation in your book to help convince them? Go help your parent.
00:57:55
Speaker
Help get over that fear, that apprehension that they might have in helping their aging parent. Well, I think I was very fortunate because I had a good relationship with my parents. I think it would be tough if someone does not have that.
00:58:09
Speaker
And again, if they if that is their relationship, they can still, and whether it's it's going to make you feel so much better, be present. Hire somebody who can do it. Again, if you're uncomfortable, hire someone who's going to do all the messy work.
00:58:25
Speaker
Mm-hmm. If your parent knows or your loved one knows you're there and present and do care about them, that that's all you need. i would have to say some of my favorite moments with my mom was just sitting at the kitchen table holding hands.
00:58:40
Speaker
Not a word was spoken, but there was so much love going through that connection. and And sometimes that's the last connection we have with our loved one is the holding in the hand as they as they do transition. And I have to say, and and this came out of the distance between, the book came out on Mother's Day, actually three years ago.
00:59:00
Speaker
But I couldn't do, that i wanted to do the audio book and I, i I get really emotional when it comes to family things. and And so even when I was practicing and with all my acting training, even when I got to a ah chapter, I had nothing to do with emotion.
00:59:16
Speaker
One of them is about baseball. And there's no crying in baseball. And I've gone, oh, man. So it took me several months before I could do this book.
00:59:27
Speaker
But during that time away from it, i when I revisited the book, I'm looking at it with a fresh set of eyes. And it was great because new things came out and realizations and stuff. And the best one was, if you hear this story, it sounds like I went back to rescue my mom.
00:59:46
Speaker
And in a sense, yes, I did do that. But upon reflection, with that with that distance between the the two books, I think my mom rescued me.
00:59:56
Speaker
h Because she gave me this, i did i I did a lot of good things in life and some bad things, as we talked about, but I never did anything really important. I didn't, you know, i i hadn't married and had no children. So unconditional love was something I didn't really grasp.
01:00:12
Speaker
And I learned it certainly during this process. But my mother gave me this opportunity to do something really important. And luckily, I was smart enough to jump on it. And so I think that was mom teaching me another lesson. yeah Still being mom. Whether she had dementia, she's still mom and she still had lessons to teach. So I'm hoping some of those lessons will continue to teach others too. Because I, again, it for for me, it was a gift.
01:00:41
Speaker
And it was a lovely way for my mother to leave this earth. And i don't think I had any... bad feelings because we I don't think we left anything on the table and so I don't know if I was even I've said certainly that she wasn't here but it was a beautiful way to go and my dad also at that point 17 years earlier my dad died in his bed with me by his side and one of my other sisters and it it was a lovely way to go and so with mom was the same thing so It it was very rewarding. And I think those those gifts that your parents, hopefully, I was lucky to to be the recipient of many of them. Hopefully, the people that were gonna be, let's say, more open to taking this on or certainly to reading the book, well, there's there's there's a lot of joy in it. And that was one of my mottos too, is is find the joy.
01:01:36
Speaker
So if you if you look for the positive in this situation or any kind of circumstance, boy, it makes it so much easier. to focus on the good. And yeah, so that was that was a ah good experience. So thanks, Mom. Thanks for that opportunity.
01:01:52
Speaker
I love that. Mark Steven Pearl, the author of A Cup of Tea on the Commode. I want to thank you so much for coming on this show, sharing your story, and just opening your heart heart to not only me, but also to ah to the audience and allowing us into this incredible story. So thank you so much for coming on the show. My pleasure. Thank you.
01:02:23
Speaker
You know, one of the things that really stayed with me from this conversation wasn't the caregiving. It was the relationship. Because somewhere along the way, we convinced ourselves that our parents stopped changing once we become adults.
01:02:35
Speaker
We will remember them as people who packed our lunches, paid the bills, set the rules, somehow always seemed to have all the answers.
Impact of Caregiving on Relationships and Legacy
01:02:43
Speaker
But life has a way of changing every relationship.
01:02:46
Speaker
The people who once carried us eventually need someone to carry them. And that's a difficult reality to to accept because it forces us to confront something we spend most of our lives trying not to think about.
01:02:59
Speaker
Time. Time catches all of us. The people who looked larger than life become a little slower, a little weaker, a little more dependent. And one day, without any anyone announcing it, their relationship changes.
01:03:15
Speaker
That's not easy. It's emotional. It's exhausting. Sometimes it's unfair. Sometimes it's beautiful. Most of the time, it's all of those things at once.
01:03:29
Speaker
What I appreciate about Mark's story is that he never tried to make caregiving sound glamorous. There were difficult days. There were frustrating days. There was moments where life became smaller because someone else needed everything he had to give.
01:03:45
Speaker
But there was something else. There was purpose. There was connection. There's opportunity to know his mother in a way he'd never had before. And I think that's the lesson.
01:03:57
Speaker
Not everyone is going to have the same relationship with their parents. I know that. Some of you listening have incredible relationships. Some of you have complicated ones. Some of you are carrying wounds that never healed.
01:04:11
Speaker
Every family story is different. But if you're fortunate enough to still have the opportunity to show up for the people who once showed up for you, don't take that opportunity for granted.
01:04:22
Speaker
None of us knows how many conversations we have left. None of us knows how many hugs are left. None of us knows which ordinary Tuesday will quietly become a memory we'll spend the rest of our lives wishing we could have back.
01:04:38
Speaker
That's why this conversation matters. Not because it's about aging, not because it's about caregiving, because it's about love in its most practical form.
01:04:50
Speaker
Love isn't always found in big speeches. Sometimes love looks like showing up. Sometimes it looks like patience. Sometimes it looks like choosing someone else's comfort over your own.
01:05:04
Speaker
If today's conversation resonated with you, I really encourage you to pick up Mark's book, A Cup of Tea on the Commode. It's heartfelt, it's funny, it's honest.
01:05:14
Speaker
It's one of those books that reminds you that even in life's hardest seasons, there's still room for humanity, laughter, and grace. Whether you're caring for a loved one now,
01:05:27
Speaker
knowing someone who is, or simply want a story that will make you look at family a little differently, this is absolutely worth the read. Go support Mark. Go pick up, once again, the name of the book, A Cup of Tea on the Commode.
01:05:42
Speaker
I think you'll laugh. I think you'll get emotional. And more than anything, I think you'll come away looking at family a little different. Because maybe the greatest gift our parents ever gave us isn't raising us.
01:05:56
Speaker
Maybe it's giving us one last chance to love them the way they spent decades loving us. Not because we owe them, not because we have to, but because somewhere between childhood and adulthood, the relationship changed.
01:06:12
Speaker
And in that moment, we get one final opportunity to say, thank you. Not with words, but with presence. That's what stayed with me after talking to Mark.
01:06:25
Speaker
His story isn't really about aging. It isn't really about caregiving. It's about what love looks like when nobody's applauding, when there aren't cameras around, when there's nothing to gain.
01:06:38
Speaker
Just showing up. Because at the end of our lives, I don't think people who love us are going to remember how many meetings we attended, how many promotions we earned.
01:06:50
Speaker
or how much money we made. They're gonna remember whether we were there. And maybe that's the uncomfortable part people don't wanna talk about. The greatest measure of our lives may not be found in the things that we built.
01:07:05
Speaker
It may be found in the people we were willing to stop everything for. Because long after careers end, long after titles disappear, long after accomplishments fade,
01:07:19
Speaker
The love we gave the people who needed us the most, that's the part that remains. That's the part they'll remember. And maybe that's the part that really defines us.
Conclusion and Promotion of Additional Content
01:07:35
Speaker
Ladies and gentlemen, i want to thank you for listening. I want to thank you for watching. And until next time, as always, I'll holla.
01:07:48
Speaker
was a hell of a show. Thank you for rocking with us here on Unsolicited Perspectives with Bruce Anthony. Now, before you go, don't forget to follow, subscribe, like, comment, and share our podcast wherever you're listening or watching it to it. Pass it along to your friends. If you enjoy it, that means the people that you rock will will enjoy it also. So share the wealth, share the knowledge, share the noise.
01:08:10
Speaker
And for all those people that say, well, I don't have a YouTube. If you have a Gmail account, you have a YouTube. Subscribe to our YouTube channel where you can actually watch our video podcast and YouTube exclusive content.
01:08:22
Speaker
But the real party is on our Patreon page. After Hours Uncensored and Talking Straight-ish. After Hours Uncensored is another show with my sister. And once again, the key word there is uncensored. Those are exclusively on our Patreon page.
01:08:35
Speaker
Jump onto to our website unsolicitedperspective.com. for all things us That's where you can get all of our audio, video, our blogs, and even buy our merch. And if you really feel generous and want to help us out, you can donate on our donations page.
01:08:50
Speaker
Donations go strictly to improving our software and hardware so we can keep giving you guys good content that you can share. clearly listened to and that you can clearly see. So any donation would be appreciated. Most importantly, I want to say thank you.
01:09:04
Speaker
Thank you. Thank you for listening and watching and supporting us. And I'll catch you next time. Audi 5000. Peace.