My Grandmother and Me: Making Art with a Loved One During Hospitalization
Marcella Boechat, DTATI
Minas Gerais, Brazil
After 4 years living in Canada I moved back home. The context was me coming to be with my grandmother while she was going through radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatments.
This woman, whom I had the great honor to be guarded by, passed away in January.
The treatment as many know is brutal.
My grandmother, this incredibly strong woman, heard about her diagnosis and started treatment (her second journey with cancer) in January 2019. Even with access to private health assistance, factors such as burned-out staff, broken logistics, insufficient facilities and long hours in the emergency room were our routine.
As an art therapist I was always trying to propose some connection time with art making. But the side effects of the treatment drained her body. Not really knowing how to soften spending up to eight hours in the ER waiting for transfusions, I started taking my art materials with me.
At first, she couldn’t believe I had crayons and a pouch full of markers ready to go. Then with time the art-making became the attention and distraction of the room. Nurses would recognize us as the duo talking about shapes, colors and sharing songs, while respecting other patients' journeys and space (up to 20 people in a room and the companions standing or sitting by when there were enough chairs).
My big love didn’t have the mood or physical strength to draw, but she certainly knew how to give me instructions. What a privilege I had! What an amazing time of love and presence!
In one of the longest chemotherapy sessions we named one of our pieces The Traveling Boobs (Image 1). She had already dealt with breast cancer and those boobs were flying.
Another of our pieces, created during a blood platelets transfusion, was based on a picture she had on her phone. Someone took it during Carnaval season. You see, my grandmother shared big love for life and dancing! In the picture she was wearing a long dress and a bright turban. The drawing is her by a window in front of the forest (Image 2).
“While I revisit these recent stories I’m sure my mind is already adding and subtracting moments. But you see, the fact is that it happened. Me and the person I most loved in this world made art.”
The background was suggested by another patient in her eighties receiving saline solution. The skin tone was suggested by a man across the room who was waiting for his daughter’s test results. And like that, in that unlikely environment we created and reframed moments of waiting and uncertainty.
Sometimes she would wake up from an in-between procedures nap and immediately ask: So, what’s the next piece? I don’t know if she was excited about it or if it was the typical grandmother impulse to encourage her young companion. Does it matter?
It was in one of these times that Image 3 came about. This one is called Creates Healing Creature. We had a chat about this one being either a person or some kind of surreal creature. And yes, we laughed!
Dear reader, don’t get me wrong. I’m not romanticizing this painful moment in my grandmother’s life. In the hospital setting we would create for those long hours of waiting for a spot or for the transfusions to be done. There were innumerable processes, and when her body was so weak even feeding was hard. There was pain, so much pain. There was despair and anger. But for some brief moments there was connection, lightness and self permission.
Self permission to process emotions through art, self permission to connect with others during a challenging time, self permission to get our minds off scans, needles and the cold environment that a hospital can be.
This whole time Marilena (my big love) only gave me encouragement towards creating. Traveling Boobs was actually sold after a post on Instagram and a line of nature creature drawings developed from Creates healing creature. This was as much of a process for me as it was for her. Both of us were in it for each other.
While I revisit these recent stories I’m sure my mind is already adding and subtracting moments. But you see, the fact is that it happened. Me and the person I most loved in this world made art.