(This article, reprinted with permission, featuring Deborah Greene "D. G." Fulford, class of 1967, appeared in The Columbus Dispatch on July 1, 2008)  7/12/08

Mom, daughter renew bond through writing

Phyllis Greene and her late husband, Bob, own a green-friendly, one-bedroom apartment, daughter D.G. Fulford likes to say.

And when it is time for Greene to join him in the "apartment" at Green Lawn Cemetery, Fulford and her brothers will be ready.

Greene, 88, and Fulford, 59, have made a living laughing off death -- and no detail, not even the menu for the shiva after Greene's funeral, is too minute or morbid to consider.

"It's a lot more fun to discuss these kinds of things with your mother before than to have to deal with it after her death," Fulford said.

The two decided to share their experiences in a joint memoir, Designated Daughter.
The book, published in April, offers tips for children who act as caregivers for elderly parents. The ultimate message: You are not alone.

One in four American families provides care to an elderly relative, said Patty Callahan, a caregiver advocate with the Central Ohio Agency on Aging -- with about 70 percent of the care outside assisted-living facilities.

"There is a huge demographic of women doing this," Fulford said. "Although for centuries women have taken care of their parents, it was never called anything before."

Ten years ago, while living in Nevada, she received "the call" from Greene -- who told her that, because of her ill father, she should take the next plane to Columbus.

A visit wasn't enough: The decision to move back home, Fulford said, was an "eternal necessity."

"There wasn't anything else that my soul would let me do, and it isn't because I am the nicest person in the world or the most responsible. I'm an artist."

Fulford has two brothers, including older brother Bob Greene Jr., a former Chicago Tribune columnist who has written several books.

She was the only sibling, though, not tied to an office job or a spouse, so the "freestyle, freelance girl" was the one to pack her bags.

At first, Phyllis Greene -- still in relatively good health -- didn't want to inconvenience her daughter.

"When D.G. said she was coming home, I said: 'Don't. I'll be fine. I know I'll be fine.' And I'm not sure, looking back, how fine I would have been," Greene said.

Fulford, it turned out, needed her mother, too -- and stayed for good, settling not far from Greene on the Far East Side.

Both wrote segments of Designated Daughter, which resembles an intimate session with a stranger's diary.

The book covers everything from Fulford's struggle with sobriety and seasonal affective disorder to their daily routine -- which, when Greene was more mobile, often consisted of navigating their "Bermuda Triangle": Kroger, CVS and the library.

"I didn't hold anything back," Greene said. "There was no other way for us to tell the story but to lay ourselves out there on the page."

The commitment to her mother has prevented Fulford from frequently seeing her daughter and grandchildren in California, and from having a love life.

Yet, for now, the latter isn't her focus.

"You have gone off and lived a whole life without your mother," she said, "but the chance to come back and have her again is a terrific opportunity."
 

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