Nancy
Nau Sullivan’s memoir The
Last Cadillac won two Eric Hoffer awards.
Her first mystery, Saving Tuna Street,
will be released in June 2020. She has a master’s degree in journalism from
Marquette University and worked at newspapers in the Midwest. Learn more about
her and her books at her website.
Writing a Memoir
My
memoir started with an explosion of sorts: My mother died, my
marriage crashed, and my father announced he was leaving Indiana and coming to
live with me and the kids on an island in Florida. It wasn’t an
easy time. My siblings accused me of “kidnapping” Dad. He had a number of
health problems, and I had no idea how to deal with illnesses of the elderly,
particularly cancer and dementia. But my dad and I were close. I couldn’t
disappoint him. I wanted to take care of him – and at the same time do the best
for my two kids still at home. And so began my memoir The Last Cadillac …
As
a newspaper journalist, I was drawn to writing it all down. On occasion, I’d
written feature articles about the “sándwich generation.” Now, suddenly, I was in the
sándwich – in the middle between caring for my elderly parent on one side and the young
ones on the other. I began to see that whether planned or not, most of us end up being
caregivers, or being cared for.
Many of these caregivers told me their stories, and I had to tell mine.
There is no manual for this sort of family adventure, and it was
not my intention to write one. But I felt strongly I had to write about what I did right
and what I did wrong, and there was plenty of the latter.
Even
as I was
driven to write my book, the effort seemed doomed from the start. For one, I
hardly had time to think straight about what was happening one day to the next.
Dad would wake up hobbled with leg or back pain; the kids had all sorts of
activities: cheerleading, soccer, birthday parties. And all along, I jotted
down events and bits of dialogue as we went “down life’s path” (Dad).
Getting to the heart was essential. I trained myself to stay focused on the message – about care giving
while juggling life:
I
knew where my story would begin – with Dad’s announcement that he was coming to live
with us – and I knew where
it would end. With his death. It took me a long time to write that ending. The middle was a
never-ending series of mishaps and discoveries about how to stay on my feet. (Loving
mostly every minute, as it turned out.)
The
message kept
me going and
moved me along. I had a point and I stuck to it. I was writing a
warning, of sorts, but I tried to be encouraging, and some of it was pretty
funny. At least, that’s what they tell me, and I have to look back on some of
it and laugh.
One
standout from all of it was that much of the drama, disappointment, and
sometimes disaster could have been averted with better planning and
communication. I blame all of us for not cooling off, sitting down, and really
communicating (especially the listening part). As a family, we did nothing to prepare for any of it. My parents didn’t talk about money –
“How vulgar!” And my mother never used the word “cancer” when she got sick. It
was “The Big C.” We talked a lot, but we did not communicate very well. With the
divorce, and the kids, and then Dad and all my personal problems, I didn’t take
into consideration that my siblings had just lost their mother – and now they
were going to lose their father to Florida some 1200 miles away.
But we got through it. I wrote the
story, which now has been dubbed “a must-read for caregivers” and “a common sense and
humorous guide to surviving family relationships.” I hope it
helps some people. Most of us
have parents and relatives we are concerned about, and we will need to take care of them. I
didn’t see it coming, nor did I do anything to prevent it when the situation
presented itself almost overnight. I tried to enjoy it, and learn something
from it. I did see, finally, that humor and love worked in our favor. But I didn’t have to write a
book to know that. A lot of love was always there.
The Last Cadillac, a Memoir
Middle-age
is challenging enough, but when Nancy Nau Sullivan suddenly finds herself
caring for two children, grappling with her mother’s death, and caring for her
ailing father while at the same time navigating a contentious divorce and
dealing with long-simmering sibling rivalries, she wonders how she can keep
herself sane. Things get even more complicated when her siblings accuse her of
“kidnapping” their father and carting him and his Cadillac off to Anna Maria
Island, Florida, where they are greeted by Hurricane Josephine. In this
gripping memoir, Sullivan guides the reader through the chaotic whirlwind of
unexpected and unwanted change and offers a common sense and humorous guide to
surviving family relationships.
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