I see a former colleague and his wife in the mall where I walk in the morning. They are always holding hands and are obviously very loving toward one another. She seems to have an early stage of alzheimers or something similar. They remind me of my last year with my wife before she died of brain cancer. I assume the man is suffering from the diminished capacity of his wife, just as I did in the last years of my life with my wife. But my point is that in those last years FOR BOTH HIM AND MYSELF the level of love, loving care, and the quiet joy it affords could not be higher. A silver lining as it were.
Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones
We live in a life-care community. We are in Independent Living, but there are various degrees of assistance, up to and including a nursing home on site with an Alzheimer's unit (please God we never get to that point).
For the last couple of months we had someone from a really good agency stay with Bob once a week so I could get out on errands, and I hope we can make that arrangement again.
Now I'm going to curl up with my lecture notes one more time, then forget it until 10 o'clock tomorrow. It will be interesting - we will have introductory music to play the audience in and again at the end as they leave. It will begin with Gershwin, Cole Porter, etc because the first book discussed is "The House That George Built" by Wilfrid Sheed. I'll finish with Dan Shaughnessey's "Senior Year", all about high school baseball, so we'll end on a nice rollicking rendition of Take Me Out to The Ballgame.
The music is an experiment. One of our neighbors is a semi-professional pianist and he provided music for my last poetry reading. This was extremely popular, so we're trying it out with the lecture.
Tomkitten, YOU sound delightful.
I agree, I'm getting to know Tomkitten more by these posts, all to the good.
Mental Decline
What was delightful was that poetry reading which was all poems about different kinds of dance. I had the poems all chosen when this newish neighbor (who, oddly enough, has the same last name except for the last letter) was feeling a bit sad because he couldn't figure out how to fit his piano playing into the residents' entertainment schedule. (He didn't want a recital all to himself; that's not his thing). Our Activities Director thought it might go well with the reading. Did it ever! It was talked about for days.
To be honest, I didn't see it as part of today's presentation, but he was so cast down when I said I didn't think it would work & he'd have to wait for the next poetry reading, that I figured we ought to try. And while the refreshments at Intermission are definitely a draw, so will the music be.
I'm watchng my mother's mental state steadily decline.
She'd had trouble with names and occasionally confusing something she
imagined with reality. Now she will ask me if she is still married (she
separated from my father before my first Christmas) or she will ask
about her mother (my grandmother has been dead for over forty years.)
On Monday, when I stopped in on my way home from work she asked
how I knew she was there.
I think this is not going to get any better. It feels like she is being taken
away a bit at a time. It's hard.
Her personality remains the same, though. She remains cheerful and
optimistic, still enjoys a joke or a story. We had a great conversation
about the fun she had as a young woman at the Oceanview Ballroom,
dancing to swing-era bands.
Tomkitten -- I'm looking forward to hearing about the lecture and the music.
George -- It's hard. Unfortunately, it gets harder. Keep talking, we'll keep listening.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I submitted long-term care policy applications last week. Peace of mind, I guess.
Well, my mother behaves differently to how you, George, described it.
Yesterday, Mrs Walter stayed here while was on a daytour with some friends, who are visiting us. Mrs. Walter phoned my mother, asking her, if all was okay. It was, was the reply.
Then minutes later (she always has to refind our notice with various telephone numbers) she phoned backed, telling my wife that my sister and BIL were coming to visit her that afternoon.
Since/although you never can't be sure, if she hadn't mixed something up, Mrs. Walter drove there (by bus & train).
They came, and proudly my mother told them that she goes shopping nearly every day, prepares dinner at least any second day, gets visits by friends every day, goes twice per week to gymn ... all things, which really had happened: before she got the stroke six years ago.
When confronted with that (which I mostly avoid to do), she negatates having said such or that we missunderstood what she had said or ...
Besides that, my aunt really doesn't feel well - indigestion, the doctor aid; additionally "fed up" with my mother, commanding her, and looking after my mother, we say).
So she stayed in bed, said, she couldn't move ...
I've been there three times today. At noon, I told them that my aunt had to go to the hospital (something she really wants to avoid - going tot the doctor's is already a pain for her), and stay ther, since I couldn't provide the essential medical care. [I'm not talking about how her room lokks like: I suppose, farm animals live in a better surrounding.])
And my mother would stay during that period in a stationary short term care.
This led at least my aunt get out of the bed and sitting with my mother by now.
(I want to add here that the nurse visiting my mother this morning [and at noon] was a grat help: although my aunt isn't cared by them she looked at her [she's a certified nurse] and phoned with the doctor [which certainly was better than when "a nephew" wanted something to know ...].
She deeply sighed after having looked at my aunt and after my mother told her, how well both could get along. I wonder how long my sighs would take ... :wink: )
Tomkitten, if you're willing to tell me the details of the reading, I'd love to go to it (unless it's already happened). Can you PM me the details if you're willing? Thanks.
Sorry to hear about your mother, George. When my grandmother started to lose her memories it made my mother quite distraught. I kept thinking about how she maintained her sense of humor and good graces until her death. I think it's so much easier that way. My dad's aunt went the other way and often had to be restrained in the nursing home because she would physically lash out at people around her.
Restraints, that must have been grim!
Restraining isn't done (at least legally) here very often: judges aren't quick in allowing that.
Tomkitten--
Are your cultural innovations the cause or the result of your youthful mind?
George--
At least your mother trusts you as a source of information in this confusing world. Still, watching the erosion of a beloved personality is very troubling and saddening.
Walter--
Rewriting history is maddening for the onlookers. Mr. Noddy is more and more inclined to adjust the past for his own greater glory. I figure that what can't be cured, must be endured.
********
Today after much discussion--some of it heated--a contractor sealed the driveway and patched three winters of frost heave before the problem became acute. The Contractor also agreed to put down four bags of Sacrete to create a bridge over the little gully between the road and the mailbox and paper cyclinders so that I don't have to wade in vile weather to retrieve information.. The Sacrete was in the trunk of our car.
We agreed he'd start the job at 10. He arrived at 9:45 and set to work.
Mr. Noddy went for his morning coffee klatch. At 10 he left to run a few little errands. He and the Sacrete arrived home at 11:30 after The Contractor had left.
Mr. Noddy feels no guilt. How was he supposed to know The Contractor would show up on time and bustle like a beaver?
Done is done and can't be undone, but I'm fighting a feeling that Eliza Doolittle and I both deserve Special Days devoted to our Enduring Glory.
With luck the Sacrete will be in Mr. Noddy's way and he'll be inspired to put it down himself.
Walter, one of the hardest things for my mother to endure with my father was her feeling the need to correct his misstatements, which became more and more egregious as time went on. She hated his 'lies', he hated being corrected. It was a dilemma for both.
Noddy, may your gully be filled and your access to information be unhindered in good weather and in bad.
JPB--
As Mr. Noddy's creative powers grow, access to objective information is of great symbolic importance.
My son will be visiting at the end of the month and I'm hoping the weather will allow for a little pick & shovel work in the name of family solidarity.
If it rains or the heat is oppressive, he can give the computer a good house cleaning.
Life can be full of positive potential.
Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones
I had to give in and call Bob to say I couldn't come tonight - the twice-a-day visits have caught up with me and at 4 p.m. I fell asleep at the computer, so I didn't think I'd be safe to to drive (especially as the roads are rather curly, with one right-angle bend which comes suddenly, despite a warning sign). But he was very alert and chatty on the phone, has in fact, been increasingly so, which seems a very good sign.
So I'm going to bed early early tonight. They are coming to clean the carpet and his recliner - it seemed a good idea to take what advantage I could of his absence - so I have to be up early early, and I'll visit in the morning. That will be a nice change.
Walter Hinteler wrote:Restraining isn't done (at least legally) here very often: judges aren't quick in allowing that.
In the hospital ( I don't know about nursing homes ),
but a relative or legal counsel has to sign the petition for restraints. I've never heard of a Judge being involved, when the patient is noncriminal.
Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones
Noddy - I heard an interview on NPR this afternoon in which there was speculation about a memoir by Karl Rove - now that might wind up being a bit of adjusted past...
Mental Decline & Dependency/Coping With Aging Loved Ones
Last Thursday I was asked about restraints for Bob and I definitely opted for medication instead.
When my mother was in a nursing home as the result of a series of small strokes, she contracted pneumonia. We took her to the hospital and they didn't ask - this was some 17 years ago, and I think policies have changed since then - but I came in one morning and found that they had used very soft cloth restraints around her wrists because she kept climbing out of bed, even with the bedrails up. I had no idea she was so athletic! Anyway, the restraints were totally inadequate; she just worked her arms right out of them. To be honest, I don't remember the final outcome.
