Another Sanity Challenge

Well.  No sooner did I express my aversion to hospitals...

This morning, my mother's physical therapist called me to tell me that mother's caregiver told her that she thought my mother had a urinary tract infection.  (Did you follow that?)  Because my mother needed to repeatedly get up in the night and nobody got any sleep.

*Sigh*

I talked to my mom, but she had no clue what I was talking about.  But the evidence was there...wet sheets, wet underwear, many trips to the bathroom...

So I called her primary care physician to make an appointment, but we couldn't get in.  They suggested we go to an Urgent Care facility, but they didn't have one to recommend.

(Gee, thanks for the advice.)

I called the Hospital Emergency Room, where she had just been a few weeks earlier for her leg.  I asked, "Do you think we should go to an Urgent Care facility or to the ER?" 

"You can go anywhere you want, but if you come here (ER) we will be able to do everything that might be needed (labs, etc)."

So off to ER we went.  It was a slow afternoon, so we walked in the door and within 5 minutes we had a half dozen nurses and doctors jumping on her case.

They already had her history on the computer so the questions were pretty basic.  Then, because she really doesn't have the mental wherewithal to provide a good urine sample in order to get a clean catch, they did an "in and out" catheterization.

They sent the sample it to the hospital lab.   

Diagnosis 30 minutes later:  A bad UTI.

Within 90 minutes, we had our antibiotics and were on our way back to her Assisted Living facility.

So she only had time to ask me 10 times why we were at the ER.  LOL.

Lesson learned for us (at least when it comes to my mother)...don't waste time with Urgent Care.  For the average person with a cut or nosebleed, Urgent Care is probably just fine.   But when it comes to my mother and her issues, I doubt Urgent Care would have been able to do a catheterization nor would they have been able to get the lab results so quickly.  And if it had been something more serious, the ER could have admitted her to the hospital.

(We actually kind of learned this lesson with Buster...if it is something potentially serious, which it almost always was, don't bother with a regular vet, take him to Emergency.)

I'm home now, glad to be here, and hanging out with my husband and dogs.

I need to take advice from Jenny.

HEY, DON'T WORRY...RELAX!

The Art of Maintaining My Sanity

What a weird trip the last few months have been!

After my mother fell and broke her leg, she spent a few days in the hospital, then was in a rehabilitation facility for about 6 weeks. 

Suffice it to say that the biggest problem she has now is NOT her leg.  It is her brain.  Her Alzheimers seems to have gotten significantly worse in the span of two months, which I don’t really understand because (as my husband says) “she didn’t fall on her head.”

In fact, at rehab, she was a star in physical therapy.  But because she was in a new facility, it became apparent that she literally cannot learn anything new.  I mean ANYTHING.

Like, “Use your red button to call the nurse when you need help to get to the bathroom.”

She never learned that.

She also could never remember why she was in the hospital or rehab.  You could tell her a dozen times in the span of a 20 minute visit, but she would continue to ask.

Plus she has flights of fantasy about what she can do…she thinks she can walk without help, use the bathroom, get dressed...yes, she could do all those things before she fell, but not now!  And while she knows who I am (probably because I visit almost every day), half the time she doesn’t know who my brother is. 

So fortunately, finally her leg was well enough for her to be discharged.  She's still in a wheelchair a lot but also can use a walker a bit.  But she forgets she cannot just get up and walk around!  So this meant that she couldn’t go back to her normal living situation in her Assisted Living facility, where she was basically pretty independent.  I couldn’t leave her alone, for fear she would fall again.  But I also didn’t want to move her out of the life she at least kind of knows.

So I’ve hired a service to provide 24 hour supervision.  Now, she’s back "home", with essentially a full time babysitter in her tiny studio.   She doesn’t remember a lot of her friends there, but she still loves to play bingo and penny poker.  At least for now, she’s safe and cared for, but I don’t know if this is a long term solution, mostly because it is SO expensive.  Right now I'm just playing it by ear, trying to figure out what's best for her. 

Anyway, as you can imagine, my own life was a bit in turmoil.

In between all the doctors' appointments, CareTeam meetings, arranging for the caregiver service, and visiting her every day, meanwhile also trying to work at my job as much as possible, I can proudly say that I always worked out at least 3 days a week with my trainer.  That was very helpful to managing my stress.

But my food…whew.  That was another story. "OF COURSE," stress and turmoil automatically means I eat crap.  I got back heavy into the licorice and ice cream, and just generally eating too much.  (All the things I crave now are foods my mother would not let me have as a child, because I was "too fat."  OMG, could my food foibles be any more clichéd?)

I have no idea how much weight I've gained, but my skinny jeans are super snug.  I'm going to guess I'm back up to 175.  Well, maybe not quite that much, but at least the low 170's.   I'll weigh after a few days off the sugar.     

At least now that things are under control with my mom, I can ease back into eating right.   Today was the first day I did that.  The biggest thing was today I didn’t eat any of my normal comfort foods.

In my book that’s a victory.

Anyway, I apologize that I have not been around much to read and comment on all your blogs, but I promise...I'm back!

ETA:  I was just getting ready to post this two days ago, but I wanted to proofread first.  Then I got distracted...and then my husband had surgery this morning on his foot, which he injured about a month ago by tripping on a curb.

Das Boot

So we got home a bit ago, and I am hanging out with him while he sleeps in his chair.  I woke him up and asked him if it was okay to leave for a few minutes (to visit my mom) and he said "No, not until this is over."  I have no idea what that means.  I think it's the drugs, but I'm sticking around.

Between my mother and my husband, I am so tired of hospitals.

Anyway, today is day 3 of no licorice and no ice cream, and to be honest, I'm dying!  I want a fix so bad, probably due to the stress and boredom.

I have both in the house (bought a week ago), but I've made up my mind that I will not have any.  I suppose I could throw them away but right now I want to see if I can be strong and resist.

Actually, I am looking at all of what's happened lately as a challenge to maintain my sanity.  I don't feel too crazy, yet...so far so good!   

Onward and Upward!

Everything was Business as Usual...Until It Wasn't

Summer Solstice came and went.  It was a crappy, cold, windy day (not atypical of Seattle) and so my girlfriend and I barely left her condo.  We kind of looked over the railing at the goings on.  The parade wasn't as well attended as usual because of the weather. We watched a lot of TV and I was introduced to shows I'd never seen before (90 Day Fiance, Dr Pimple Popper, and sMothered...all gross in their own way)

I'm not one to just sit around, though, so I finally ventured out by myself just to shake off the boredom.  The event is in a very hippie dippie neighborhood, so it had the usual booths of handmade jewelry and ceramics, vegan and CBD products, tie dyed stuff, and "fair fare."  I bought some red licorice (for me) and some fudge (to take home the next day for my husband).  Pretty exciting.  Not.

The only thing worthy of a photo was this cute display of succulents in front of a plant store.

This is a Volkswagen...so are the succulents in the boot? Or in the engine compartment?

Diet for the day was junk food, so I ate potato chips.  Lots and lots of chips.  I went a bit crazy, I think mostly because I don’t normally get those things at home (we just don’t allow them in our house unless we are having a party, and then all leftover chips go home with someone).

As a result of all that salt, my right ankle and foot swelled up.  This is the ankle I sprained badly years ago, and it is still very sensitive to any aggravating factor.  Especially because normally I eat pretty cleanly and my system has no idea how to handle junk.  When I worked out for the next week, my shoe was so tight it hurt.  I had to keep loosening the laces.  Lesson learned…do not eat mass quantities of potato chips, or junk in general for that matter. 

Life continued on, 4^th of July came and went.  There weren't too many fireworks and both dogs handled the loud booms well.  I didn't drink a lot of alcohol nor eat a lot of crap.  We also had company for that week, which was fun.

In between all the fun stuff, life was normal...work, work out, visit mom, work, work out, take mom to appointments, work...

So I was busy and didn’t really get a chance to update my blog.  Business as usual. 

Then…last Friday, I got a call around 8:30 am.  The person calling had a heavy accent so she was difficult to understand.  She kept saying something about a scheduled surgery and a transfusion.  I asked, Are you sure you have the right number?  Finally she said Aren’t you Mary S’s POA?  Yes, I said.  Well, she is scheduled for surgery this afternoon to fix her broken leg. 

Holy crap, it was the hospital calling to ask my permission to give my mother a blood transfusion during surgery if necessary. 

Turns out, she had fallen in the night at her Assisted Living place.  She had broken her femur and was in the emergency room and had been there since 4 am.  Well, at least they did get her to the hospital, but neglected to call me to let me know.  Yikes.  Not the way you want to start your day.

So I headed on over to the hospital, there she was.  This was her x-ray.

 

Fortunately, amazingly, she didn't seem to be in a lot of pain, as long as she just lay still.  Unfortunately, with her Alzheimers, she just kept asking over and over, why are we here?  And during our stay there, she must have asked me a million times if I could help her get to the bathroom.  No, Mom, because you can’t be moved. 

Anyway, turned out we were in the ER until 6 pm that night when an operating room finally opened up and a surgeon was finally available to fix her leg.  The surgery went well. 

So the last week has been a flurry of activity, visiting her wherever she is (and she was moved 3 times in 3 days in the hospital), making medical decisions and arrangements (plus still trying to work as much as possible).  She’s now in a skilled nursing facility.  They've had to move her twice because she keeps trying to get out of bed, so now she's right across the hall from the nurse's station.  But I think she is finally realizing what happened.  This afternoon she told me, my leg hurts!  I asked, Do you know why?  She said, I broke my leg!   

To be honest, I don’t know her long term prognosis.  Her mind is extremely scattered, she’s not eating, and she’s not a very robust person anyway.  So I’m starting to wonder if she will ever be able to go back to her Assisted Living place. 

Anyway, I’m just kind of venting right now.  Getting old is not for sissies.