DOING GREAT

He is doing great!  The doctor took him off one of his blood pressure medicines and he stopped being light headed and dizzy; so he can now walk without falling – wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.  It happened a few days ago but I could not blog it because my laptop is having a nervous breakdown (along with me).

Will do some stories in the next few days.  Feel so much better since he is doing better.

I really appreciate all you people who are following my blog.  Thanks.

ALWAYS A GENTLEMAN

My darling is always such a gentleman;  I guess some things don’t change. 

When I was bringing him home from the hospital last week I pulled into a service station for gas.  He started getting out of the passenger’s seat.  I asked where he was going and he said to pump the gas.  The sweet man could hardly walk but he remembered his old fashion manners. 

The other day I was walking behind him holding on to his gait belt so he would not fall.  We came to a door and he stopped dead still and I crashed into him.  I asked  him what was the matter and he said for me to get in front of him so he could hold the door for me.

DOWN HILL

Darling is too dizzy headed to do much walking now.  This morning we went about 20 feet and he leaned against me and the wall and just crumpled down to the floor.  Believe it or not it was not hard to get him up and back to the chair with the gait belt.  God bless gait belts.

THANKSGIVING

We have the holiday figured out.  Our family will celebrate on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  We did this last year and it worked out great.  James and I stayed at home on Thanksgiving day but we never turned on the TV so he never knew it was Thanksgiving.  Then on Saturday all the kids and grandkids came with turkey and the trimmings and as far as he was concerned it was Thanksgiving day.  As I have mentioned before, count your blessings no matter where they come from.

HOME AT LAST

James home from the hospital.  Don’t think he will ever get strong and good at walking again.  It is like pulling teeth to get him to get up from sofa and refill his own coffee cup.   He will have home health care and physical therapy.  To be eligible  for this he has to be homebound.  They only permit leaving for three things 1) doctor appointments  2) church and you won’t believe 3) for hair appointments!  They put that in there for people like my mother.  And yes, she was a beautiful lady.

I woke up sad this morning.  Guess that could be expected on occasion. 

IS THIS THE NEXT STEP?

This morning he feels tired.  The nurse stood him in the bathroom to take  a shower.  He has not taken  a shower alone yet.  I kept listening and no water was running.  I went in and asked if he needed some help.  He said he guessed he did; he did not know what to do.  Heart breaking.  I bathed him and got him back in bed.  I hope when he gets back home he will remember how to take a shower etc.

WONDERS NEVER CEASE

Darling will be in the hospital another week.  His pneumonia is not gone and they are giving him more drip antibiotics.  Believe me this is good news.   They were telling us he would leave soon and they recommended going to an interim facility for physical therapy before going home.  I kept trying to tell them he gets sundowners and does not do well when I am not around.  They kept just not taking it in and telling me how great the care was.  They would look at this sweet, gentle man  sitting up in bed drinking coffee and know I was exaggerating.  When Missy, our daughter came in and   they told her about the suggestion, she told them she saw it as being a full blown disaster.  Drew, our son thought the disaster would be if we took him straight home before his walking was good, he would fall, take me down with him and break bones in both of us.  We were in a real quandary.  So it is great news to all of us that he will be here another week to practice walking and balance.  Also, of course, for the antibiotics.

 

I have tried not to let the alcohol affect our social life.  When we go out in the evening, I drive and I used to hold his hand getting into our destination.  Since we fell going into Vetoni’s restaurant I don’t always hold his hand.  Coming across the parking lot it was one of those 10 or 12 step falls,  more and more out of control – going down – going down – going down – splat.  He was holding my hand so hard, I could not get away.  Oh yes, I’m that kind of gal; I would have let him go down by himself if I could have gotten away.  After all, someone has to stay healthy to take care of him. A young family was coming in at the same time.  The father, a mountain of a man wearing starched, creased jeans, cowboy boots and a shirt with the name of one of the local ranches embroidered on the pocket .  He picked us up, me first, naturally, after all we are still in Texas.  He helped dust us off and put us at ease with a fall story of his own in the pasture and how he looked around to see if anyone saw him, even though he knew no one was around.  I told him that at our age we were more thankful for help than embarrassed.  Oh yes, I do love East Texas. 

A YUCKY VACATION

A step forward.  Darling has moved into a private room.  He slept through the night, no waking up to strange happenings.  No tearing the tubes out.  All was peaceful.  Hopefully, he is getting a back to “normal” a little bit.  The other night in ICU he woke up in the middle of the night grouchy and complaining and aggravated and they came to the waiting room to get me to calm him down.  He told me it would be a cold day when he came on this vacation again!  I told him I sure hopped so.

I haven’t talked about his alcohol yet.  I wrote this before he developed diabetes.  Of course he is not having beer in the hospital; I am not sure what will happen when we get home.  I’m a little worried.

Alcohol -  Beer, he drinks lots of beer.  Probably a 6 pack to a 12 pack a day.  I don’t usually count because I don’t want to know.  I did count 8 empty beer cans on the kitchen cabinet one night and that was after we had been gone most of the day.  I haven’t been arguing with him about it; after all, like I told his brother, he has a much bigger problem than alcohol.  Maybe I am just saving myself.  It would be a 24/7 job for me to slow down his drinking,  plus unending arguments at home, I don’t think I am ready for that.  So if you have been considering buying stock in a beer company, buy Budweiser; your investment should be safe. 

DOES ANYTHING CHANGE?

He has been up twice today sitting in a chair.  His nurse, Esmarilda, went into great detail telling him (and me) why he is not to have unlimited fluids and some things he could do instead.  She finished and he said “May I have a cup of water?”

Sex – the last thing to go, at least thinking about it is the last thing to go.  He can’t remember twit but several times a day he brings up the subject.  Nothing raunchy; he is still a gentleman.  Mainly, things like he invites me to the bedroom.  I decline and we both wipe imaginary sweat off our foreheads and are relieved.  As I have said before men’s brains are in their crotch.  My cousin calls this oral sex – when all you do is talk about it.

STATUS

Doing good this morning.  They are weaning him off ventilator.  He is sedated but if you talk to him he will barely raise his eyebrows.  Fingers crossed

On Sunday Darling’s mind was everywhere except in the hospital.  Shannon was sitting with him.

  He thought he was in the doctor’s office and wanted to know what time his appointment was; he was tired of waiting.

Then he thought he was at McClain’s for lunch and wanted to know if we had ordered yet?

Then he thought he was in the dentist’s office.  He was tired of waiting there too.  The nurse started bringing in the pan and all the things to give him a bath.  Shannon was sure we were going to have trouble; she was sure he would not let them give him a bath; you don’t get baths at the dentist office.

WHAT A DAY

The surgery is over.  Dr. Magee said they removed fluid and gelatos stuff which gave his lung a lot more space to expand into. Said there had been inflammation there which had caused it.  He left two tubes in which would stay another two or three days.  I hope I have all this right.  I see a prolonged recovery period and am fearful that it may not be a “full recovery” to where he was before.

Did not vote today.  We’ve been here in hospital with James since Friday.  Of all the elections to miss!!!

Our life has been pretty easy up to now, I don’t know what it will be after this illness.  I think I know why our life has been better than expected.  There are a lot of people praying for us.  It would have to be something that powerful.  Prayer is so amazing – such a mystery.  It is even more of a mystery than the fact that food comes out of dirt.  I have always thought the fact that food comes out of dirt is the most amazing mystery.  I told that to someone and she did not seem to think the food part was a mystery.  If she does not think food coming out of dirt is a mystery, I wonder what she feels about the much bigger mystery of prayer.

I am sure I will continue to post the the blogs I had already written about living with alzheimers.

A SICK FELLOW

 Darling is a sick man.  In ICU at Medical City. Pneumonia.  They drained his lung once with a needle and the fluid came back in 24 hours.  They put a tube in his lung but nothing drained out.  Too much scar tissue.  They will do surgery to drain fluid.  He is on a ventilator and sedated.  Trying to schedule between surgeon and operating room.  It is my understanding that the longer it takes before he starts getting better, the longer it will take to get better.  Does that make sense? 

Written earlier for the blog:

Hypotenuse - We were talking about going to Stevenville and what towns were near-by and he thought that was the long way around.  I replied, Oh no, we went across on the hypotenuse.  (An old family joke.)  He said "Mmmmmmm,  hypotenuse - the sum of the square root of the other two sides."  Whaaaat?  Even if it is true, how on earth did he remember it?  Also, how could he remember where these towns were and that it was the long way around?  He can't even remember if he ate breakfast or not.