Good bye, baby. My sweet boy. I hope you find Riley on the other side of the Rainbow Bridge. I love you.
Sunday, August 31, 2014
It's over
Good bye, baby. My sweet boy. I hope you find Riley on the other side of the Rainbow Bridge. I love you.
Update on Jack the cat
My sweet boy Jack, who has been through EVERYTHING with me, was diagnosed with lymphoma several months ago.
I chose not to take aggressive action, and to let it run its course, trusting that he and I would know when it was "time."
He's been making himself bleed a lot, obsessively grooming his lesions, and he's having more and more bad days lately.
So I asked Dave to call the vet and inquire about a prednisone injection to try to ease Jack's discomfort, and maybe buy us a little more quality of life for a couple of weeks.
The doc was in favor of giving it a try, as well as in favor of letting ME administer the injection at home, to spare Jack the trauma of a vet visit.
I gave him the shot a few days ago, and it really didn't seem to make a difference, except to give him his voice back. He'd lost his voice over the past month or so. My suspicion is that the cancer has moved inside. Something the first doctor, who turned out to be a horrible hack, said would not happen.
His current doctor says it can go anywhere once it's established.
So, I am keeping an eye on him.
He recently had a stretch of very good days, and even did his old thing of hopping up on his back legs to try to get me to play. I took a phone recording of him playing with strings on a pair of shorts just a week ago.
He is losing weight, but he is still eating and drinking. A little, anyway. I'm not sure he ate yesterday.
But.
He will tell me.
Sadly, it won't be long now.
I chose not to take aggressive action, and to let it run its course, trusting that he and I would know when it was "time."
He's been making himself bleed a lot, obsessively grooming his lesions, and he's having more and more bad days lately.
So I asked Dave to call the vet and inquire about a prednisone injection to try to ease Jack's discomfort, and maybe buy us a little more quality of life for a couple of weeks.
The doc was in favor of giving it a try, as well as in favor of letting ME administer the injection at home, to spare Jack the trauma of a vet visit.
I gave him the shot a few days ago, and it really didn't seem to make a difference, except to give him his voice back. He'd lost his voice over the past month or so. My suspicion is that the cancer has moved inside. Something the first doctor, who turned out to be a horrible hack, said would not happen.
His current doctor says it can go anywhere once it's established.
So, I am keeping an eye on him.
He recently had a stretch of very good days, and even did his old thing of hopping up on his back legs to try to get me to play. I took a phone recording of him playing with strings on a pair of shorts just a week ago.
He is losing weight, but he is still eating and drinking. A little, anyway. I'm not sure he ate yesterday.
But.
He will tell me.
Sadly, it won't be long now.
Monday, August 25, 2014
Back home
Sorry I missed posting this past weekend, but today, I'm down with a tummy bug, so I have time.
Mom was sent home from the nursing facility on Thursday of last week. We thought it was too soon, because she was still wobbling out of her mind a lot, still in a diaper, and still pretty weak. When we visited two weekends ago at the nursing home, she was completely insane--completely manic and demented.
Then last weekend, she seemed better, and I saw her sitting up for the first time in over a month.
But she'd been through so many back slides and baby steps forward and back slides over the month of her being "in patient" that we couldn't be sure of anything.
But home she went.....because we aren't Medicare, and Medicare runs the show.
We asked Dave's dad to please arrange for the visiting aids (we figured out they aren't actually nurses) to start the day mom went home, but he didn't bother with that.
So, for the past 4 days, he's been feeding her oat meal, and letting her sleep all day.
She says she feels like she's being drugged, which she is--her current list of meds is pretty long...but he could be making her get up like she was yesterday when we visited. She SHOULD be getting up every day.
She needs rest, but she also needs to get up and move around every day, or she will get actual pneumonia.
We're pretty sure she never had pneumonia, by the way.
There never was a chest xray to indicate it, and while she DID have an upper respiratory infection before and during her hospitalization, and she DID check in with MRSA, she never had any lung crackling or other signs of actual pneumonia, according to the hospitalist.
The E/R doc diagnosed her with it because of her dyspnea...but we are pretty sure she was gasping for breath because she was off her psych meds, and was in constant panic mode at that point.
Then she fell into rapid cycling bi-polar, which is her main issue when her meds aren't in her body. Plus, during this mis-adventure caused by her taking herself off of medication that keeps her sane (we still have no idea why she chose to do this after being on them for 25 years), she was also completely demented much of the time. Crazy. Completely out of balance mentally.
It was very scary for Dave, who saw most of it, because he spent the most time at her bedside.
Anyway, we went to the house yesterday, and took a bag of groceries and some spaghetti and meat balls that I made and put into containers for the freezer. We gave them cans of soup, pudding (one of the few things she actually ate while in the nursing home), apple sauce, fruit cups, frozen veggies, microwave rice, and Ensure for weight gain. Others had been there to visit, and there were three packages of cookies out on the counter, and the freezer was full of ice cream.
At least we brought real food.
There were a few frozen dinners in the freezer, too, but not enough for a week for two people who are supposed to be eating real food.
They said thanks. We suggested she eat something while we were there.
Dad said "we're not really lunch people."
She weighs 90 pounds...she needs to become a lunch person.
I just don't know about Dad sometimes. But of course, I was too timid to SAY "She weighs 90 pounds, she needs to become a lunch person!"
(Keep in mind that Dad was in a lock down facility for dementia for a couple of years. They had misdiagnosed him with alzheimers, but it turned out to be alcohol-induced insanity instead of that..... He no longer drinks, but we really wonder where his head is at sometimes. Not really lunch people? He clearly does NOT GET IT.)
So, all we could do was leave the food there, and hope that they take advantage of it. She is going to end up right where she started if all she eats is cookies and oat meal, and if she stays in bed all day.
She sat up and chatted with us, and was happy to see us, but she didn't remember my name at first, and had to ask me where I was from. THEN she remembered that I am the daughter in law who lives HERE (the others are out of state, and she only sees them once in a great while), and who helps her.
She also didn't know where Dave and I live, how long we've lived there, or if we owned or rented, but we gently reminded her.
(There was a lady from the church there at the time, too, and she was telling her about me and Dave, and having trouble with most of the details. At least Mom knew who David was.)
When we asked, Dad said that the visiting aids are due to start today. I hope this is true, because we know for sure that they have lied to us, and kept stuff from us, in the past. Like Mom not wanting us to know she had a cold, and was not taking her medication...and the family friend intervened.
The aids, if they are actually coming, will help with chores, bathing, and they will prepare food, run errands, and ask if meds are being taken.
Hopefully, them coming in the house will encourage her to get up and chat with them, too. Not sure if Mom is still diapering, but if she is, I imagine that they help with that, too. I hope.
It would be impolite for her to just stay in bed with people in the house, and hopefully they will make her get up and bathe, etc.
So that's where we stand at the moment. Just have to wait and see.
She sees the psychiatrist later this week, and hopefully, the sheer volume of medication will be reduced so that she can function better. She also needs to see her primary care to discuss the medical collection of drugs she is on.
Dave is also going to try to talk to the psychiatrist first, and ask him to please impress upon BOTH Mom and Dad the critical importance of regular, quality nutrition.
We clearly can't get that message across, but they'll listen to a doctor.
The family friend who has been watching out for them for years has now officially moved to Texas, so we won't have any back up other than the visiting aids. No one to tell us things Mom and Dad don't want us to know. No one to call us when things get out of hand.
We're hoping that Dave's son, who lives in the same town as Mom and Dad, can step up and take a little more pro-active involvement...But he's 20something and has a live in girl friend, so he's busy being young and happy.
Like I said, I guess we'll just have to see how things go.
Mom was sent home from the nursing facility on Thursday of last week. We thought it was too soon, because she was still wobbling out of her mind a lot, still in a diaper, and still pretty weak. When we visited two weekends ago at the nursing home, she was completely insane--completely manic and demented.
Then last weekend, she seemed better, and I saw her sitting up for the first time in over a month.
But she'd been through so many back slides and baby steps forward and back slides over the month of her being "in patient" that we couldn't be sure of anything.
But home she went.....because we aren't Medicare, and Medicare runs the show.
We asked Dave's dad to please arrange for the visiting aids (we figured out they aren't actually nurses) to start the day mom went home, but he didn't bother with that.
So, for the past 4 days, he's been feeding her oat meal, and letting her sleep all day.
She says she feels like she's being drugged, which she is--her current list of meds is pretty long...but he could be making her get up like she was yesterday when we visited. She SHOULD be getting up every day.
She needs rest, but she also needs to get up and move around every day, or she will get actual pneumonia.
We're pretty sure she never had pneumonia, by the way.
There never was a chest xray to indicate it, and while she DID have an upper respiratory infection before and during her hospitalization, and she DID check in with MRSA, she never had any lung crackling or other signs of actual pneumonia, according to the hospitalist.
The E/R doc diagnosed her with it because of her dyspnea...but we are pretty sure she was gasping for breath because she was off her psych meds, and was in constant panic mode at that point.
Then she fell into rapid cycling bi-polar, which is her main issue when her meds aren't in her body. Plus, during this mis-adventure caused by her taking herself off of medication that keeps her sane (we still have no idea why she chose to do this after being on them for 25 years), she was also completely demented much of the time. Crazy. Completely out of balance mentally.
It was very scary for Dave, who saw most of it, because he spent the most time at her bedside.
Anyway, we went to the house yesterday, and took a bag of groceries and some spaghetti and meat balls that I made and put into containers for the freezer. We gave them cans of soup, pudding (one of the few things she actually ate while in the nursing home), apple sauce, fruit cups, frozen veggies, microwave rice, and Ensure for weight gain. Others had been there to visit, and there were three packages of cookies out on the counter, and the freezer was full of ice cream.
At least we brought real food.
There were a few frozen dinners in the freezer, too, but not enough for a week for two people who are supposed to be eating real food.
They said thanks. We suggested she eat something while we were there.
Dad said "we're not really lunch people."
She weighs 90 pounds...she needs to become a lunch person.
I just don't know about Dad sometimes. But of course, I was too timid to SAY "She weighs 90 pounds, she needs to become a lunch person!"
(Keep in mind that Dad was in a lock down facility for dementia for a couple of years. They had misdiagnosed him with alzheimers, but it turned out to be alcohol-induced insanity instead of that..... He no longer drinks, but we really wonder where his head is at sometimes. Not really lunch people? He clearly does NOT GET IT.)
So, all we could do was leave the food there, and hope that they take advantage of it. She is going to end up right where she started if all she eats is cookies and oat meal, and if she stays in bed all day.
She sat up and chatted with us, and was happy to see us, but she didn't remember my name at first, and had to ask me where I was from. THEN she remembered that I am the daughter in law who lives HERE (the others are out of state, and she only sees them once in a great while), and who helps her.
She also didn't know where Dave and I live, how long we've lived there, or if we owned or rented, but we gently reminded her.
(There was a lady from the church there at the time, too, and she was telling her about me and Dave, and having trouble with most of the details. At least Mom knew who David was.)
When we asked, Dad said that the visiting aids are due to start today. I hope this is true, because we know for sure that they have lied to us, and kept stuff from us, in the past. Like Mom not wanting us to know she had a cold, and was not taking her medication...and the family friend intervened.
The aids, if they are actually coming, will help with chores, bathing, and they will prepare food, run errands, and ask if meds are being taken.
Hopefully, them coming in the house will encourage her to get up and chat with them, too. Not sure if Mom is still diapering, but if she is, I imagine that they help with that, too. I hope.
It would be impolite for her to just stay in bed with people in the house, and hopefully they will make her get up and bathe, etc.
So that's where we stand at the moment. Just have to wait and see.
She sees the psychiatrist later this week, and hopefully, the sheer volume of medication will be reduced so that she can function better. She also needs to see her primary care to discuss the medical collection of drugs she is on.
Dave is also going to try to talk to the psychiatrist first, and ask him to please impress upon BOTH Mom and Dad the critical importance of regular, quality nutrition.
We clearly can't get that message across, but they'll listen to a doctor.
The family friend who has been watching out for them for years has now officially moved to Texas, so we won't have any back up other than the visiting aids. No one to tell us things Mom and Dad don't want us to know. No one to call us when things get out of hand.
We're hoping that Dave's son, who lives in the same town as Mom and Dad, can step up and take a little more pro-active involvement...But he's 20something and has a live in girl friend, so he's busy being young and happy.
Like I said, I guess we'll just have to see how things go.
Saturday, August 9, 2014
Movement
They moved mom out of the hospital into a skilled nursing facility last week. Dave met with her psychiatrist yesterday morning at the facility, and all meds were reviewed.
The psychiatrist believes that she is currently on an adequate regime of medications, and with continued good nutrition (this is key), and physical therapy to get her strength back, she should fully recover.
All of this has happened since we walked into her room last Sunday and she snapped out of it.
Dave went in, after the nurses had told us how awful it had been (they said she'd been hallucinating, refusing to eat, and even kicked a nurse in the chest).
She knew who he was, and said she was hungry, and she fed herself, and she spoke coherently. I stepped in then, and she knew who I was, and made polite conversation..... and then she wanted the nurse to come get her out of the bed so she could use the rest room instead of her diaper.
She hadn't been out of that bed for 2 weeks.
The next day, she was up walking up and down the hallways at the hospital (with assistance, of course).
Yes. Just like that.
Since that moment last Sunday, she has spent far more time in this reality, rather than in her own little catatonic world, "off with the fairies."
So. It's looking a lot better this weekend than it did last.
The psychiatrist believes that she is currently on an adequate regime of medications, and with continued good nutrition (this is key), and physical therapy to get her strength back, she should fully recover.
All of this has happened since we walked into her room last Sunday and she snapped out of it.
Dave went in, after the nurses had told us how awful it had been (they said she'd been hallucinating, refusing to eat, and even kicked a nurse in the chest).
She knew who he was, and said she was hungry, and she fed herself, and she spoke coherently. I stepped in then, and she knew who I was, and made polite conversation..... and then she wanted the nurse to come get her out of the bed so she could use the rest room instead of her diaper.
She hadn't been out of that bed for 2 weeks.
The next day, she was up walking up and down the hallways at the hospital (with assistance, of course).
Yes. Just like that.
Since that moment last Sunday, she has spent far more time in this reality, rather than in her own little catatonic world, "off with the fairies."
So. It's looking a lot better this weekend than it did last.
Sunday, August 3, 2014
No news is...well..no news.
Dave's mom remains in the same room, on the same floor, in the same state of shifting realities.
They're keeping her on the medical floor because she still has a low grade infection somewhere in her body.
They can't shift her to psych and work out her imbalance until she's cleared by medicine.
So. Two weeks into it, and nothing has really changed. It's been exhausting, with all of the worry, and for Dave, with all of the time spent going to and from the hospital. Fortunately, his workplace and his boss are very flexible.
She's had a few "better" days in the past week, where she was marginally coherent and present in her body, but getting her to focus on the here and now is difficult.
I keep saying she's "off with the fairies."
We'll see how she is today, and we'll try to just go on with our lives until tomorrow.
They're keeping her on the medical floor because she still has a low grade infection somewhere in her body.
They can't shift her to psych and work out her imbalance until she's cleared by medicine.
So. Two weeks into it, and nothing has really changed. It's been exhausting, with all of the worry, and for Dave, with all of the time spent going to and from the hospital. Fortunately, his workplace and his boss are very flexible.
She's had a few "better" days in the past week, where she was marginally coherent and present in her body, but getting her to focus on the here and now is difficult.
I keep saying she's "off with the fairies."
We'll see how she is today, and we'll try to just go on with our lives until tomorrow.
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