This post will cover two days (March 12 and March 13) as I was too tired to post yesterday.
Wednesday, March 12th
Dad and I were anxious to see how mom’s mental state would turn out after a good night sleep. I blogged about the fun time we had trying to relate to a sedated person. Since we were not really sure what was causing the dramatic decline in her ability to focus and think, we had hoped it was just a result of the chemo treatment and that she would show signs of improvement. Thankfully, things were a little better. Not 100% but maybe like 50%. They dropped me off at the gym so I could workout while they went to get the shot she needs post-chemo treatment to control her white blood cell count. They headed back to the gym and came inside for their social workout. It is good for them to get to see their friends. It really brightens their day and perks them up. After that we went to Costco to restock on some of the household items.
Shopping with parents who aren’t sick and who move and think at normal speed is bad enough, but trying to shop with my parents now is… well… not a fun event. I was patient and allowed them to wander around looking at things, trying to decide if they want this one or that one. All the while I was hoping they would get tired soon so that I could send them to the front of the store to wait for me while I finished shopping. Finally my mother had enough and had to use the restroom so I was able to rush off and finish up the shopping in probably less time than it took them to walk to the front.
I got all the stuff we bought put away and by that time it was nearly 3:30 pm. I still have some things I needed to do, but I thought maybe I could get in a quick nap before it was time to start fixing dinner. That plan went out the window shortly after laying down when a friend of mine came over to visit. Sadly, after my friend left, there wasn’t enough time to get a nap so I started dinner. I made spaghetti and garlic bread. I was too lazy to also cook up meatballs and thought maybe no one would notice, but they did. I told them that they will just have to deal with it.
Later that night I talked for a long time on the phone with Laverne, my mother’s close friend and my second mother. We had a good conversation and talked about all sort of things, mostly relating to my parents situation. After I got of the phone, dad was hollering at me that he needed something. He said that mom needed to take some medication, but that he didn’t know what she needed. Until now my mother has been good about sorting out here own medication, but given her mental awareness the past couple days, it has become clear she needs help with that. I had written up instructions for my father’s medications already so I had planned on doing her’s as well. Her’s is more complicated and I just hadn’t gotten to it yet. So dad was at a loss on what she might be needing to take. I asked her what she needed and she indicated nothing was needed, but we knew that wasn’t quite right. So I figured it out and just brought her what she needed to take. Surprisingly she did not put up any fuss.
All in all it was a pretty good day.
Thursday, March 13th
Today was supposed to be a pretty free day. I will probably need to wait until the end of a day before deciding if it will be a lazy day or not. What turned out to be a free day was surprisingly full. I started the day off this morning discussing with my parents that there is a list of things that really need to be addressed now rather than later. They need to get on top of their medical directives so that we don’t end up in a situation where we have to decide what is best for one of them. They need to review their living trust and make sure it is still correct and still has their desires reflected since that trust was set up years ago. They need to visit the funeral home and make arrangements for their funerals. Mom also needs to let someone besides herself into the household finances so we ensure bills are paid and that they have money available. I knew that bringing these things up was not going to be a party type topic, but it had to be discussed. Although we don’t know how long each one of them has left on this earth, we can guarantee they will leave us at some point. This stuff needs to be addressed before its too late. Of course this sparked a little argument, especially the household finances. Mom, as I have written before, is very reluctant to give up control of that part of her life. The topics also sparked sadness and dad got emotional, whereas mom just got mad.
After a bit of discussion we agreed on a plan. Dad has a doctor appointment today, so the plan was for me to go with dad to his appointment while mother prepared herself for me to get into her books. While at dad’s appointment with the oncologist, we discussed with the doctor how dad was doing. Explained everything that had gone on last week with the hospital visit and the doctor reviewed the reports from the hospital. He said things were looking good, but wanted to get blood labs and setup an appointment to review them next month. We also discussed mom’s situation and he wants to get another brain MRI done to see how things are looking given the decrease in mental state. He also discussed that while there is another chemo setup in a couple weeks, he wants to check her mental condition before then because he does not want to do chemo if she isn’t well enough to do handle it. We also discussed when we would look at involving home health care or hospice and decided we would give it another couple weeks to see how things progress.
After the appointment, dad and I stopped by Walmart to pick up a basket with suction cups attached to put in the shower to make things a little easier for mom to do her business. Finally it was time to head home and see how mom was doing. We had a running bet if she would be asleep or if she would be taking care of the household books. I figured she would be asleep, but to my surprise she was on the computer. I pulled up a chair and we went over some of the things she does for the expenses. I got an idea of how she handles things, which fortunately since I grew up with a bookkeeper in the house, I already understand a lot of it. I just needed to have her explain the particulars of how she goes about it. Once we got that out the way, she was getting tired and I suggested that we pretend she was no longer around and that I would have to pick up the pieces. She agreed that would probably be a good way to handle it. I was proud of her, she didn’t put up too much of a fuss once I got her focused. She had separated things into small stacks and kept getting a bit confused by the different stacks, so I put a couple post-it notes on them and she was all squared away.
She went to lay down for a bit and I took the time to get my own errands done. When I got back home, I called my cousin Sherry and she walked me through the genealogy database online that she had already seeded with a lot of the family records. She wanted me to add in my parents portion of the tree and start adding mom mother’s stories to the database. It is a pretty nice system. It is hosted by the Mormon church, to which the majority of my family belongs. It was now time to get dinner fixed and the family fed, it was leftovers night.. yay! Only a couple more things to tackle tonight. I have to finish this blog and then get my mother’s medication chart typed up. If there is time and I am not too exhausted, I will work a bit on the bills.
My cousin David came by to drop off a video camera this morning and visit for a few minutes. Mom had a moment of panic because she did not have her hair on. Initially she covered up her head with a blanket, but both David and I said it would be okay, that no one would care one whit how she looked. I probably should have been more conscientious of her feeling in that situation and given her time to put on her hair, but she is going to have to get used to the possibility of people seeing her cute little almost bald head. She looks like a mangy mutt and is just as adorable and loving.
Well I think that sums up the day. We shall see what fun stuff tomorrow brings!