Happy Hanukkah to Me

Well, I'm going to hell for sure, but what a nice month+ it's been. Betty's respiratory stuff just wasn't going away, and in early November, she got so weak that we took her to the emergency room. I won't make you sit through the play-by-play, but she ended up with a diagnosis of pneumonia and had her gall bladder taken out. Turns out that her stomach aches were the result of gallstones. After the surgery, they put her in a rehab center to get stronger, and all these weeks later, she's still not home. I have to admit it's been a nice break, but I suspect it's nearly over.

So since November 9, I've had to deal with multiple doctors, bring her books, make semi-regular visits, etc., but I haven't had to deal with her dentures, meds, complaints (well some of them), semi-dressed state of nakedness, etc. So I'll burn in hell for enjoying her hospital stay, but I'M ENJOYING IT.

There, I said it. BRING ON THE DIVINE RETRIBUTION. BRING IT.

It's Good to be Immune

Betty has been telling anybody who will listen, as well as the rest of us, that she's immune to cold and flu viruses. So when she gets a hacking cough, runny nose, and a sore throat, like she has now had for four days, a cranky person like myself has to ask herself one important question:

DO I BURST HER "I'M A MEDICAL MIRACLE" BUBBLE, OR BE MATURE AND LET IT GO.

I'll let you know what I decide.

Birthday Surprises

Betty turns 85 today. I was gone most of the day yesterday (took sick Korean host daughter to doctor, after taking my mom to the podiatrist), and when I came home between bringing Mikey home from his soccer practice and driving back to pick up Sami from her soccer practice, I went in to check on Betty.

"I need a sheet," she said.

I looked at her bed, which seemed well-sheeted to me.

"I need a sheet."

"Clean sheets?"

"I need a sheet."

I'll skip the next few minutes and get right to the part where I figure out she means a sheet CAKE. Today is her 85th birthday, and yesterday she wanted to make sure I had purchased a cake to take to the Senior Center. I had already bought one, but she insisted it was too small. She'd been told she could bring a "sheet cake" to share with the staff and clients, and was sure they meant a full sheet cake.

"Just order me another one," she said.

I get full credit for not exploding on the spot, as I had exactly 30 minutes to deal with this. I ran to Kroger, had them decorate another cake to add to the one I had already bought, raced over to the soccer fields, and picked up Sami. So Betty is taking two cakes today...

Happy Birthday.

Dean Martin and Death

This is one of those mornings when Betty vacilates between longing for the tranquility of The Big Sleep and hoping her Dean Martin DVD's arrive soon.

Acknowledging My Limitations

I've been hearing radio ads for "Senior Helpers," so last week David finally called them. I think he could see that I was losing it. Just the stress of wondering how each morning is going to be--especially Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, when MIL is supposed to go to the adult day care that the VA pays for (God love them), has been making me perpetually angry. Some mornings she gets up and goes without much fuss, and other mornings it's hours of nagging (from me) and procrastinating (from her). Now that my mother is in Assisted Living and doesn't have a drivers license, I have to take her places as well, and the stress of trying to combine these duties and keep to a schedule wears me out. I start stressing the night before, wondering if it's going to work, and wake up already crabby at MIL.

So Senior Helpers is coming on Mondays and Wednesdays, they'll get her up and dressed, DRIVE HER TO THE SENIOR CENTER, and PICK HER UP IN THE AFTERNOON AND BRING HER HOME! We're using some of Betty's money to pay for it, which seems reasonable to me, as this may prevent my psychotic break and keep her alive.

No, It Was a Temporary Glitch in my Bad Mood

Could be hormones, but MIL is driving me nuts today. I had an impossible schedule to meet, with three people needing to be taken to three different places at virtually the same time. I juggled things, called in favors, etc., to handle it all, and had pretty much decided not to take MIL to the Senior Center, although it was Friday. Her home health aid, Devonna was coming to get her showered and ready to go, but it still wasn't going to work well.

So I should have just smiled and said, "OK" when she started saying she didn't want to leave the house today, and that all she does at the Sr. Center is watch television, but instead, I lost my temper. Stupid, but I've heard it a hundred times and I'm sick of it. So I yelled at her, ran a few frustrating errands, came home for a few minutes to eat lunch, and she started in again, asking if I wanted to know WHY she didn't want to go to the Senior Center...

Knew, didn't care...

But she wouldn't stop talking about it, and I lost my temper again. She's going to live forever, and I'm going to give myself a heart attack.

Am I Developing a Better Attitude?

When little things that Betty does tick me off, like taking her teeth out at the dinner table, I write the blog entry in my sarcastic little head, and yet I haven't been writing them in my sarcastic little BLOG. I think I'm accepting the situation for what it is--something she can't help--and feeling a little less snarky about it.

Then there's the fact that I spent a week with extended family, and Betty's lookin' better and better to me... Yeah, there are those teeth I have to hear about every day, and see in the bathroom (and sometimes on the kitchen table), but on the other hand, she doesn't criticize anybody, doesn't pick on my kids, is generally grateful for things we do for her, and pays her own way around here. She worries that she's not contributing to the running of the household, when in truth, we couldn't live here without her.

There's a lot to be said for that.

So maybe I'll start being more INFORMATIONAL in my postings, instead of VENTING MY SPLEEN. At least until the next time she takes out those damn teeth while I'm eating.

We're Trying Aricept

The VA doctors finally agreed to prescribe this, and I gave Betty the first pill last night. It's supposed to be taken at bedtime because of potential side effects. While the TV ads say "well tolerated by most people," when you read the medical disclaimers in the box, it apparently causes everything short of SUDDEN DEATH... and maybe I just didn't read far down enough to find the part about SUDDEN DEATH.

Betty is worried this morning becauses she's having very vivid dreams, and she's afraid it's a sign that she's losing her mind. She doesn't remember getting the diagnosis of Alzheimers (despite having been told it 50 times), but she remembers seeing the diagnosis on a paper in a doctor's office (actually it was sitting on our kitchen table). She's sad and worried about it, and can't stop talking about how real the dream was. I'm reassuring her that the fact that she DID figure out it was a dream is a sign that she's not completely crazy yet.

I on the other hand...

Life at the VA Hospital

Well, it FELT like a life sentence, anyway. I took MIL for her 6-month checkup, and just as we were ready to leave, she got sick and ended up with full-body tremors that came every 3-4 seconds. Damn spooky, and we ended up spending the rest of the day in the Veterans Administration Hospital emergency room.

I'd brought my iphone for entertainment, but the battery died, and I couldn't leave Betty sitting there while I went to my car to recharge it so I could keep playing Scrabble. Well, I could have, but it would have looked bad...

So we ate lunch out of the vending machines (her blood sugar was low, a possible contributing factor), and I made horrible faces when nobody was looking and suffered through MIL saying, "I feel so guilty ruining your day" almost as often as she had the tremors.

They finally checked her in for overnight observation at 5pm, and I went home. If my kids weren't so weirded out by adults drinking alcohol, I would have self-medicated. As it was, I met my family at TKD class and we went out for dinner. I don't remember any of that.

From now on I'm not going near the VA hospital without my charger. YES, IT'S ALL ABOUT ME.

Oh, I suppose I should mention that MIL is fine--they think it was low blood sugar and needed another dose of restless leg medicine that messed her up that day. David picked her up in the morning and she's been fine since.

My Two Moms

Well, not really. One's Betty, and one's my mother, but I'm starting to see worrisome similarities. My mother lives one neighborhood north of me, and is older than Betty, but comes from a line of women who live long lives, free of dementia. I'm afraid my mother, 89, is going to break that winning streak. She agreed to give up her car last week, but she's having more and more trouble keeping details straight in her mind. I took her shopping yesterday, along with the Korean student who lives with us, and Ra Youn helped my mother carry her groceries into her house. My mom had her keys in her hand and seemed to be trying to open her front door with the electronic car opener thingy. She covered herself quickly when it didn't work, but still...

We have a follow-up appointment with her neuropsychologist on July 1. I'm going to insist he take a look at her list of medications to see if there's something there that explains this, and that he put her on Aricept or something like it.

Signs of Trouble

We've had the discussion a dozen times since Betty started a kitchen fire a month after moving in here... DON'T USE THE STOVE. NO, NEVER. YES, I MEAN YOU. ALWAYS. NO STOVE. EVER. NO COOKING. NEVER. NOT EVEN A LITTLE. EVER.

It's been months since we've had to discuss this, but yesterday I had a large package of hamburger patties defrosting on the two front burners, when I heard the click-click-click-click of the ignitor. She was trying to light the burner to soften the earpieces of her reading glasses. Fortunately, she doesn't know how to use the stove, or flame would have melted the plastic wrap before I could have stopped her.

So we had the discussion for the 13th time, and she let me know that every sane person knows you use the kitchen stove to adjust glasses. I tried to raise my voice just enough to make an impression on her, but apparently, it didn't take, because she tried it again this morning. I heard the clicking from upstairs, but David was closer, and stopped her.

There is now a sign above the stove that says, "Do Not Use the Stove." There is a similar sign on the patio door that says, "Do Not Let Any Cats Outside." That one has worked fairly well, except when a cat escapes, comes to that door, and she opens it to let that cat IN, thus letting two or three others OUT.

She saw this sign and asked, "What's wrong with the stove?" I explained to her why I'd put the sign there, but she doesn't remember trying to use the stove, so she's upset about the sign. She keeps insisting that it's not necessary, because she'd never do anything that she's been told not to do. So I have to explain that she doesn't always remember what I tell her not to do, and she doesn't remember that this is true, so we do that little Dance Around the Logic Pole.

If arguing with her was aerobic, I'd be a size 4.

Independence--It's Not Easy

Betty tried to handle her own lunch a few days ago because I was gone. She poured a large can of soup in a China bowl, warmed it in the microwave, then dropped it on the range top. I came home with one hour to prepare dinner for the family and my mother whom I'd envited, and found smashed china and thick soup covering the burners, running down the cabinet below, and pooling on the floor. Betty was using various spatulas and spoons to try to scoop it into a bowl, which she planned to eat. I had to show her a piece of broken China in the bowl to convince her this wasn't safe. She wanted to help clean up the mess, which she felt terrible about causing, but this would have taken hours. She retreated to her room and had to be coaxed out to eat dinner.

After dinner she couldn't quite remember what had happened, and demanded that my 9-year-old son, who was home at the time, tell her what she'd done. "Something is happening to me. Something is happening to me. I don't understand it," she said.

I think I did a good job of not getting angry at her, but my husband and daughter were both gone, so I had to clean it up myself, my mother showed up 45 minutes early for dinner, and it was a complete disaster... I WAS angry, but Betty was so upset with herself that I couldn't get mad at her. I tried to reassure her that it was just an accident caused by low blood sugar, and that the only thing she should have done differently was to ask Mikey to help her.

He came to me later and "confessed" that although he had asked her what she was doing when he saw her with the soup, he let her proceed on her own since she wasn't using the stove. (She's not allowed, since she almost burned down the kitchen with the toaster oven...) He felt guilty that he hadn't stepped in to help her, but was torn because he's been told not to act like the "babysitter" unless he sees her doing something really dangerous. Of course, I reassured him that he wasn't at fault, and reassured her that it was just a can of soup.

I've had to learn to let my kids try things on their own, even if they end up causing a mess, but I can't do this with Betty. She's not going to get better, not going to retain new skills, and not going to learn from her mistakes. It's a balancing act between not insulting her by treating her like a complete incompetent and not tripling my workload by letting her help herself...

Every Day is Different Here

Betty is very sharp today--walking fairly well, philosophizing about the mythology of God, the innate worthlessness of mankind, the supremacy of viruses and insects... She was a sociology professor, and still retains her intellect, at least on days like this. She doesn't want to go to the Senior Center, but she missed last Friday and Monday, and needs the physical therapy.

She'll do more talking and interacting there than she will here, so I don't feel too guilty about taking her, although she considers it a waste of time and says all anybody does there is watch TV.

I think the Silexa (anti-depressant) is working, as is the physical therapy--she hasn't used her walker for days, and although she always looks like she's going to fall over, she hasn't fallen in over a week.

Yesterday I took her to Barnes and Noble (the Happiest Place on Earth) and left her for about 90 minutes. I was panicked the whole time, but when I came back, she was fine. She had a two foot tall stack of books to buy... although she'd previously agreed to settle for three. I gave in, though, as it finally occurred to me that fewer trips is better than lots of trips, and the only way to justify not taking her is to remind her that she just spent $117!

The Aftermath of Sweets

This day was disturbingly predictable... After the Mother's Day candy and dessert with dinner (Chocolate Thunder Down Under from Outback Steakhouse), Betty was sick and lethargic today. She threw up in the car (thankfully, the car was still in the driveway) on the way to Adult Day Care, so she stayed home and slept most of the day.

On another note, the VA called last week and they've taken her off her blood pressure/heart pill, as it seemed to be lowering her blood pressure too much. So her balance has improved, and she's walking without the walker, at least for now. Tomorrow the home health care lady is coming, and she'll take her weekly shower. It's the little things in life that keep me sane...

Candy... The Ultimate Magnet

It's Mother's Day, and Betty has been asking for chocolates for a week, so I bought a box for David to give to her. She's a diabetic on insulin, so we don't do this often--but aside from football, it's all she thinks about.

So he gave her the box, she ate a few pieces, and put it up on the kitchen counter. We were gone for several hours, and when we came back, David checked the box and she hadn't taken any more! But when she realized we were home, she asked me where the candy was--she'd forgotten where she put it! Now she's come toddling out of her bedroom three times to get "just one more piece."

We had a conversation yesterday about the connection between Alzheimer's and Diabetes, and she's brought it up several times today, but she can't stay away from the candy. Tonight we're taking her out to dinner, and she'll be miserable if she can't have dessert... We'll give in, though, because sometimes it's probably more important to make her happy, than to focus on her health. I find myself saying NO to her 10 times a day. Tonight we'll say YES. Tomorrow it's back to NO NO NO!

Making Memories

It's probably not a good thing that the best way to get MIL to remember something is to holler at her about it. The neurologist confirmed this for me, that when there's lots of negative emotions attached to an event, Betty will more likely remember it. So I've yelled at her about not going into the garage, for example, and she hasn't done it for at least a week. The garage is an issue for me because I'm worried that she'll fall, she's always barefoot, and there's a refrigerator out there in which I hide things she can't stop eating, like chocolate syrup, and things we don't want her to eat, like the cottage cheese I feed the kids, my stash of hummus, etc.

But I don't like myself very much when I yell at her. It bothers my kids, and makes me feel like a jerk, even when it works. And it's not balanced by warm and fuzzy moments of love and affection, because I never felt that and I can't fake it now. So it's balanced by moments of tolerance and even-temperedness, at best. It's balanced by my grudging purchases of foods she likes, though not as often as she wants them.

I suppose I get a few points for ordering a bunch of football DVD's for her on Amazon, because she asks to watch football at least three or four times a day, but those are things, and easy for me to provide. It's positive emotion I can't give her.

So I justify my bad temper by pointing at its effectiveness in making an impression on her and modifying her behavior, but I don't like the memories I'm making for myself.

Boundaries

MIL always had weird eating habits, but they're even weirder now. She consumed almost a pound of hummus yesterday, and I have to hide cream cheese, as she likes to cut a big slab off the bar and just eat it--no bagel, no toast... She'll pour salad dressing, gravy, and sauces in a bowl and eat them like soup, too. When you object to any of this, she really doesn't get it. Her point is that if she likes the taste of something, why not just drink it?

It's a hard question to answer. It's all about customs and etiquette, and what seems "right" and "wrong" to me.

The real issue for me, personally, is that I get all tense and irritated when she takes something out of the refrigerator. I'm forever jumping up to make sure she's not spooning food out of a container with a spoon that she's put in her mouth, etc. I've caught her doing this a few times, and my assumption is ALWAYS that she's about to do it again. She finds this insulting, of course. But if I (or my kids) suspect she's done this, we just can't eat the item ourselves, so it's all hers!

Maybe It's Me

I'm not sure which is worse--MIL in a bad mood or MIL in a good mood. When she's crabby I can be crabby back, which lets me vent, albiet childishly. When she's all perky and peppy, as she was a few days ago, I find it intensely irritating. Her sense of humor was never appealing to me--her joking comments were always sarcastic--and that hasn't changed. Now, combined with the Alzheimer's issues, it's a double whammy.

I brought her back last Wednesday from a day at the Senior Center, and wanted to feed her dinner right away. This is selfish on my part--I don't enjoy eating dinner with her--but it suits her just fine because she doesn't have to put in her dentures if she eats before or after the rest of us. The downside is that I usually have to find something she can eat that doesn't require teeth, and she usually wants to eat things that she won't be able to chew, yet doesn't want to put in her teeth... the endless, circular arguments about it drive me nuts. So after five minutes of that nonsense, I offered her the rest of the soup I gave her the day before, and she agreed to it, but as I was taking it out of the microwave she started to leave for her bedroom. I said, "Wait, Betty, your soup is ready," and she said, "Oh, I don't want soup!"

Fortunately, my husband was there, or I would have REALLY lost it. As it was, I stomped out of the kitchen and left it to him... and she just cackled away at her little joke.

She never did eat the damn soup.

Betty Calls My Bluff

It's Friday, which is one of the days MIL is supposed to go to the Senior Center for therapy (and, yes, to get out of my hair). She wouldn't get dressed, so I told her I'd take her in her nightgown if that's what she wanted. This has worked in the past, but not today. She put her coat on over her nasty old nightgown! I asked her if she might find it embarrassing to be there in her nightgown, and she said, "No, not in the least."
I called the senior center and they told me I'd have to hang out there until she got dressed, which defeats the purpose of bringing her there... So I told her THERE WAS NO CHOICE and she had to get dressed, and SHE DID. It didn't feel like a victory.
Note to self: Never try to psych out a stubborn old lady with Alzheimer's...

The Ultimate Irony

Betty saw me reading "The 36 Hour Day," an excellent reference book about Alzheimer's, and demanded to know why I was reading it. We don't mention the A word around here because she's convinced she doesn't have it, and gets upset when she hears otherwise. I told her a tasteless joke one day after she heard her diagnosis for the fourth or fifth time in a month and got upset...

A man is at the doctor's office. The doctor says, "I have bad news.
You have Alzheimer's Disease."

The man gets upset, and the doctor says,
"There's more. You also have cancer."

The man says, "Well, at least I don't have Alzheimer's Disease!"

Betty looked at me and said, "I don't get it."

I Think I'm Officially a Hypocrite

About a year ago MIL started receiving Veteran's Administration benefits, as she was in the army for 9 months near the end of WWII. Ironically, she taught map-reading, which she never could do herself. I suspect we were supposed to land in Norway, rather than Normandy, but the mixup was covered up to prevent national embarrassment.

Anyway, Betty gets a VA pension which pays for her care in "assisted living," whether it takes place at a facility or in our home, and she gets her medications at almost no cost. Then I found out she could attend an adult day care center and receive physical therapy at almost no cost, and as of today, the VA is sending a home healthcare aide to our house to help her take a shower, change her clothes, and even clean her room. EVERY WEEK! So three days a week I get a few hours of blessed privacy and peace, and she's gonna put on clean underwear at least once a week! I'd dance a jig if I knew how.

So here's the problem. I'm a fiscal conservative, and I hate how the government is taking everybody's money to pay for social programs. BUT OVER MY DEAD BODY WILL THEY CANCEL BETTY'S SOCIAL PROGRAMS. I'm pretty sure this makes me a BAD fiscal conservative.

LET'S JUST BE HONEST

I married David almost 11 years ago, when I was 40 years old. If I'd been a 20-something, my MIL would have had me in tears many times. The first time I invited my in-laws to dinner, I spent the day cleaning the condo and cooking, and when she walked in the door, Betty looked around and said, "I wouldn't worry about it; David is used to living in a messy house."

She loved to remind me how generous David used to be with his money, "before we lost him. You know, when you got married."

She once regailed us at a restaurant in Indianapolis with what she'd learned that day about the causes of vomiting.

And she never tired of telling me how spoiled my daughter was. (I adopted Sami from China before I met David.) Sami was, and is, the most unspoiled child on the planet. You can ask any adult who knows her--she's not perfect, but she's not spoiled!


GET THE PICTURE?

So now, through a series of stupid, if well-meaning decisions, she's living in my house and I'm taking care of her. We knew she had a deteriorating memory, but a few months after moving in she was officially diagnozed with Alzheimer's disease. I have purchased a few books about this, but I'm a little tired of reading about how we must remember how much we love the patient and how much they mean to us and how they can't help what's happening to them so we have to be patient and loving. I'M NEITHER. If you're in the same boat, let's keep each other sane by forgetting all that sweetness and saying how we REALLY feel, okay?