Wednesday, February 1, 2006
Not that anyone would care, but I updated the Death Dates just now.
I added Mom's only brother-in-law and, most significantly, added her maternal grandfather and her only maternal uncle, with whom she lived when she attended college and about whom she's been asking after lately and frequently, beginning prior to the Educating Mom podcast. I was spurred to the updating because this morning when Mom awoke the first time, her mother was living with us. Then she asked about "where Grandpa and Harold are" and, well, I knew it was going to be that kind of day. Curiously, soon after she awoke (at 1100), before we even began her bath she headed back for bed. I let her, even though by doing so she broke through her 12 hour allotment of night sleep. She was very hazy upon first awakening and so astonished that her mother isn't living with us and, for that matter, no longer living anywhere on Earth, that she simply didn't believe me.
She finally reawoke at 1330. She rated only an abbreviated bath. Apparently she went to bed dehydrated last night without me noticing. Aside from drinking a little over half of her quart of bedside water during the night, although she did leak, she didn't leak through her paper underwear. I changed it out before she headed back to bed this morning so her sheets and pajamas don't need washing and it was only necessary to bathe her groin area.
Good. For some reason I've been a little hazy, too, today and a temporary respite from a few of the quotidian chores is welcome. I don't know why I'm hazy but I've been amusing myself by considering that Mom's hazy because her brain worked so hard last night during GWB's speech that it suffered a temporary cramp. She is, also, napping, as I write: Went down about a half hour ago. I decided to allow it. While she was up I called MCS for the necessary death dates. While we talked Mom once again registered astonishment that Harold is dead, refused to believe me, then refused to believe how old she is. I'm glad MCS was "present" for this. I'm sure all my sisters believe me when I relate these incidents to them, either personally or through this journal, but, well, if you're related to an Ancient One with Dementia-Lite, you haven't lived until you've experienced one of their time phases. Being on-site when one of them happens, I believe, increases the understanding of Those Absent regarding what The Present One experiences on a regular basis.
Later.
She finally reawoke at 1330. She rated only an abbreviated bath. Apparently she went to bed dehydrated last night without me noticing. Aside from drinking a little over half of her quart of bedside water during the night, although she did leak, she didn't leak through her paper underwear. I changed it out before she headed back to bed this morning so her sheets and pajamas don't need washing and it was only necessary to bathe her groin area.
Good. For some reason I've been a little hazy, too, today and a temporary respite from a few of the quotidian chores is welcome. I don't know why I'm hazy but I've been amusing myself by considering that Mom's hazy because her brain worked so hard last night during GWB's speech that it suffered a temporary cramp. She is, also, napping, as I write: Went down about a half hour ago. I decided to allow it. While she was up I called MCS for the necessary death dates. While we talked Mom once again registered astonishment that Harold is dead, refused to believe me, then refused to believe how old she is. I'm glad MCS was "present" for this. I'm sure all my sisters believe me when I relate these incidents to them, either personally or through this journal, but, well, if you're related to an Ancient One with Dementia-Lite, you haven't lived until you've experienced one of their time phases. Being on-site when one of them happens, I believe, increases the understanding of Those Absent regarding what The Present One experiences on a regular basis.
Later.
