Where'd she go?
It's been a while since I've written anything here. Lots going on in my real life, and that's an understatement.
I've joked off and on about the two 89 year old kids I live with and help out. They're my Grandparents, I love them, and I wouldn't stop doing what I'm doing for them for anything short of catastrophe. That said, I had another crying jag tonight about the whole situation and my part in it.
See, Grandma has Alzheimer's and Grandpa has limited mobility. Grandma's Alzheimer's is complicated by osteoporosis and Grandpa's limited mobility is complicated by his total lack of any hobby that doesn't require him to go outside and play with the power equipment. My care of them is helped by my Dad, who moved next door, but hindered by my full time job. Mostly things work out.
Tonight's crying jag started when I took the day off to go play with friends. It's my Sunday tradition, and my friends know I count on them for some down time from a rather hectic real life. We game. Pencil and paper and dice (or in my case, the cyber equivalents) role playing games, and we've been gaming together for years. It was a good game. I'm even running again, which I like to do.
But then I came home.
Grandpa is dehydrated from several days of not drinking enough water because, he says, no one can drink sixty-four ounces of water in a day. He's to the stage tonight where he's seeing little dogs in the house and belching heavily. Hopefully he hasn't dehydrated to the point where his kidneys are failing again, because the last time he did that he was in the hospital for a little over two months. We tried giving him pedialyte today, but he threw that up, which is a very bad sign.
Grandma, over the last few days, has developed a new fixation, which is pretty common for this stage of Alzheimer's. The last one was wiping her mouth after every bite of food. The fixation before that was sweeping the kitchen floor. This one is much more disturbing and disruptive. She goes to the bathroom, complains of constipation, and wears herself out trying to go. Then she needs to lay down to rest, but is up five minutes later claiming to need to go to the bathroom. There can't possibly be anything left in her. And we only have one bathroom. And she's not sleeping at all.
And speaking of sleeping, that's something I'm not doing. I'm up with them late every night, then get up, go to work, come home, feed and care for them, do what house cleaning and laundry I absolutely have to, then try to get them to sleep, which usually happens sometime around one in the morning. Then I'm up again with Grandpa at three, when he wakes up (sometimes believing his latest dream is real) and needs help. Then I'm up again at six to get ready for work.
So here I am, exhausted and sleep deprived enough for the screen in front of me to occasionally swim in and out, with one Grandparent who keeps trying to get up and needs to be reminded over and over that it's time to sleep and the other who can't sleep because he's burping and gassy and uncomfortable from dehydration. If I fall asleep before both of them do, tomorrow will be worse, with the possibility of taking one or both of them to the emergency room. If I don't sleep tonight, I'll be even more of an emotional mess tomorrow.
So it's me a mess or one of them in the hospital. Sigh. My tear ducts must need the workout. Or my temper. Or maybe my blood pressure.
Excuse me now. I'm going to go look at retirement homes. The ones that do full care and hospice. I want to sign up now, so I have a place reserved when I'm ready. Because I'm self centered enough to want to be comfortable when I can and grouchy when I can't, but selfless enough to never, ever want to put my loved ones through this. Ever.