Not a good day today. The physiotherapist came and gave Ray a tape with some exercises, sat him down and did some of them with him and then did an assessment - and that's it! She's not coming back!
Why?? Because Ray's answered every question: "Yes", "Fine", "Can do." etc. According to him he can do all the exercises and doesn't need the help. I didn't actually hear all the answers as I had Tori and kept her busy so I only heard the tail end when she told me Ray was doing just fine and if he
As a caregiver I sometimes have to be in the right about things. Even while I am asserting what I think is right in a situation, sometimes over and over and in a loud voice, a small voice in the back of my head says:"but what about their rights?"
Because of Ray' disabilities it is easier for me if we follow a routine. Sometimes when I say:"Come on mate, it's time to get ready." he rolls his eyes and I can see that he doesn't want to go out. I guess in the days when I could leave him safely o
When I was in my 40's I worked on the Lifeline phones. Lifeline is called by other names in other countries but is mainly a suicide prevention line. We had a 20 week training course on Rogerian counselling , a lot of role play and practical courses on drugs and alcohol,dealing with domestic violence, gambling etc and then we were on the phones. I did a four hour shift a week and mostly enjoyed in.
Most of our calls were made out of boredom or loneliness, some out of need and a few out of an
I have just farewelled my four year old grand daughter. She was here for twelve hours!! 12 hours!!
Her uncle and her Dad went for a public service exam in Sydney about an hour and a half's drive away. They got held up on road works, traffic jams etc (on a Sunday morning??) and missed the first five minutes of the exam, were told to come back at 1pm , and then the exam started at 2pm. So hence the long day.
She is a lovely little girl but oh so full on. And Sunday afternoon I generally put
Today my sister came to look after Ray while I went off to the Lodge to see Mum. It is the same routine when I go on Fridays, cut up fresh fruit salad drive to the Lodge. There I walk in, sit down with her, wait for her to acclimatise to my presence, introduce the fruit salad, and watch her eat it. That can take up to 30 minutes, then we do various things. We usually walk that "circuit" (this is a dementia specific Lodge so a walking circuit is a must) and go to her room. Sometimes we sit i
I had my little grand daughter this afternoon as I do every Thursday. She was in a strange mood, a bit out of sorts and then the new physiotherapist came to assess Ray. She was a small woman of Scottish ancestry and had a booming voice and as she bossed Tori's beloved Pa around Tori got scared so she hid in our bed and had a twenty minute or so cat nap.
She surfaced again with her usual aplomb in place and jumped on the trampoline and did various activities.
The kids two blocks over skid
One of our past prime ministers said: "Life wasn't meant to be easy." I think he meant life is supposed to be a challenge but his quote, from a man worth millions has been used by cynical journalists ever since.
I just had my Mum home for the three hours I can manage while Ray is at Daycare. I managed to get her in and out of the van with minimal fuss today, although she did cling to the seat belt in the hope that I wouldn't be able to get her out when I drew up in front of the Lodge.
Tod
My emergency care plan seems to be taking shape, my next door neighbour does have a key and does know where it is and will let me release his phone number if I need to. He says if I have an emergency and he is home he is willing to help.
One of my old friends down the road used to have a key too but she has moved so I need to decide on another neighbour to have one.
The boys say not to worry as they are usually in contactable distance but I would rather know there was a back-up plan as well
A visit to the neurologist today and more home truths. It seems that the new brain damage from Ray's last stroke, linked with brain shrinkage is starting to cause vascular dementia. It is not a common side effect but can happen.There is nothing that can be done for it.
I wanted to scream and cry but with the best of British stiff upper lip tradition I managed to smile bleakly and thank the neurologist. He said "I'd make the most of the next six month, if I were you." which I guess is some k
I seem to be stuck in a time warp again. Some people see the big picture, I see all the little details. Life at the moment is a trivial pursuit.
Today I took out the white primulas that the wind burned off and replaced them with little blue violas that will be a picture in a fortnight if we don't have a heatwave by then. I topped up the pots with soil and watered them. It took an hour or so but I was out in the fresh air and the birds raced past (it is pairing time for a lot of them) it wasn
Ray and I just had a visit from the social worker. What a sweet person. Too sweet. Each time she told us an unpalatable home truth she smiled her sweet smile. I just hated it. It was like being dunked into a vat of syrup!! YUK!! YUK!!
Okay, I KNOW what is wrong with Ray, and I know what is wrong with me. But I felt like a control freak as she sweetly advised me to "let go of the load", following that up with "when are you going to take time for yourself?" does she have a practical ans
Sometimes I get really tired of being typecast, pigeon holed, generalised and marginalised by the media as a caregiver. Sometimes I just want to be proud of who I am and what I do.
From time to time there is a program on our serious ABC about the tut! tut! poor disabled and how some government parties have treated them as a waste of resources, the lack of money spent on those poor carers, support packages for young caregivers etc. The pictures always show a couple of noble women who are tende
Wish I could say I am full of the joys of Spring but Spring and I are going through a dry period. No bright flowers bursting forth, no bright ideas in my head either.
Sometimes I feel like a lady-in-waiting. Part of that comes from the fact that I fetch and carry a lot. Ray "forgets" his cup, his spoon, his pills, his handkerchief and I go fetch them. He needs a second cup of tea, a piece of fruit , a sandwich, and I go fetch them. His buttons won't button and his zip won't zip, so I go d
We had a power surge and my modem blew. It took a fortnight for various reasons to get back on online again.
The first week I suffered from severe withdrawals. I have become used to all you cyber friends and felt lost and lonely without you.
The second week I filled in time, did more craft work, more beading, more reading. Still felt lost and lonely.
Thankfully I will be back on line for a while now. So glad to be able to sit down and check out your blogs and catch up with new
There have been a few mentions lately in threads and blogs about friendships. My worry is not that we lose friends but friends lose me as well. After all my primary concern is Ray and his well-being so I don't have time to be that kind, supportive person that they made a friend of in the first place.
Last night I went to my pastoral care meeting and we talked about how people re-invest their time after a traumatic event, principally bereavement. As we all know people can change radically
Ray had two falls in 24 hours, one last night about 6 pm and one this morning about 8am. Both times his "knee gave way". This morning it took a lot of effort to lift him as he was in the bathroom and there was not much room to move. And he didn't seem to be able to do anything to help himself. I brought the wheelchair in from the car, first time I've needed it in the house since late 1999. I finished up dressing him as he suddenly seemed to have no energy. He did improve by lunchtime so nothi
I have just been talking to my next door neighbour who is a geo-physicist, a bit of an academic but as a single father with an eleven year old daughter pretty down to earth too. He has just returned from a three day retreat at a Buddhist campsite in a beautiful valley about three hours drive from here. He was intrigued by the philosophy of emptying our thoughts, emotions etc and resting the mind. The director told him not to read or write but to just wander through the space and let his mind re
When I got up this morning I only had two things to do, go see my Mum and take Ray to a funeral (his brother-in-law's mother's) at 3.30pm. Then a friend called and could we meet for lunch? I said, okay, but we've got a busy day. Then Ray asked me to go to the pharmacy to pick up his pills, only he seemed to be short a prescription.Well to get a script we have to see the doctor.
It all turned into a very big deal with each event taking more time and me getting later and later and more fr
When I had my Mum living here, she lived here for two years after my Dad died, as well as Ray, not long home from hospital after his major strokes I went pretty well mad for a while. Not mad dog mad, but not myself. Too much work, too many demands on my time. Then a good friend of mine spoke to a good friend of hers and said:"Do something about Sue." and that is how I got a lot of care for my Mum including Adult Day Care one day a week, Community Restaurant ( I have never heard of it being a
"Sweets for my sweet, sugar for my honey". Used to be the words of a song from the 60's. Tonight I ranted at Ray on the way home from our Lions dinner. I was careful with his meal, made sure it was cut up small enough, easy to swallow etc. he did well with it, ate it all, no coughing fit.
I went to the toilet and when I came back one of the kinder, older women had put a bowl of small chocolate biscuits in front of him and he was eating his way through them.
"OMG Ray is a DIABETIC,"
Hey Everyone
I just read a post which said that someone had posted a birthday a day early. Let's get something straight here, time is relative to where you are on planet Earth. Like it is Sunday afternoon 3.33pm here, while in Vancouver it is still Saturday 10.33pm, in New York it is Sunday 12.33 am, Washington DC is 1.33am, and good old Wellington capital of New Zealand is getting dark at 5.33pm Sunday afternoon. That is why you can always have scotch first thing of a morning, just say:"
I was wrong about the sweet little girl. She rang back late afternoon and said she had given it all some thought and she will try to get the modified Barium swallow as soon as possible and maybe send a dietician to go over the foods we eat and make recommendation. That is a new approach so I hope it can work.
Thanks Bonnie. In your reply to my last post you talked about "pride" and that is what it is with Ray!! He does put on a good front with his doctor and some times others not realising
GRRR!! If I was a dog I would go bite someone. Just had a sweet little girl come and assess Ray for speech therapy. She said all the right things, he did all the right things. So where is the evidence of the coughing fits, heaving etc he does before after and during meals? Not on show today.
And that seems to be the story. He falls at home but walks strongly into the doctor's rooms. He has incontinence problems but if questioned by the doctor says, with a boyish grin: "not often, not fo
I seem to be running on the spot today. You know those nightmares you have where you try to run away but your feet are stuck in glue, or mud or some other goo and you just feel the muscles move but nothing happens?
Today is Tuesday so it was housework, school to teach Religious Education (we say Scripture) and then out to lunch. It sounds good doesn't it? Well the housework was searching for an account I seem to have mislaid, a large phone bill so I want to check the figures before I pay it
Hey, thank G-D I'm a country girl. Just enough rain last night to bring on the "potting up" jobs. For those of you who live in small city apartments and have no garden that means taking all the pot plants out of their pots and either potting them up into bigger pots or for those that divide (like my bromeliads) you take a knife cut the whole root ball in half and pot each half into a pot. This gives you one for the church fete, or one to give away, or you can just move everything around and re
