I should be sleeping. I feel like I still need sleep...
...even though I had a fairly good nap, today, and lay around the house hacking and blowing my nose and feeling generally miserable. And yet...and yet...
    Forgot to mention, probably because I was so out of it this morning, when I went in to let everyone know I wasn't going to be officially in today, Mom's roommate informed me that despite me telling the aid for my mother's side of her floor last night, and the nurse, as well, that I wouldn't be back and Mom needed to be prepared for bed without me, at 2130 the roommate awoke and noticed that Mom was still sitting in her wheel chair, at the window, fully dressed, in the dark. I imagine she was asleep in the chair. The roommate told me she buzzed the aid, pointed out the situation and the aid responded that "Her daughter usually does that." Truth is, I've been so goddamned far in the toilet today that I have no idea who to believe. All I know is that Mom finally got to bed.
    When I arrived this evening around meal and med time I noticed that, once again, third day in a row, Mom had been dressed without a bra. What is the deal with this? Anyway, other than that, she apparently had a good day. The PTs who worked with her said that she'd had her "best sessions yet". Good news. She's coming back fast and going on. Then I discovered that the nurse from last Thursday (I think it was Thursday but it might have been Wednesday) who had the extremely lackadaisical attitude toward med dispersal was on, tonight, so I guess either no one else complained about her or Mom was the only patient toward whom she was lackadaisical, and responsible for my mother's side of the floor. So, of course, I stayed, to make sure the meds were right, which they were. When the nurse set up her breathing treatment and told me, that's right, told me, not asked me, to give the treatment after dinner, I responded that I wouldn't be there to give it to her and she'd have to do it. It was obvious from my condition, only barely disguised by the half cold pill I'd taken a few hours before so that some of the cold spillage would dry up during the visit I'd planned, that I shouldn't have been in there anyway, but, there I was.
    Funny, one of the superior nurses on the day shift has mentioned to me several times that many of the things I do while I'm there are meant to be done by the aids and nurses and I should let them do them since they get paid for them. One day last week he even stopped me from doing some things, like making Mom's bed afresh because she'd scratched her back in her sleep (which she often does) and had gotten blood on the sheets, and returning cafeteria trays that had been left in the room for a couple of hours because Mom eats slow. And yet, when I go out of my way to let people know I'm not going to be there to do those things that they get paid to do, lo and behold, they don't get done.
    Yes, I'm in a fucked up mood. On my way to the rehab center I picked up my Mac, all shiny and fit with a new double sized hard drive. Come to find out that restoring the back up isn't as simple as the "official" application I used would have one believe, especially since when the people at the repair shop installed the system they got my username wrong, which I'd given to them in writing. So, now, I have to go through a prolonged, painful process of manual restoration, which, apparently, involves changing stuff at the UNIX level, once all my files, all 37.5 GB of them, are restored to a separate folder rather than replacing what is on the machine now. I'm sure I can do this, I understand all the instructions, but, jesus, I wasn't planning on having to do this. I asked if I could just bring the machine and my back up drive in and have them do it. I offered to pay. The shop refused to do this, citing liability regarding proprietary information that could be on my back up, etc.
    So, I'm totally pissed at the world, am hoping I die of a heart attack or something else equally quick and tidy tonight so I don't have to go through all this shit anymore. I'm sure my mother is in for at least two more weeks of rehab. That means two more weeks of 12 hours days at rehab for me just to make sure my presence ensures a modicum of decent care for my mother. I am about ready to strangle my mother's roommate, despite the possibility that she may have actually saved my mother from an entire night in the wheelchair, simply because she also took it upon herself to try to deliver a lecture to me on how, no matter what, I "should" be there, constantly for my mother. I deflected her in no uncertain terms and only partially diplomatically told her to shut up. In my equally strong, no-such-thing-as-indoor-voice I assured her, and probably everyone lurking in the halls and a few close rooms, that, yes, I know the facility sucks at bedside care, I know its staffing situation guarantees that no one gets very good care, I know that my mother needs a protector there, I know no one else has one and if my mother is lucky enough to have one that protector should be there no matter what, I know, I know, I know, and I don't want to TALK ABOUT IT ANYMORE!!!! I'm doing what I can. It's more than anyone is doing for any other patients in rehab, whether those other "anyones" are staff or family. Leave me the fuck alone!!!!
    I'm sure that part of the problem, as it always is in medical facilities, is that the staff actually comes to depend on my mother's dementia to keep them from having to do too much when I'm not there. I mean, my mother, for instance, doesn't remember spending several hours sleeping in her wheelchair. She has no idea when she's swimming in her own urine inside an industrial strength brief, and, besides, she has no concept of call buttons. She's easy when I'm not there. Who cares if she gets a urine rash or sleeps sitting in a wheel chair. There's too fucking much for the staff to do. If I had wanted better care for her I should have taken her someplace else; except that the other two places that actually have good reputations (and, there are only two) are always full and were full when my mother needed rehab.
    Jesus, jesus, jesus. What a fucked up world we live in.
    Well, I feel better. I think I'll finally hit the sack. I'm not going to set the alarm but I assume my cold will awaken me early enough for me to make it into the facility in time to get a goddamn bra on my mother before her day officially begins. And get her bathed. When I don't do it every morning, she doesn't get bathed but once a week, and I haven't done it for three days. Baths are important. They stimulate the skin and the circulation. They are important for arousal and for prevention. But, you know, at a severely understaffed facility, so what????
    This is ridiculous. May the gods save me from both infirmity and old age. If they don't, I'm of a mind to save myself from them.
    Later.
- posted by Gail Rae @ 23:33   email  this post