This morning I decided that I'm no longer going to...
...think I'm "late" for anything or anyone, at least for the foreseeable future and possibly for the unforeseeable future. I already feel myself relaxing internally with this decision.
    Yesterday Mom and I again visited the Riparian Area down the hill from her facility. We were there well over an hour wandering, talking, "thinking" (Mom's term when she didn't want to talk). I spent some time laying on my back looking up through the crossed branches of the cottonwood grove at the sky, listening to sounds, watching clouds, evidence of breeze, movement, just like I used to do when I was a kid. Later in the day, as I was returning to Mom's room at the facility after a nap, I met Mom's OT in the hall. She not only reported a good session, she mentioned that Mom told her of our outing. She said that Mom mentioned that "the three of us" were in the Area.
    "Ah," I said, "someone from The Dead Zone must have been with us. She didn't mention them, but apparently they were there." I could see that the OT was curious about this, so I explained The Dead Zone and its significance in our lives. I told her, as well, that sometimes Mom will mention visits to me and sometimes she won't.
    The OT mentioned, as well, that, yesterday, Mom had no interest in napping after her session, so she left Mom at her window with the Sunday paper and water. When I arrived in Mom's room, she told me that she'd been visited by family (from The Dead Zone, I'm sure) that afternoon after therapy. That's good. I was concerned about leaving her alone but I guess I don't have to worry about that. She also told me about lots of things she'd observed at her window and we discussed the goings on at length: The coming and going of cars from the church; the arrival of a van full of people who tumbled out of the van and entered the cafeteria area of the facility, which Mom thinks is a separate building...the van, a bright orange Volkswagen Van, was still parked at the supply entrance of to the kitchen. I mentioned that maybe someone's family had come to visit them while they worked, since "today" was Father's Day.
    "It is?!?" Mom said. "No wonder Dad was here! I wish I'd known. I would have wished him Happy Father's Day!" So, at least one of her visitors yesterday afternoon was either her father or mine...probably hers, as she usually refers to my dad by his first name.
    I don't think I'll be taking my day off today. I think I'll hang around the facility and see what happens. I'm not quite so tired. I think I've traced the tiredness to deciding to substitute coffee for tea. I've been doing that with my afternoon coffee and it's worked well. Yesterday, though, I decided to substitute my morning coffee for tea, too, and I don't think I got quite the amount of caffeine I'm used to getting, which is quite a bit, so, I decided, for the time being, anyway, to continue it. Now is not the time for me to try to change certain habits.
    I am continuing to record programs on the DVR that I think Mom would be interested in watching. I let her know when I'm doing this, in order to keep her focused on the fact that the facility is not home...she has another home to which to return. At least once a day we have a conversation, which I initiate, about how good it will be when she returns home, how much the kitties miss her, how much I miss her and what we'll do when we get home (that part is usually initiated by her). I do this because Mom has been away from home for so long that she sometimes thinks she is at home when she's at the facility. I've even told her, on occasion, "Don't be thinking this is home, Mom! I have no interest in moving the kitties in here! None of our stuff is here, I'm not interested in sleeping in these horrible beds and our window views are much better than the window views here!" Saying this every once in awhile seems to keep her on track.
    The facility doctor came in yesterday for a short visit. I was able to thank him personally for trusting Mom's immune system. Nothing else was out of order, as far as I know, so it was a perfunctory visit, but appreciated. I hadn't expected that he'd check in on us. Which reminds me, I forgot to ask if the results from last Thursday's blood draw were up. I'm sure that at least Mom's hemoglobin is doing well, but I also want to check on her electrolytes, if they did either a BMP or a CMP.
    I'm hoping that sometime this week the PT department will hav an evaluatory meeting and we'll get an idea of what their plan for release is for Mom. She still isn't as confident standing as I'd like, but, at this point, I figure that with just a little more practice she'll be able to recover most, if not all, of her foot confidence at home. I'm sure she could use a little more practice on their stair steps, and maybe a little more strengthening. However, I also feel that when she returns home, a lot of her native confidence in her environment will return and, as well, the absence of someone instantly at her side to support her will encourage her to rely more on her abilities. If not, though, we'll figure out what we need to do to help her get around.
    I continue to wonder when some sort of obvious decline connected to her lung cancer is going to kick in. I did read the couple of chapters in How We Die about death by cancer. They weren't particularly detailed, although the detail they contained was not pretty. Maybe, without realizing it, over the last few years, we've figured out how to live with her cancer in a way that allows us and the cancer some leeway. MCS mentioned to me last week that cancer doesn't always metastasize and "they" don't know why. The way she explained it to me, cancer is often surrounded by a sort of bubble or sac. If the sac bursts, the cancer usually spreads. Sometimes, though, even as the cancer grows, the sac doesn't burst. That doesn't mean the cancer doesn't cause other problems, like, for instance, in Mom's case, choking the breath out of her. But, it doesn't affect other systems.
    We'll just take it as it comes. That approach has been successful for us in the past. I have no reason to believe it won't be in our future. If we have to change our approach, well, we've done this before, we can do it again.
    I want to get some rescreening done on the windows, too, before Mom gets home. Better check into that sometime today.
    Later.
- posted by Gail Rae @ 06:51   email  this post