Caregiving Journal 15

Today I am taking care of myself, taking a day off from care, or at least it feels that way.  There are people I have to call, I'll be going to the medical appliance store, too.  But my husband is taking me to lunch at HiLos, one of my favorite little kitschy restaurants, in Bremerton and I haven't had a call yet from my brother. I will call him to see how things are going today and I may end up going to see Mom depending on what he tells me, but for now the plan is to do my own thing today.

Yesterday my taking care of myself assignment was to go to my book club meeting.  I went to see Mom at 11 and stayed until 1:15.  My brother had no luck giving her the morning pills, so I showed him a trick I learned at Northwoods.  Pills with applesauce or pudding.  I'd brought some pudding to add whipped cream to and to give to Mom and so I put a pill in each spoonful--Mom even sang, "A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down", while I fed her each one--it was tasty, smooth and a good way to take her morning pills.  She didn't want to get out of bed, though.  I propped her up to take her pills, which my brother hadn't done--no wonder she refused them--who can eat or take pills lying on their backs?  Not me, not you, not Mom.  Stanley realized he'd been going at it in a funny way and I hope he learned from watching.  After getting Mom situated I did some chores in the house and had a short talk with my brother about "the future", which means after Mom passes.  Housing, where he will live, how it will be accomplished.  The last time we addressed this situation he was in a panic--he imagined there would be hundreds of people who would want to buy his Mom's falling-down house--they'd be banging on the door, bidding against each other.  It was a paranoid vision.  The house is in such bad shape that we will likely nearly have to give it away.  I assured him, though, that I would not put it up for sale until we had found a place for him.

I know that down the road, in "the future", I will have to put a limit on how long he can live in the house before he must be out.  There will be a money limit already--how long can Mom's funds pay for the utilities while we find a place for him to live?  That's why I'm working on it now.  Unfortunately, finding a list of housing is the first and a kind of difficult task.  Apparently there is not just one list.  Secondly, each housing location requires that a potential renter get on their own list and each requires different criteria.  Thirdly, my brother is incapable of starting or following through on doing this, so it will be me, me, me who has to do this, too.  Today I feel strong, directed, decisive.  I had a decent night's sleep.  The book club was fun and we laughed about lots of things, my husband and I watched good TV--The Killing on AMC, a terrific new series and a recording of Blue Bloods (Tom Selleck series).  And I nearly fell asleep on the couch, so I knew I would have success with sleeping.  Only trouble was, I was awake by 3:00 a.m.  Absolutely awake.  My method for dealing with that kind of being awake in the middle of the night is to get up, go down to the guest room bed with my book, read for awhile and then fall back to sleep.  Last night it worked--I read for 30 minutes, fell asleep, didn't wake up until 6.

It's not raining (yet) though the wind is blowing and we'll be leaving in 15 minutes.  So far, so good.  I've gotten two emails today about Chapter 14, as a friend called it, telling me how the readers reacted.  I'd like to get more reactions, but truly, this blog is therapy for me.  Writing has always been therapy for me.  If it helps you, then that's fantastic and incredible.  Know that loving someone is always worth it, no matter how much pain comes with losing them.