Very Bad News Update
Posted: Tue May 09, 2023 10:49 pm
I haven't been posting the last few days although I've checked in a couple of times to see what's going on. This has been perhaps the toughest stretch of my adult life.
Mrs. SSS has Alzheimer's. She was first diagnosed around the time of the pandemic, although she had been showing some oddball behavior earlier that we didn't realize were probably the early symptoms. Over the last three years, she has regressed and become increasingly unable to do many of her customary activities. She still wanted to help out so she could be useful but her help often did more harm than good. We hired a cleaning service to come in once a week but otherwise I took over the cooking and all the household chores. I also wound up helping her shower and dress. Her speech became less and less coherent, and she asks questions that I have no idea what she's trying to say. It's been taking a toll on me physically and our daughters emotionally as well. We took her to adult day classes a couple of days a week for several months, but she eventually had too many toileting accidents so she couldn't continue there. She became confused about who are daughters are. Sometimes, she thought they were her sisters and sometimes she thought they were part-time caretakers I hired to check up on her.
Finally, last week, we put her in a memory care home a few miles from us. She has her own room with furniture from out house and a new twin bed our daughter bought. She's with about 30 other residents in varying stages. Some of them seem almost normal senior citizens when you meet them, and some move around like zombies. A few apparently stay in bed almost all day. My wife hasn't handled this well. She thinks I've abandoned or divorced her and that her daughters are dead. I've been there every day since she went there, and I've taken her to movies and out to meals. (They feed her three meals a day tailored to senior citizens, e.g. mild soft foods.) She gets so excited when she sees me; it's like a little child seeing Santa Claus. Our daughters have been there a couple of times as well. But it's been rough. Sunday I came by and she was sitting on the couch in the group TV room looking at a picture of me and crying. Friday was our 39th wedding anniversary, and I realized she had no concept any more of what that meant.
I haven't always been the best of husbands, but she's been a wonderfully supportive and caring person the entire time I've known her. She's also been an incredibly strong person. She's still as sweet as she was and physically she's in good shape for a woman her age. She takes part in fitness classes there and enjoys when they play music. We're getting the cable TV hooked up in her room so she has something to watch at night. But she still hasn't really made any friends with any of the staff or other residents although the staff tells me she's getting better adjusted every day. It also doesn't help matters that I've been having my own physical problems as well. Shortly before we put my wife in the home, one of our daughters took me to the emergency room where they hooked me up to a catheter for a week. My problems stem from the prostate surgery I had. I seem to be doing okay for now since they took the catheter out but it's just one more thing hitting at a bad time. In addition, I'm in the middle of having some major dental work as well.
I'll be posting some more in the days ahead, but right now I just don't have the spirit to engage in the usual political banter.
Mrs. SSS has Alzheimer's. She was first diagnosed around the time of the pandemic, although she had been showing some oddball behavior earlier that we didn't realize were probably the early symptoms. Over the last three years, she has regressed and become increasingly unable to do many of her customary activities. She still wanted to help out so she could be useful but her help often did more harm than good. We hired a cleaning service to come in once a week but otherwise I took over the cooking and all the household chores. I also wound up helping her shower and dress. Her speech became less and less coherent, and she asks questions that I have no idea what she's trying to say. It's been taking a toll on me physically and our daughters emotionally as well. We took her to adult day classes a couple of days a week for several months, but she eventually had too many toileting accidents so she couldn't continue there. She became confused about who are daughters are. Sometimes, she thought they were her sisters and sometimes she thought they were part-time caretakers I hired to check up on her.
Finally, last week, we put her in a memory care home a few miles from us. She has her own room with furniture from out house and a new twin bed our daughter bought. She's with about 30 other residents in varying stages. Some of them seem almost normal senior citizens when you meet them, and some move around like zombies. A few apparently stay in bed almost all day. My wife hasn't handled this well. She thinks I've abandoned or divorced her and that her daughters are dead. I've been there every day since she went there, and I've taken her to movies and out to meals. (They feed her three meals a day tailored to senior citizens, e.g. mild soft foods.) She gets so excited when she sees me; it's like a little child seeing Santa Claus. Our daughters have been there a couple of times as well. But it's been rough. Sunday I came by and she was sitting on the couch in the group TV room looking at a picture of me and crying. Friday was our 39th wedding anniversary, and I realized she had no concept any more of what that meant.
I haven't always been the best of husbands, but she's been a wonderfully supportive and caring person the entire time I've known her. She's also been an incredibly strong person. She's still as sweet as she was and physically she's in good shape for a woman her age. She takes part in fitness classes there and enjoys when they play music. We're getting the cable TV hooked up in her room so she has something to watch at night. But she still hasn't really made any friends with any of the staff or other residents although the staff tells me she's getting better adjusted every day. It also doesn't help matters that I've been having my own physical problems as well. Shortly before we put my wife in the home, one of our daughters took me to the emergency room where they hooked me up to a catheter for a week. My problems stem from the prostate surgery I had. I seem to be doing okay for now since they took the catheter out but it's just one more thing hitting at a bad time. In addition, I'm in the middle of having some major dental work as well.
I'll be posting some more in the days ahead, but right now I just don't have the spirit to engage in the usual political banter.
