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| Our backyard this afternoon. Oh how I LOVE our backyard. So peaceful and relaxing. This is the best time of year! |
Momentous news this week folks!
July 21st is the scheduled date for my first cataract surgery. I got the call yesterday. This surgery is for my right eye, which has a noticeable cataract in it. You can' see it from the outside from inside my eyeball I'm looking through a foggy or smeared with grease glass window. I can't wait to get that eye corrected so I can see normal again. Also, this should help out my double vision. To get cataract surgery you have to have had a current EKG. I have one that is good for my first surgery but it will have expired by the time of my second cataract surgery. I made the call to my cardiologist's office this morning and left a message requesting an appointment for that EKG. My life is a series of doctors' appointments, I just can't get away from it.
Today the head coordination for Bill's at home hospice service came by with papers for me to sign discharging Bill from hospice care. She assured me that he can go back on at anytime I deed it necessary. It won't be necessary now because Bill has stabilized but he's not the person he was before his two strokes. Health wise he's good but mentally he's getting more confused. I can see the dementia slipping in. Thank God me still knows who I am. I think that would be the line that I don't want to cross. I don't think I can care for a stranger. I have my hands full taking care of Bill as he is now. He still can't dress, feed, bath or take his medication on his own. He just can't connect the dots. Cognitive issues. I've seen it with other friends of mine who have since passed on, including my Mother.
This morning I woke up with very little hearing in my right ear. Bill's worn a hearing aide for over thirty years now. I've always prided myself on my excellent hearing. I don't know what caused this hearing loss in my right ear. I think it's temporary. My ear feels plugged up like it does when you get off of a long plane ride. Last week it was plugged up like that but after I took a few hard gulps, it popped. I tried the gulping today but no pop. Maybe when my caregiving days are done and I'm still alive I'll see a hearing specialist. That's something I can put off. My cataract surgery, I can't.
Every day I get up my whole body aches. I put this down to just an eighty-year old body that arthritis is slowing over taking my joints. Right now my back is aching. I'll take an Advil for that pain. Advil works for me. Tylenol doesn't. My other joints all ache. It's tolerable but I'm no longer the springy guy I used to be when I visited the Veterans Hospital in Wilmington, Delaware and prided myself that I didn't walk like an old man like so many of my fellow veterans. No longer, I'm starting to walk like an old man.
Sometimes I think I've lived long enough. I have to stick around to take care of Bill but after that assuming I survive Bill, I have to evaluated my quality of life situation. Like today, it was a beautiful sunny 72 degree, low humidity day. Our backyard is beautiful, inviting, and relaxing. I like nothing more than to putz around in our backyard doing yard work. Yesterday I mowed the lawn, which I love. Today I did the trimming which is a little more onerous (a lot of bending and stopping) but still pleasant and relaxing for me. But when I bend down on my knees to transplant some grass plugs, I have one helluva time getting up. I'm thinking what happens if one of these days I can't get up? I'm just laying out there on the grass like some old man who has lived too long? My father died when he was eighty years old. He smoked his whole life and ate greasy food almost every day. Up until two weeks before he died he managed to work in his garden. He loved to plant and grow corn. Way more than we could ever eat, he gave most of it away. But gardening is the one thing he truly loved. More than his sons, that's for sure but I digress. Wouldn't it be ironic if I kicked the bucket during one of my transplanting grass plugs days or just trimming the grass with my grass shears? Some actors would like to die on the stage, me I prefer my bed during a good dream. Speaking of which, I've really been having some weird dreams lately. Can't remember the details (I rarely do) but I do remember if my dreams were good, bad or just weird. Having some weird ones lately folks.
This Friday Bill's regular hospice nurse comes by for the Last Visit. She'll take his emergency drugs (morphine) and dump them down the toilet. She'll say "goodbye" and Bill and I will enter this new phase of our life. I feel like I'm on HOLD. But here we go, life goes one. And believe me folks, if I have anyone young reading this blog post (which I highly doubt), getting old definitely ain't for sissies!
12 comments:
My husband has had both eyes done for cataract. He drives much better now. Before, I'd be pressing the imaginary brake pedal on the passenger side of the car at traffic lights. Very happy for you and Bill.
Ron your ear problem may simply be an accumulation of wax. A primary care doctor should be able to take care of that. Also whenever you get down on the floor or any place else be sure your near something to grab onto to pull yourself up. Don
Boy, I can sure relate to a lot of what you say, like the morning body aches, ‘walking like an old man’, trouble getting up when down, and other things like stiffness in most joints. I wonder how much I will be able to take, when it will be time to put an end to it.
I hope your cataract surgery goes ok, I’ll be watching for a report. I see the cardiologist once a year, they do an EKG at each visit. That happened last Friday. My colonoscopy is this coming Monday, not looking forward to that but I’ve got to do it to get my PCP off my back about it.
I’m glad you still are enjoying your yard work. You are lucky to have the rain to keep it lush.
Jim
Hospice ending this way is good. With my mother after a few months off she started to decline again and the restart was seamless. As for cognitive issues, my personal experience was that when I was no longer recognized the caring became easier.
Because I no longer expected my mother to act in a certain way,
She was a stranger in need of help and empathy kicked in.
But while the day to day caring became easier, the quiet moments became harder. You felt as you had lost your love one
and you were tending a memory rather than a person. If that makes any sense.
Anonymous,
With the one exception of my late brother's botched cataract surgery I hear nothing but good about life after cataract surgery. I am so looking forward to that life. Looking through a foggy lens in my right eye is discouraging. I suspect my left eye is almost as bad but I just haven't realized it. Thanks for your encouragement!
Ron
Jim,
Isn't it something the way our whole body aches when we get up from a nap or bed? Creaky. All those years when we were younger and we thought nothing of bouncing right up from bed, with clear vision and ring bell hearing. I feel like I'm going down hilll at an accelerated path now. I am so looking forward to my cataract surgery. Good luck on your colonoscopy. Mine is coming up year after next, assuming I'll be here. One never knows.
Ron
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Anonymous,
Thank you for sharing your experience with your caregiving experience with your mother. I fear the day when Bill doesn't know who I am. He is still quite aware of who I am and in many ways he is his old self. It's just that his body is giving out. But thank God he can still manage to go to the bathroom by himself and spoon feed himself. I have to do just about everything else from dressing him, keep track and give him his prescriptions and prepare his food. He sleeps a lot. Now that he is off blood thinner (Eliquis) I don't have to worry about keeping him warm even when the temperature is 90 degrees plus outside like it was today.
I understand completely what you say about "the quiet moments becoming harder." I can't share many of those moments now because Bill can't connect the dots but if I keep at it I can bring his memory back. A lot also has to do with his hearing and now I have the same hearing problem, maybe not as severe as Bill's. One thing I will be forever grateful for is that I have this opportunity to take care of Bill at this time of his life. Last year I thought I had lost him and that was just too abrupt. Now, when either his time comes (or mine), we're more prepared for the final separation.
Ron
Funny to read this just as I am starting a new medication for BPH.
I'm 31 now and have been reading your blog posts for years. Wanted to show that's not true that younger readers aren't reading!
Don,
You were wright! I got some ear cleaning solution at Walgreens. Now my ear is unplugged and I can hear, thank goodness! Still, I made an appointment with an audiologist though to check my hearing. I don't hear as good out of my right ear. Thanks for the tip!
Ron
Dr. Spo,
I am always pleased to see your comments. Good luck with your new medication. As we get older, more medications are coming!
Ron
Jardley,
What a pleasant surprise! I truly didn't think anyone young read my blog. I am now inspired to make more blog posts!
Ron
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