Wednesday, July 27, 2022

Wednesday, July 27, 2022

Tonight's picture was taken on July 21, 2009. Almost a year after Mattie was diagnosed with cancer. By this point, Mattie was off of chemotherapy and was still doing his experimental treatment and more intensive physical therapy. That day Peter took Mattie to out patient physical therapy. You can see that Anna, his therapist, was trying to re-teach Mattie to walk. Of course telling Mattie to hold onto bars and walk wouldn't work. So she put whoopie cushions on the floor, which inspired Mattie to walk toward each and step on them. Our goal was to rehabilitate Mattie so he could return to school in the Fall. The Fall never came for Mattie as he died on September 8!

Quote of the day: Caring for an Alzheimer's patient is a situation that can utterly consume the lives and well-being of the people giving care, just as the disorder consumes its victims. ~ Leeza Gibbons

I feel my dad's outpatient therapists mean well but are making me NUTS. The speech therapist wants my dad to keep a notebook of daily memories! Mind you she may want this, but he has LITTLE TO NO interest in doing this. Frankly I am not sure this was ever his thing, but now he wants to expend as little cognitive and physical energy as possible. 

Each day I prepare my dad's white board by the kitchen table. It alerts him to all the things he is doing that day. In addition, I now prepare his therapy notebook each morning. For example, today he went to his memory care center. Therefore, I designed today's questions in the notebook around his day program schedule. It was my hope that he would jot something down based on what he did. 

I went through the notebook and day care agenda with him at breakfast and showed him the questions I wanted him to complete in his notebook. I made sure his notebook was in his walker pocket and that he could visibly see the notebook in the walker. It sticks right up, it would be impossible to miss it! When my dad got home today, I found he did not touch the notebook and answered NONE of the questions. I wanted to pop my lid, but I didn't. I once again reminded him why we are using the notebook and the importance of using it to record his days. I am getting close to fed up. My dad wants no responsibility and also has no interest in anything other than eating and toileting. It is very reminiscent of caring for a baby. 

In addition, his new walker arrived in the mail today. This is walker #6! Yes I have a collection and can start my own health supplies warehouse. In any case, the occupational therapist wants him using it, and I will encourage him to use it. She wants him walking 1,000 steps a day and this afternoon, I pushed him to get up and walk ten minutes around the house. It is very tiring to monitor him constantly, and if I don't push him he wouldn't do his brain, OT, or PT exercises! 

While my dad was at the memory care center today we had some friends over. This is our friend Junko and my mom. I met Junko and her family the summer of 2007, right before Mattie entered kindergarten. Junko's son, Kazu, and Mattie were enrolled in a summer camp at their elementary school and it was through that camp we became close friends. When our boys were in kindergarten, they remained friends and Junko and I attended the school's weekly chapel each Tuesday. We were chapel mates. We sat next to each other every Tuesday and of course through Mattie's cancer journey our friendship continued and grew. My mom needs a social outlet, and I am lucky to have friends like Junko who share of their time and compassion with us. 

Our friend Ann came over today with her cousin, JP. JP visits every summer for two weeks from Massachusetts. Today JP came for lunch and swimming. 

JP and Ann in the pool. 

I must say I have been remiss in my Sunny walks. Between balancing my parents, Sunny's cancer, and this heat..... walking isn't high on my list. But I miss it! Later today, Peter and I walked Sunny. However, it was too hot for Sunny and Peter had to walk back home to get our car and then pick us up. Nonetheless, I know Sunny loved his adventure. Along our journey we came across this deer, which looked emaciated to me.