Tonight's picture was taken in January of 2005. Mattie was almost three years old. You know Mary had a little lamb, well if I were Mary, my lamb would have been Mattie. Mattie loved following me around and being where ever I was. That day I was working in the kitchen and Mattie wanted to participate. So I lifted him up on the counter to be a part of things. When I look at this old kitchen set up, what quickly comes to mind was when Mattie had cancer and was in the hospital undergoing treatment, our complex came into our kitchen and updated our cabinets and countertops. When I came home, I was stunned. It was so nice to have this done, when not around, and the upgrade was deeply appreciated given what we were managing.
Quote of the day: Today's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins.
- Number of people diagnosed with the virus: 75,269,655
- Number of people who died from the virus: 890,040
Today was another whirlwind. I got up, got myself showered and dressed and then went downstairs to make breakfast. My mom showed up soon thereafter, and we made some phone calls about bills and statements. I then quickly went upstairs to wake my dad and help him shower and get dressed. While he was physically in the shower, I was running around upstairs making my parent's bed, picking up trash in bathroom garbage pails, and even took on cleaning out Indie's cat litter box. Once I got my dad downstairs, it literally was one thing after the other after the other.
I had to prepare my dad for the fact that TWO therapists were coming today... occupational and speech. I try not to schedule things back to back for him, but this health care agency and I are NOT on the same wavelength. I really think the notion of having two appointments spiked his anxiety. With that, of course triggered his irritable bowel syndrome. I cleaned up three times after him today in the bathroom, and because I was jumping around, it took me about two hours to eat a bowl of cereal and fruit. Frankly at one point, I wanted to take the cereal bowl and throw it against the wall. That is how frustrated I get sometimes. But I kept it together.
During my dad's occupational therapy session, the therapist got him to walk with his walker for ten minutes consecutively. Once he stopped moving, he was huffing and puffing. The therapist then measured his oxygen level and took his pulse. His oxygen level was fine, but his pulse made NO sense. It should have been over 100, and yet it was in the 40s, which was counter intuitive. It was the therapist who asked if my dad has heart issues. She said it today and the podiatrist said it yesterday. That was enough! I called his primary care doctor and demanded his help in getting my dad a cardiology appointment this week. As the appointment I scheduled for him was in March, which in my opinion is too far away.
When talking with the doctor, I got my parent's blood test results. My mom is fine, and my dad has many things elevated that are in need of management. The speech therapist showed up about 90 minutes after the other therapist. She too is wonderful and is working with my dad on memory strategies. Today's strategy has the acronym... WRAP. Writing, Repeating, Associations, and Pictures. Ironically I may not know this acronym but I have my dad make associations and to visualize things in his head in order to remember things. Clearly I am on the right track!
While balancing the speech therapist, I had the mobile dog groomer over, and also my mom went out for the first time today by herself to CVS. That too triggered a great deal of WORRY in my dad. He asked me many times why I let her do this! Mind you CVS isn't far from the house and I told my mom that if she got lost to call me. I wrote down directions for her and also programmed the GPS on her phone. Meanwhile, on top of this, while the speech therapist was over, I got a call from the primary care doctor, the cardiologist office, and of course at the same time my dad had to run back to the bathroom, and had a pooping accident all over the floor. I could see the therapist was looking at me and internally saying..... how do you managing all of this? NOT sure, but some how I am still standing. Frazzled but still standing, and Sunny even got a walk in. The walk may have been at 4:30pm, but it happened. As I feel that walking is important for both of us.
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