Tonight's picture was taken in March of 2006. This was a typical sight in our home. Lots of things happening on the floor of our living and dining rooms. Mattie and I were playing Candy Land and apparently Peter snapped a photo of us. As you can see Mattie was all business and did not want to look at the camera. Of course another tell tale sign of Mattie was his sippy cup full of milk. Mattie drank so much milk that I always thought he'd have the strongest bones around.
Quote of the day: It’s your reaction to adversity, not adversity itself that determines how your life’s story will develop. ~ Dieter F. Uchtdorf
We had to get to the hospital by 9am because Fridays are team meetings for the entire unit. The meetings occur in each patient's room, during the 9am to 10:15am time frame. They don't give you a specific meeting time, so we had to arrive early to park and to get up to the room. The doctor, program director, and case manager arrived in the room by 9:50. They aren't kidding when they say the meeting will be short. Frankly it is a lot of information being directed at you, with little time for questions.
The doctor updated us first. He was short and to the point. However, the main focus was the rash on my dad's back. He is so miserable that it makes it hard for them to keep his attention in therapy sessions and for him to get sleep at night. So the doctor decided to give my dad prednisone today because the rash is not responding to any topical creams! I assure you that the past two days, I have been lathering my dad up with all sorts of creams on the half hour. Even then, he is rocking side to side in his wheelchair trying to scratch his skin off. Rest assured I will never forget that my dad is allergic to adhesives in the future. Adhesives from heart monitor leads and adhesives from pads to prevent bed sores. The rash is all consuming and my dad can't focus on anything else, therefore a good chunk of our team meeting was focused on the rash.
Once we moved off from the rash, apparently the team thinks my dad is doing great physically! HONESTLY, what planet are these people on? By the way in all this conversation there was little mention of my dad's dementia issues! So naturally I brought this up as it is the big elephant in the room and NOT talking about it won't make it disappear. It may not affect them in the long run, but it definitely impacts our family's quality of life. Since my dad is getting speech therapy in the rehab unit my question was how is this therapy assisting my dad and being integrated into his physical rehab? Mainly because I do not view any person in isolation, as they were doing today! Certainly it was clear that they can't manage the dementia and therefore that isn't even on the table when reviewing his physical rehab. All I know is I find my dad's dementia all consuming and when they tell me he is doing great and implying he is easy, I would like to suggest that they take him home for 24 hours and then LET'S talk!
At around noon today, one of the speech therapist's working with my dad came in for a session. She asked if yesterday's therapist who did a cognitive assessment called or wrote to me. I told her no! That said, I looked in the portal yesterday and I did see my dad's results from this assessment. NONE of which I agreed with as she deemed my dad as having mild deficits from dementia. There is NOTHING MILD about him! I pushed back on this therapist today and said I did not agree with these results and clearly they were one snapshot in time, and I am with my dad 24 by 7. In addition, I can't stand when they ask my dad about time, place, and person. Because these questions are repeatedly asked of him, he knows that it is March, 2022, that he is in the hospital, and Biden is president. But scratch the surface and you will find out that my dad has significant impairment. He can't retain information for more than a minute, he can't process multiple pieces of information he hears, his long term memory is fading, and the list goes on. These deficits make it very difficult to function in every day life, as my dad no longer can engage in conversation, he can't follow what's on TV, can't read and take in information, and has trouble with activities of daily living. Putting that aside.... HE'S GREAT, just ask them!
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