My family

Family Stories Vlog

DAY 1

15 Nov 2016

Well, it is clear that this new program of mine is going to require patience.

Happy that we had a Plan (though it meant I would not be able to do the stuff I had to do at home), I went off at 11.  We were going to buy lipstick.  I would take her to Panda Express for lunch and then we'd go back to Atria and either go to Bingo or work puzzles.

She had something to do today!

Only she was still in bed asleep when I got there.

Well...OK.  I had given all day to this enterprise.  No need to wake her up when I have a book in my purse.

I sat down to read and eventually I fell asleep in the chair, waking when one of her care givers came to take her to lunch.  It was 12:30.

She got up slowly, body creaking and feeling out of sorts.  She tried saying that she didn't know what she was supposed to be doing but I had an answer for that one.  We had, by that time, however, decided that she didn't feel well enough to go shopping.  I told her that since she didn't fell well, we could put off doing that job until tomorrow, so she has a plan for tomorrow too.

I got coffee for her and we talked for awhile until her head cleared.  An interesting thing happened at the lobby coffee pot.  A woman was just finishing up her coffee when I came and she looked at me and said "Are you the one who writes the reviews for the paper?"  Now how in the world she knew that I don't have a clue, since my photo has never appeared with my reviews.  But it was kind of fun to be recognized.

Raquel had brought a walker in to the apartment.  Apparently she will now use it to go to meals, if it is in her room, but then she leaves it in the dining room.  She doesn't know what it is or who it belongs to, but she's not as negative about it as she once was.

Since we weren't going out, I decided to go to lunch at Atria, though I really am tired of Atria meals.  We walked slowly to the dining room (no walker) and had a nice lunch, though we were joined by a woman who has been at Atria for about 8 months.  She says she likes to sit with different people each time so she can find out about where they come from.

She then proceeded to tell me her whole life story from childhood to today, the farm on which she lived, her family, her job (a teacher), the book she's writing, that she had not felt well this morning and had gone to the doctor (she had meds she picked up that she couldn't open and I opened the bottle for her).  She talked the whole time we were there and didn't ask my mother a single question.  She is also the first person I met who refers to herself by her last name.  I only know her as Mrs. D.....

We went back to the apartment and I told her that I had to go home to get some work done.  It was 2 p.m. now, and Bingo was over anyway.  But I told her I'd come back tomorrow and we'd see about going out tomorrow.

I came home and started to work on the reviews, but fell asleep for about 2 hours.  I'm starting to think this dementia thing is starting to make me depressed because I've been sleeping so much.  It seems whenever I sit down to do anything, from work to play, I have to get up and go take a nap. I'm getting as bad as my mother.

But Wednesday is the meeting day for the Dementia Support Group.  They meet the 3rd Wednesday of the month and for many months now I have had conflicting activities, but I realize I really need support, encouragement and suggestions from the group this time.

I love my mother but I never dreamed that when we started paying about $1,000 a month extra for assisted living that it would increase the time I needed to spend with her!

I'm also taking a couple of weeks off from Blue Apron.  I love the meals, I love not having to plan, and about 90% of what we get is delicious and the things that I don't particularly like, Walt does, so it has worked out exceptionally well.

But mis en place is killing me!  Tom says he loves having all of his ingredients measured and chopped before he starts cooking.  I've always been a "search frantically in the fridge before it's time to add the next ingredient" kind of cook, and while I agree completely that mis en place makes your life easier, I'd just like to take a couple of weeks off.  All that chopping before cooking kills my back and I end up having to take a few minutes off about 3-4 times during a meal, so with a couple of weeks of having to plan my own meals again, I will be happy to go back to getting those little boxes every week -- and besides, part of that will be Thanksgiving anyway. 

I've decided to cook a small turkey and see if I can encourage my mother to come over here. I could have a turkey dinner with her at Atria, but then I'd have no leftovers, the last time Atria served no dressing, and I don't like their pumpkin pie (and wouldn't have any left for breakfast in the morning).  So that's another good reason to postpone Blue Apron for that week, at least.

I've been seeing a log=t of people on line indignant when they are called racists or homophobes or xenophobes just because they voted for Trump.  They see themselves as the good guys and not like those disruptive people.  What was it the Pharisee said? "‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—crooks, evildoers, adulterers"

But they knew what Trump was.  They listened to his comments about women, his threats about ethnic groups, his plans for disrupting people's lives and all sorts of other things, including encouraging violence at his rallies ("throw him out in the cold."), and I have to ask, if you are really a good person, how could you vote for a person who espouses those hateful sentiments?

Is this the man you want to show your children as a person they can emulate?

One of his first cabinet appointments has been Steve Bannon as chief strategist  Breitbart, the website Bannon ran "is a home for the White Nationalist Right that elevates racist, xenophobic, anti-Semitic tirades and conspiracy theories.”  His appointment has drawn criticism from the left and from the right.