The End of My Mother's Life

August 14, 2009

I'm looking forward to seeing as many of my siblings, children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews as possible this weekend. Grandma has rallied quite a bit--she's happy about seeing all of her children, including Butchy. She even had her hair done today at the shop in the care center. I will be bringing her home on hospice on Tuesday, August 18.

Butchy and his care-giver, Lynn, have been at the care center this afternoon with her for awhile "until she dozed off." They'll be at my house this evening for dinner. Paxton and his girls, Mandy, Megan and Elizabeth, with their families are on their way as I write this.

Nathan will be here in about an hour. Eric and Adelina will be here late tonight, and Chuck and Arlene will be in some time late tomorrow.

I've been back and forth to the care center or hospital for nearly three weeks. I'll be relieved to have Grandma in the house, because the care center simply doesn't do what family can.

I won't go into how many times I found her slumped in her chair or cross-wise in the bed where, from the wrinkle marks on her skin, she'd been for several hours. Or the screams of "Ow, ow!!" that tore at my heart when they cleaned her up or moved her. Many of the aides and nurses at Kolob are cheerful and helpful, but they have too many patients and too little time. And some of them dismissed an old ladies cries with, "She's not really in pain" then ignored her. It took me three days to get appropriate pain treatment for her, and I'm still not sure they have it right.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to try to take care of her myself (I don't have the physical ability, anyway). I have several day care people who will come in several hours a day and she will be on hospice, which means comfort care. We won't be forcing her into therapy or even making her move when she doesn't want to. And she'll be able to eat whatever she wants, because I'm not going to worry about her sugar levels, except to check it and give her insulin.

I'll try to be better about updating, but the past month has been pretty stressful.