This morning he seemed pretty clear but totally unable to make the bed to chair transfer. It took all four of us to get him dressed and up (which is a one step process—someone pulling his brief and pants up as the rest of us are lifting and transferring at the same time. Mid-Kid is shortest and the gifted one at being swift with the pulling up the two forms of pants at the same time. We wanted to have him completed dressed today because he had a blood draw at 2:30.
I left him sitting at the table receiving his breakfast at 11 a.m. and told him I would be back when it was time to leave for his appointment. The two oldest agreed to take him to the lab…but I went out to make sure he was ready only to find him still sitting at the table with spilled milk and water all over the table. I hurriedly tried to clean it up before Mom got up to grump at him about spilling things…..well, he was talking about one of my daughters over there at that coffee machine getting him coffee. I realized he was confused and said something about not being at the doctor’s office yet but when he got there I would make sure that she got him a cup of coffee….
That brought Mom to the conversation and the cat and dog fight started….So there I stood trying to mop up the mess with the two of them going at each other and both of them getting nastier by the second. I firmly instructed them both to be quiet and to stop it, which didn’t do much good. About that time one of the daughters breezed in and I started pushing Dad toward the door trying to cover up the mess on the floor so Mom wouldn’t start grumping louder about his getting eggs all over the carpet.
By this time I was regretting that I had not had my coffee before I went out…I got things cleaned up and defused as much as possible with Mom then went in to have my coffee.
I debated whether or not we ought to take him directly to the ER after his blood test…I talked with Mom, my absent Hubby by phone, and two of the three daughters—and lastly to Dad. He is still very confused and saying stupid things but he also seems to be aware that he is this way...and when I asked him if he thought he needed to go to the ER he said no. While that might not sound wise to let him make the decision, one must first know that if he felt even remotely concerned he would want to go to the ER. So I let him make the call. He is taking fluid in and he is letting fluid out, bowel movements are normal….sooner or later the electrolytes should balance out. In the meantime, we will continue to put up with his less than pleasant behavior and hope that when he comes out of this that he will not have lost his ability to transfer from bed to chair and back. He has been real strong and been doing very well until this came along.
His blood count was 8.9 so he had to get a shot.
I would not say it has been an easy couple of days. I expect that I might be up again in the night…but overall it has just been another day as caregivers.