Wednesday 3 July 2013

The ups and downs of life: Part 3

The Tuesday... 18th June


In the morning I dragged myself out of bed.
Brains and Locket were still asleep when I left to go to the hospital.
Neither of them had settled early as they were both concerned about Grandad, Mr P.
Locket had completely cleaned up the whole kitchen which was a real blessing.
She has discovered that when things like this happens it makes her feel more settled to clean and tidy up.
I guess it's being able to restore some order when something happens that is out of your control.
It restores a sense of order...and uses up some stress hormones.
Brains had appeared downstairs when I got home...I'd noticed his light was still on and expected he would come down. Not that he was worried you understand! 16 yr old males don't always like to admit to these feelings :)

Before I left for the hospital I had a call from a social worker.
Her role was to find out how much support Dad would have when he was discharged.
He was going to return to us..perhaps temporarily, he hadn't got that far in the decision making yet.
The social worker seemed to think I was very organised!
If only she knew :)

I had some breakfast and headed off to the hospital.
Dad was reasonably comfortable.
He had been seen by a physiotherapist and an occupational therapist (OT)
The OT came back while I was there which was good as I had a few questions.
I think a doctor popped in as well, plus a person I recognised immediately, though I couldn't remember what her role was.
The OT had a good chat with us, asked some questions and was able to answer one of mine.
We have a shower over the bath so the OT arranged for a bath board to be delivered.

It is similar to this one and sits on the rim of the bath, useful if he needs to sit down in a hurry.
He also left Dad with some excercises to do to strengthen his right hand.

Later the woman I hadn't recognised came back.
It was the stroke nurse. She commented that she had recognised me as well.
She was the stroke nurse for Mum back in 2009, which is why I recognised her.
After she'd attended to the discussion that was needed for her role as stroke nurse she asked for us to remind her about Mum.
She had recognised the surname but not Dad's first name.
I happened to have Mum's Total Mobility card in my pocket which has a photo of her on it.
I showed it to L and she recognised Mum.
It all came back to her.
It was quite good to have someone who was already familiar, in a way, with us.
Though I wish the circumstances had been different.

Whilst all this was happening I sent a text to Monneypenny asking if it were possible and they had the time that they call in to see/spend some time with Brains and Locket.
They do pretty well, but in these sorts of things I don't like to leave them alone for too long as emotions can run high and they are neither of them shy about getting into an altercation!
Moneypenny replied that they would be able to.
I could relax a little :)

Dad had the CT Scan and also a physio came back to see him.
She seemed pretty impressed that he could jump off the ground with two feet!
Not bad for an 86yr old...even though it wasn't far off the ground :)

They decided that they would keep him in another day.
During this time I'd been updating my siblings, the adult grandchildren and also Dad's pastor.
Since they were keeping Dad in I headed off mid-afternoon.

I called in to see Mum on the way home.
I'd called in to see her on the Monday as well since Dad wasn't able to go.
She has been a resident at Johnsonvale rest home since August 2009.
Dad usually goes to see her every day and spends a couple of hours with her.
I needed to tell her in person that Dad had more than likely had a stroke and was in hospital.
Also the staff so that they could keep an eye on Mum.
Plus the staff have got to know Dad quite well over the last few years.
Some have changed but there are many there who have been there since Mum was admitted and so know us. They care about the families of the residents as well as the residents.
As I thought they were a bit shocked as well.

Home, dinner, update who I needed to by text and a call to my sis, R, to let her know the latest.
Then bed.
I was pretty tired after a short sleep the night before.
Hmmm I think I was working on a tutu as well...it was being picked up on the Wednesday evening.
Things are a bit hazy now! Life seems to go into some kind of weird time warp when stuff like this happens.
It moves slow and fast at the same time.
A day goes past but you could swear it's been a week!

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