On and Off, Getting Out, and Breathing

Mary found the on/off switch on the belly of her “pretty birdie baby” and turned it off, saying, “There. Now you can’t say anything.” Then she turned it back on.

We went over to Mom’s on Memorial Day. Neither of us felt like going out—it was so ungodly hot—but Mom sounded so excited on the phone, I knew we didn’t have a choice. We were supposed to fix a pork roast in her convection oven. When we got there, I found out that it was this huge, thick thing with several bones in it that she’d gotten for 99¢ a pound. We tried to use the CompuBroil option, but the meat was too heavy. I didn’t look in the book to see what the limit was. We just used the regular convection option. I had a recipe for a rosemary-mustard rub. Well, we cooked that thing for 90 minutes and it still wasn’t done. We ended up having to eat some ham. After dinner, I told Mary we’d be getting the table cleared off soon—I think she’d had a pretty boring time thus far. I teasingly asked if she knew why we’d clear the table off, and she said, “I think so!” “Why?” “Dominoes!” she replied. Mom and I about fell off our chairs. Mary did much better than she did the last time. At least, she did better until it got more complicated. I felt really bad because I won all three games, but I had to—it was fate! I won with the same domino every time. Too strange.

I want to get a Hoover carpet cleaner tomorrow. It’s on sale at Kohl’s. On one hand, I hate (makes me sick, really) to spend so much money ($140), but on the other hand, it costs $100 to have three areas cleaned professionally, so I’m actually saving money. Bonnie cleaned the carpet once and it looked so nice, at least, for a while. I wonder if I’m stupid to be doing this, but I’ve made up my mind that it’s for the best.

The guy came to do a maintenance check on the AC the other day. It hadn’t been running right. Odd because before then it had always run fine. He said we needed a new thermostat and also a pound of Freon. Well, that was all a bundle, but it is a nice thermostat (digital), and now I’m able to keep it set at 78 and be comfortable whereas I used to keep it at 74. Mom turned her AC on for the first time this year (!) for us the other day. She’s never had her AC or furnace checked and I want to send someone to check it. I don’t really have the money to do this, but I’m going to do it anyway. I just hope the guy doesn’t find a thousand things wrong.

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it, but I’m a big believer in breathing. I tell Mary to breathe all the time because it helps her walk better. It helps her quit shaking. But just because I tell her to do it doesn’t mean she does. So I’d tell her I needed to hear it or that I needed to feel it (ie, her ribs expanding and contracting). I’d gotten so I’d practically yell at her because she didn’t really listen. Well, I was reading about affirmations the other day. I’ve tried them before myself. It suddenly occurred to me to try them with Mary. I came up with “I can do this,” but that seemed to short, so I added, “if I breathe.” Then I switched it around to, “If I breathe, I can do this.” That worked alright but it wasn’t perfect, so I add the word “deeply” after “breathe.” I started saying this to her. She kind of laughed at first because I was using the first person. But she was listening. Sometimes she even says it with me or she say, “That’s what I was thinking.” Isn’t it amazing? It’s just like my brother Kevin told me when I was a child, “If a puzzle piece doesn’t fit easily, don’t force it.”

I got Mary to come and sit outside this evening while I trimmed the bushes. She didn’t want to. She says she’s so sleepy. I think that comes from boredom. Luckily, it had cooled off and was bearable. I think she enjoyed it—I know I did!

Addendum

I meant to mention that I contacted Waterpik again after still not being able to find a replacement hose and they said they’d send me another one. We shall see.

There was something else I wanted to add but can’t think of it right now.

Work and Play

I finally managed to give Mary her shower this morning. I think it may have been a week since her last one—and the same goes for me. Part of it is that she doesn’t want to and part of it is that I don’t want to. Either she’s tired or…well, I guess that’s always her excuse. With me, it’s more finding the time to fit it in. I’ve had so much yard work to do and if I wait, it gets so hot. Or else I’m tired. There’s also the fact that I hate the shower head. There’s a bar so that you can slide the showerhead up and down. This is great because Mary sits and I stand. Also, I can then easily take it out of its holder to get her wet or rinse her off. It’s indispensable for washing her hair. However, the showerhead is too large and heavy, so that it fell forward a lot (I’ve learned to lean it backwards against the wall when not in use.) and the hose sprang a leak. I looked everywhere for a replacement but couldn’t find one. I guess it never occurred to them that their product might need to be replaced! I wrote an email to the company (Waterpik) but never heard anything back from them, so I just bought a sturdy-looking one. The problem is that the end that attaches to the showerhead isn’t shaped properly to fit into the holder, so the problem was multiplied. It’s a royal pain in the ass and makes me dread dealing with the shower. Well, also, there’s the fact that it’s super tiny and cramped and there’s no good place for the soap (There’s a soap dish that attaches to the bar, but that makes the showerhead be up too high for Mary. I wish I’d had the bar put in lower, but I don’t want to make holes all over the place, so I’ve just left it. Why are there so many stupid little decisions to make in life?!), and the fixture to turn the shower on and off is incredibly hard to pull and push on and off. Then there’s the whole routine, practically a ritual, that has to be gone through. I try to have things down to a science to make them most efficient. And after the shower’s over with, there’s the getting dressed part, which wouldn’t be so bad except for the petroleum jelly business. It feels so nasty! I don’t know how Mary stands it. Personally, I think she likes being rubbed all over! But putting her clothes on over top of the stuff is annoying beyond description.

Wow. Where did all that come from? I meant to just write about how I spent the day cleaning up the holly bush branches that I cut off yesterday—I decimated those bushes. Either they’ll be better off and actually start looking nice or they’ll never get over it and keel over. I moved on to a little thorn bush of some sort out front. Luckily, it has berries but no thorns yet. They’re so nasty—they poke right through my gloves. I really don’t know what to do with this little bush. It’s sort of pretty but…I don’t know why they put it there. My next step was to completely (or as much as I was capable of) cut down a wild honeysuckle bush out front. Mary sat out on the front porch, reading Annie’s Mailbox and watching me. I was so glad to see her stay awake for so long! (There really should be some sort of punctuation in between a period and an exclamation point.) I’ve wanted to get rid of this bush for so long. It isn’t pretty and serves no function at all other than to grow like crazy, blocking the sidewalk and making cutting the grass even more difficult. I’d love to have it completely removed but don’t want to waste the money. I’d also love to get rid of the one in the backyard and put an Endless Summer hydrangea there. But at least that one serves a function, sort of—the birds adore it.

Oh, get this—a mini-miracle occurred this afternoon. I was about three quarters of the way done cutting up the branches I’d cut down when a man stopped his pick-up truck, which was loaded with tree branches, in front of the yard. He hopped out and asked me if I wanted to throw everything in his truck. I couldn’t believe my ears. He said he was allowed to dump it in his work’s dumpster. So he took the branches and the bags. Amazing! Just like an angel coming to help me.

I asked Mary if she wanted to go to Serena’s or Angela’s for dinner She said she didn’t care, so I called Mom to see what she was having for dinner ( She said oxtail soup with barley. Ugh! So I said, oh, well, maybe another time. Several minutes later she called back to say she could also offer us sauerkraut and mashed potatoes with pork and a half of a stuffed pepper. She just cracks me up. She acted so nonchalant when I turned her down, but she must have been disappointed. She said we might as well come to her house because we’d only be getting leftovers at Angela’s, too. I was so tired, I didn’t really feel like going anywhere, but I have some old movies checked out from the library and I thought she (or Angie) would enjoy seeing them, too. We went over and ended up watching “It Happened One Night.” We really enjoyed it.

However, we didn’t get home till almost 11:30 PM and I’m so bad for keeping Mary out so late. Sometimes I wonder that she doesn’t just collapse on me. Well, she didn’t have her usual cup of coffee when we got in, so I know she was tired. Speaking of which…good night!

Birdie, Birdie, Birdie (Cardinal's Song)

The other day I went to Walgreens to spend some money and found the perfect way to blow $10—an almost life-sized plastic Northern Cardinal replica that moves its head and chirps and sings whenever anything moves around it. I was pretty sure Mary would get a kick out of it and I thought the cat might, too. Well, the cat couldn’t care less, but Mary is besotted. I’ve explained that there’s a motion detector that causes the bird to spring to life, but I don’t think she can remember this, if she even understood in the first place. I’m pretty amazed myself ( Let me tell you, the first two days, she talked almost nonstop to this thing! Here are some of the things she said to it:

• You’re a pretty baby, yes you are!


• You’ve got pretty eyes, baby!


• Yeah! Yeah!


• Sing for Mary!/Talk to Mary!


• You’re my baby, yes you are!


• You wanna come home with Mary? Mary will take you home with her.


• Don’t you bite me!


• Mary won’t hurt you.


• What do you want, baby? Tell Mary what you want.

The funny thing is that the batteries are probably going low, so it doesn’t react all the time, so when it does, you actually do get surprised. I’ll have to get fresh batteries because Mary got such a kick out of it. I think they probably mostly ran out while it was in my car on the way home. Every turn or bump would cause it to start singing.

Mom asked me if she knew it wasn’t real. I said of course not, but then I started to wonder myself, she talked to it so incessantly. I finally asked her, just to make sure, but I was immediately sorry. I think she got a bit insulted.

She keeps picking it up, which causes the stand it’s resting on to fall off. Then she tries to get it back and gets all frustrated because she can’t.

She just called me into her bedroom, but when I got there, she didn’t know what she wanted anymore. I leaned over and laid my face next to her and then the cat jumped up on the bed. (It always does that when I lie down with Mary.) I said something about the cat wanting to be with us and she said something about how she thought places like this almost always did have a cat. Then we had a strange conversation where I tried to get her to tell me where she thought she was and she just kept saying she knew or she’d try to say, but she couldn’t get it out. She finally said something that conveyed to me that she didn’t know she was at home, so I told her she was. I always say, “This is McD___,” and she recognizes the street name. I just don’t get why she can’t remember where she is at night. Maybe she’s just telling me, whereas during the day she doesn’t let me know.

I’ll be glad when I get the yard more under control. Then I won’t have to spend so much time outside. It’s nice for me, but I hate to leave Mary alone for so long. She needs some mental stimulation. Other than Annie’s Mailbox. Sometimes I sit her out on the front porch while I’m working out there. Today she asked if she could sit out there, which was so touching, but it was just too windy. I don’t want her to get sick. Plus, she gets cold so quickly.

The Cubans next store are having a party, I just know it. I don’t hear any music, though. They’re probably going to turn it on around 1 AM. I should just go to sleep on the couch. But I always end up with cramped legs, so I should go to sleep in my bed as long as I can. I would put in ear plugs, but then I wouldn’t hear Mary. Plus, they’re really annoying to sleep with.

My resolve to get Mary into bed earlier is going nowhere. It’s so nice out on the back porch, so we stay out there until it gets dark, around 9 PM. Then I’ve got several movies from the library, which take 2 hours, so it’s, bingo, 11 PM when we’re finally getting around to brushing our teeth.

I asked her to cut out a crossword puzzle for me (for one of my brothers) the other day. She cut out the puzzle but not the clues. I thought that was so cute! The next time I outlined it in red and she did a great job. I wish I had more puzzles for her to do, games to play with her, or little tasks to give her. There must be a resource for these things somewhere. I guess it’s different for different people, though. I mean, she used to love to do word searches, but she doesn’t do them anymore because she shakes so much.

OK, past my bedtime.

Forgotten Visitors

Uncle Tom brought Angie in today! I still can't believe it. Unfortunately, Mary didn't have a good day. She just couldn't wake up and didn't seem to really be there all day. I think Ange must have been disappointed that Mary wasn't excited about her being there. On the other hand, maybe then she saw first hand what I'm up against sometimes when I want to get her to go visit Angie.

Tom had a lunch date with one of his kids, so he didn't stick around, which was ok because he can be a bit strenuous! It's just that he's always talking and telling jokes. Doesn't seem to deal well with silence.

I wanted to go vote but I didn't want to leave Mary alone with Angie, so I called Mom and asked her if she would come over. She actually agreed. I think she lied to Dad and told him that she was going to vote. It was a good cover-up because he couldn't vote today, being an Independent, so there was no reason for him to go with her. Mom stayed a long time, but she kept saying the whole time that she really needed to get back home. Argh! I was glad for Angie's sake that she was here! Otherwise it would have been a major dud of a visit!

Angie got here just after noon and immediately wanted something to eat :-) I got out some Irish cheddar and was pleased that she loved it, but then she had a stomach ache the whole rest of the visit. Her osteo has caused her belly to really pooch out. Everything must be really squished toghether in there.

I made a pound cake--which I know Angie loves--because we've got a ton of strawberries and they go so well together. But I started too late and they left just before it came out of the oven. I said that maybe this visit would get Mary back in the swing of things and we could go out and visit Angie tomorrow and bring some cake. Well, so much for that because about an hour later when I asked Mary if she remembered who had visited her today, she was absolutely clueless. I asked her a couple of times more, but she never remembered, so I switched tacks and just kept asking if it wasn't nice that Tom, Angie and Serena had been in to visit today. Sometimes I honestly get a bit scared about how much she doesn't know anymore. The other day when I came in to wake her from her nap (cause she'd been in bed for over an hour), I could swear she actually looked...not frightened but certainly somehow shocked. She stared at me for a good half minute like that before she asked, "Bridget?"

Snapdragon Fun

The other day I brought some snapdragons in so that Mary could see them better. I was showing her how to use them as puppets. She acted like she’d never seen this, but I can’t believe that. She must have forgotten. On the other hand, I was telling Mom and she had forgotten that, too. Later on in the day, I was singing to her (which I do all the time because I’m crazy). She was acting tired and not paying me any attention, so I grabbed the snapdragon flower from earlier and pretended it was singing, using it as a puppet. Mary got a kick out of that :-)

Streetcars and Mint Juleps

The other night when Mary got up around 2 AM to go to the potty, she must have still been asleep because when I put her blue house slippers on, she said, “Aw! Am I gonna have to wear these home on the street car?” I just replied, “Yeah, I guess so.” When I told her about it the next day, she just laughed.

She’s been sleeping so much lately. I’ve been getting her to lie down after breakfast because I think it’s better for her to sleep in bed than in her chair. More comfortable. She’ll sleep for an hour or two. I figure if she’s sleeping so soundly, she must need it. I guess I’m keeping her up too late. I normally get her to bed around 11 PM. But she herself doesn’t want to go even then sometimes.

I’d started giving her mostly decaf coffee because I figured the caffeine wasn’t good for her. Since she’s not taking Plavix, her chances of having a stroke are higher. Now I have read that decaf coffee raises your cholesterol. What to do?!

I got one of those foot spa things because I thought it might help with my feet hurting. It splutters water everywhere and is supposed to keep it warm but doesn’t, but it’s still nice. Mary, however, didn’t like it and just kept asking where it came from and who it belonged to.

This is odd but during my last migraine attacks, my neck and shoulder and sort of upper back on my left side (where I get my migraines) started hurting. Even though the migraines have subsided, the pain in my neck, shoulder and back hasn’t. I’ve been taking ibuprofen, which makes it better, but I’d like to find out what’s up. The muscle on my upper arm, about three inches down from my shoulder, hurts like the dickens.

I’ve quit drinking soy milk and stopped taking my contraception pills (which are supposed to protect me from ovarian cancer) in the hopes that this will make my migraines go away. This is perhaps a little strange, but I think that another contributing factor with the pill was that it screwed up my natural rhythm and so my body was protesting. We shall see. I figure I’ll give it two months.

I went to Mom’s on Tuesday with the intention of helping her with her yard, but it was threatening to storm, and I got the distinct impression that she didn’t really want my help, so I gave her a bit of a reflexology treatment on her feet. Well, I only had time for one foot ( She said that she woke up in the middle of the night with a cramp in her foot. I hope I didn’t do anything wrong. Oh, she didn’t shut up for a minute all the while I was massaging her foot! Of course, she had had a beer, but I think she really gets lonely. Dad’s not very good company. Today I took her (had to fairly twist her arm) with me to the drug store, bank and grocery, since we both needed to go to these places. When she got in the car, I had an audiobook playing. She said, “Well if you’re going to have that on, we can’t talk.” So I turned it off and said, “OK, talk away,” which she did! She always tells me about her problems with Dad, and I always give her the same bits of advice. It’s really rather frustrating. By the time I’m finished with Mom, I am always in need of a massage!

She says I’m making her fat with all the baked goods I give them. But I can’t help it! I’ve really been into biscuits and pie lately. And there’s no one else to give it too, and Mary and I shouldn’t eat it all ourselves. I would give some to one of my brothers (Fred) or nephew (August), but they take so long to come get it, that it’s gone bad. Sometimes I seriously wonder … I guess they’re used to bought things with preservatives in them.

Anyway, on Derby Day I took a pecan pie over to Mom’s and she made a big deal about not taking any. Then she turned around and said she was actually hoping desperately that I’d give her some. Go figure! Oh, we had a very nice time on Derby Day—but we missed the race. I had changed the channel because the one that got the race doesn’t come in clearly on their TV. I thought they would show the race on the news on the other channel but they didn’t. It must be a legal rights thing. But we had our Mint Juleps (made with some unknown mint from Mom’s yard)—which Mom thought were too small, and we also got in three rounds of dominoes. Mary played worse than I’ve ever seen her play. She seemed to be warming up as we went along. Maybe it was the MJ. It seemed to almost put her to sleep. I made us some more the next day, but they didn’t taste nearly as good.

Uncle Tom should be coming this weekend. I hope that will be good for Aunt Angie. We haven’t been out to see her because either I don’t feel well or Mary doesn’t feel well or it’s raining. I know we should call but I’ve practically given up. She often doesn’t understand you or doesn’t seem to be listening. Or she is so down or in pain that she doesn’t feel like talking. The last time she gave me a detailed account of an attack of diarrhea she had had. What’s that saying—laugh and the world laughs with you? It’s hard to talk to someone who’s down in the dumps all the time. And it’s hard to talk to someone who only wants to talk about their pain when you’re in pain yourself. She also seems to have no patience to talk to Mary anymore.

Oh, did I tell you that Anna called the other day? It was a mistake. She’d meant to call the bank. She talked to Mary anyway, thank goodness.

Well, I’ve got to get to bed.

Teeth, Pee and Headaches

I realized this morning that I should probably be watching Mary when she brushes her teeth to make sure she brushes everywhere. She took her brush out of her mouth and asked me if that was all. I’d only been nominally paying attention to her (as I was brushing my own teeth at the time), but I didn’t recall seeing her do the top teeth, so I asked her if she’d done those and she didn’t have a clue. Really, I should have thought of this before. I mean, if she can’t remember where she has washed in the shower, how can she remember what she has brushed?

Her urine has been really cloudy for over a week. The visiting nurse had a sample tested last Friday, but there wasn’t anything there. That was his last visit, so if I want her tested again, I’ll need to take her in to the doctor’s office. I called to see if I could just bring her by on Monday—the line is always busy, busy, busy on Monday, so I know I won’t be able to call then. Well, they’ve taken the day off, for Derby I assume.

I think I’d also like to talk to the doctor about my migraines. They’re getting so that they last three or four days. Excedrin takes away about 90 percent of the pain but the other symptoms stay—the nausea, pain in the back and neck, “heisse Hunger,” as they say in German (basically the munchies). Not to mention the way my feet and hands hurt. I wish a reflexologist weren’t so expensive!

Mary has lain down for a rest. She looked so tired. I’m certain she has an infection.