Another early morning call from Dad, who is doing fine now. We made the decision not to go to hospital; instead, I stayed with him after the ambulance left and did his washing up while we chatted, and I'll go over after lunch to make sure he's fine.

I am beyond tired and as a result have manically cleaned the stovetop and made two different kinds of pancakes. Probably shouldn't be driving heavy machinery or making important decisions today 😅 There will be much tea!

The good thing is that I got to see a beautiful sunrise, spend time with the early birds (and frog) and I also ate a bunch of ripe blackberries from his garden, yum yum.

#caring #AgeingParents #gardening #fruit

Good morning once again from the hospital, where Dad is doing better but also we're (at least, I am?) a bit fed up with being here.

Once again, proving that bodies are overrated and we should really take another serious look at existing as brains in jars

#caring #family #AgeingParents

Well, Dad is currently back home and some relatives are staying with him but he and I have spent the last two days going back and forth from the hospital, and are still no closer to really knowing what's wrong. That's distressing. He's feeling better for now so we'll see what the specialist has to say – he may have to go to Perth but at least my sister is there.

However! Apart from all that, today was kind of great? I took Kid1 to work and Kid3 came too, then we went to the market where we got sugar loaf cabbage and some strawberries, then I picked up the library book I had on reserve, and we went to take Dad shopping. That's when we had to detour to the hospital for a couple of hours but then we brought him home, and when I took the compost out, I spotted a blue tongue lizard for the first time in years (and also the skink that lives near the old pond, who is equally gorgeous but whom I do see most times I visit).

Then we picked a bunch of roses from the garden and when my rellies arrived, we left Dad with them and went and did the shopping for him (since he missed out earlier).

Finally on the way back home, we drove to check if the Thai food van was still at its usual spot outside Officeworks, and it was, hurray! So I ordered a late lunch and when 3 and I picked it up, the business owner said she'd accidentally overcharged us so she'd given us something extra. I didn't catch what she'd said but when we got home, we discovered it was sticky rice with mango and coconut cream. It was superb.

Got to take Kid2 to and from a party later but otherwise zero obligations for the rest of the day. Thank goodness. Also there's still one serving left of mango sticky rice. Reckon I'll have it for tea 🥰

#AgeingParents #ageing #family #food #ThingsILove

Update time!

- I'm following up last week's gastro with a new improved version (it has fewer features, which means I'm spending more time in the toilet but no time with a bucket, so I'm calling that a win)

- Mum is out of hospital, yay! The effects of her illness are ongoing, which is totally to be expected but confronting all the same. I'll take her some flowers on Sunday when I'm finished getting rid of this contagion

- Jarrah is responding well to medication (no seizures, yay!) but while we go off the big pills and move onto the small ones, he has to take both for a few weeks and it's making him both anxious and drowsy. He's not quite himself but hopefully that'll get better once he's just taking the one kind of medication

- I've planted seeds and seedlings and they're all doing great, pictures to follow on the weekend

- we have cleared out and donated a bunch of stuff and it's so good to have less clutter. Still a work in progress but at least it's progress

- the two older kids are away for most of the weekend, which is odd because it's half the kids, but it's also fine? Love seeing them get out in the world and do fun stuff

That's basically it, it has been less of an exciting week and more just trying to get well and run errands for Dad and keep up with work and family and all

#family #health #AgeingParents #gardening #parenting #update #today

The shrunken state expects families to fill the voids in health and social care. Woe betide those without children | Gaby Hinsliff | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/09/families-health-social-care-children-hospital

#FamilyCarers
#UnpaidCarers
#Carers
#SocialCare
#Health
#AgeingParents
#Elderly
#CutsToServices
#FundingCuts

Just got absolutely destroyed by opening a book and finding a letter my Dad wrote shortly after the family suddenly found out about my Grandpa Bert’s dementia, when my Grandmother died in 1997.

She’d been covering for Grandpa Bert for a long time.

The letter very sensibly says Dad doesn’t want to leave us in that sort of mess, and sets out some funeral instructions.

Which are almost what he asked for when I spent most of a week helping Mum and Dad write their Advanced Care Plans in 2019. Except he’d forgotten the songs he loved and asked for in the 1997 letter.

Now Dad has dementia, and my heart is broken. The hardest sentence was “I could just get old and change from being difficult to manage to impossible.”

Oh, Dad.

#Dementia #DementiaSux #Mum
#Dad #AdvancedCarePlanning #AdvancedCarePlan #AgeingParents

Also, poor Mum, after I phoned her yesterday about the hallucinogenic spinach issue, threw out the bag of salad leaves she had in the fridge, even though it was mixed lettuce, not the same use by dates, and they’d been eating it this week with no ill effects.

#AgeingParents #BadSpinach #spinach #OhMum

Phone call with Mum in Adelaide today - just Mum, Dad was asleep.

It was one of Dad’s bad days. He had an appointment with the cardiologist this morning to check his pacemaker, and so he was agitated yesterday, and “didn’t sleep a wink” last night.

Mum told me the Uber driver commented on the way home, “You wait for half an hour, see them for five minutes, pay them two hundred dollars, and that’s it!”

Well, yes. But I’m very grateful that the pacemaker is doing what it’s supposed to.

But for Mum - it’s exhausting. When Dad is okay, he just gets a bit confused about things. But when he’s anxious about his routine being changed, and this week has had three appointments to break his routine - he’s not so happy. She says he doesn’t intend to be any trouble. But I can hear the strain it’s causing her.

I imagine it must be like being a widow, while your husband is still living with you.

#dementia #AgeingParents #Mum

Had a chance to speak with Mum in Adelaide by herself today.

As soon as she called, I could hear her voice was small and shaky, upset.

“Oh, Mum, what’s happened?”

“It’s your father. He lost a filling on Sunday night. He wanted to drive to the dentist at eight thirty yesterday morning and wait, I had to explain that wasn’t how dentists work. I managed to get him in this morning, but he’s been so anxious all yesterday and today, he’s so upset and tired with the break in routine.”

“Oh, Mum, I’m so sorry. Is he resting now?”

“I’m n the back bedroom so he couldn’t hear the phone, he’s asleep. He has his good days, but it’s so exhausting on his bad days.”

“And the geriatrician?”

“Oh, he’s memorised the answers to the geriatrician ‘s questions. He knows what he’s going to ask.”

I feel so helpless. Mum can’t leave their big house, it would disrupt Dad even further. And she has to keep going until the next assessment in April.

#dementia #Adelaide #Mum #Dad #Ageing #AgeingParents