Every Day an Adventure

I earned my nap today.

I was not looking forward to the day.  My mother had a doctor's appointment, one which I really didn't want to take her to.  Atria has been telling me that she is not taking her meds, and that she gets very anxious, especially in the evening.  Also, her latest bone density exam shows she has osteoporosis and the doctor wants to put her on Fosamax.

But it's such a hassle getting her to the doctor mainly because she does not want to go and tries all sorts of things to get out of it.  

This time I thought I'd be smart and took her to lunch first and then the doctor.  I allowed plenty of time and thought we'd have to kill half an hour or more, but turns out we got there exactly on time.
First, though, I did something I've never done before.  I called Atria and asked them to please get her ready and that I would drive to the back door (where there is no parking, so you can't leave the car).  They gladly agreed.  I am finally making some use of that exorbitant rent we are paying!  When she came out and saw me she said "Oh my goodness!  Where have you been?  It's so good to SEE you" and then told me she wanted to cry because it had been so long since she last saw me (2 days).

I think Atria must have a communal wardrobe.  After three and a half years of wearing the same thing every day, now whenever I go to see her, she is dressed in something I've never seen before, so I'm sure it belongs to someone else and got mixed up in the laundry.  But I'm not complaining and she doesn't notice.

We drove to Applebee's in Woodland, because it was farther away than the one in Davis, and would kill time.  The waitress served us coffee and put two bowls of cream on the table.  My mother was fascinated.

She had never seen anything like little containers of cream and wasn't that clever.

About then, Jeri called and she talked with her grandmother for a bit, then my mother handed the phone back to me and I finished talking to her until our food arrived.  When I hung up, my mother wanted to know who I was talking to.  When I said Jeri, she said "JERI?  I haven't talked to her in a long time."

We each had Caesar salad and soup  I had French onion soup (which was fabulous) and she had tomato soup. She would eat some of her salad, then notice the bowl next to the salad, ask what that was, I would tell her it was tomato soup, she would take a spoon full, tell me it was delicious, go back to the salad and in a few minutes notice the soup again, ask what it was, etc.   Probably 10 times in all.

By the time we finished lunch, I was going to have to briskly drive to Kaiser where we arrived just in the nick of time.

While we waited for the doctor, my mother noticed the linoleum

And couldn't understand why that colored tile was there.  We had a long discussion about it.

Then the doctor's appointment went exactly as I anticipated and we could have done the whole thing over the phone, but she did get her prescription for Fosamax and the doctor told her it was important that she take her meds, which she won't remember, and then we headed back to the car.

Today was the day her Alzheimers Buddy comes and I had let her know about the doctor's appointment. She comes at 2:30 and I thought we could get there by then, but wanted to let her know that if we weren't there when she arrived we would be there shortly after.  I couldn't believe it when we arrived at Atria at 2:29.

Then I went to Supercuts to finally get my hair cut.  It has gotten WAY too long as it has been about 8 or 9 months since my last cut and I swear they cut off 2 lbs of hair.

Next it was off to the supermarket, another place I should have gone to long ago.  I was out of so many things that the bill came to nearly $200, which is ridiculous for just two people.

By the time I got home, I felt all the energy had been drained out of me  It wasn't that I did a lot, but being with my mother takes a lot out of me.  Walt brought the groceries in, I put the frozen stuff away and then collapsed and took a long nap.

In the evening, I got a wonderful note from her Alzheimer's Buddy....

I did end up going in today and we had a lot of fun. I did more puzzles with her and we looked through the scrapbooks you left which really perked her up (thank you so much for those by the way, they are wonderful!). I also got her to learn the chicken dance with me along with the other residents haha. We had a pretty goofy day.

I think this woman is going to be the best thing in the world for my mother.  She certainly responds to her more than to me.  But that's OK.  I'm just glad they had a good afternoon.