Take a Care GIVER to lunch - Today

If you're ready to learn some things about yourself, look for a care-giving role. And this one isn't even very hard, really. Joel can stand by herself and walk from room to room, etc.

She can't reach all her parts, though; she can't raise the leg support on her recliner; she can't prepare her own meals; she can't shower alone. I would have said that there are some things I just won't do. I don't say that any more. There are not any tasks that are good or bad or gross, or anything. They are just things that must be done, and I signed on to do them when we got married 12 years ago.

The hard part comes in the emotional attachments and in the differences in which we experience the same events. For example, she experiences the physical pain of showering or changing dressings and I experience the feelings of knowing that I inflicted some of the pain. Has to be done...
My head is running all around the thoughts of does it hurt because it hurts or because I'm too rough - and am I unfeeling, angry, just tired?
Talk about dragons...!

And I forget sometimes that even breathing is still difficult, all movement laborious, and some movement just plain impossible.

I battle my impatience a LOT. When I put the leg rest up for the umpteenth time and my back hurts, I forget that she would do it if she could. I just feel a (short-lived) flood of impatience.

Tracking the meds is hard; I couldn't do it at all without a log. Remembering to take temps and changing dressings is hard... not physically, of course; it's just another detail in the huge amount of stuff that I used to take for granted.

Last night about 11:30 the power went off and I was awakened by this awful screaming beep that the oxygen machine emits when it looses power. While I'm glad to know that I can't sleep through an emergency like that, it is still a horrible way to wake up.
It took a few minutes to deal with the dark and remember where the candles are and find the flashlight...AND remember not to place candles too near to Joel and her oxygen. Then switch to the tanks and don't fall over the tubing. And then, what do you do if you run out of backup? (In our case, it's load her up and go to the hospital where there is a generator and plenty of O.) I didn't know that before hand though. I waited about 1/2 hour, then when the power was still off, called the police to find out what my options were.

I think the one single part that makes this all a little worse than it has to be is just the physicality of it all. It's work, plain & simple. And it immediately follows 9 days of bad sleep on a nasty little sleeper/chair with a metel rod and a tilt!

OK,
I feel better, now.
A little whining works wonders. :)

Now, you go find yourself a care-giver and baby-sit her patient for a couple of hours so she can go to lunch with a friend - or get a massage -

Thankfully, I have that. Or I'd just have to do a little more whining, this time with tears.
God, what a wimp I could be.

Today, I'm grateful for

a dear sweet lesband who's not dead and who values &
appreciates everything I do & even lets me complain,

sunshine,

Jennifer & Kay - great home health nurses,

my health,

friends who take me to lunch,

a strong back,

the best massage therapist in the world (I'll be there next
week, Joyce!),

for TV, computers, blogs, and trashy mystery novels...

and, (I have to say it) for an extremely interesting way to
learn more stuff about myself!

and for all of you who listen to me rant, and then offer words of encouragement.
What a wonderful life.