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Old 02-25-2018, 12:42 PM   #10939
BigV
Goon Squad Leader
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Seattle
Posts: 27,063
Upset isn't the right word here, more the feeling you have where *more* is piled on, stuff you have to do stuff you have to worry about, stuff you don't have much agency to affect.

Eight days ago, we went to go visit my Mom, take her a present, say hi, etc--me and Twil and SonofV. We knocked on her door as usual and it took a looooong time before there was any action. My Mom had a stroke in 1997 and her mobility and her speech were both ruined. Consequently it takes her five minutes to walk the fifteen feet from her bed to the door, assuming she is already awake, already has clothes on, brace on, shoes on, cane nearby, etc etc. .... anyhow.

We waited a long time, an aide came in, then left, then more waiting. Finally I went in and found her stuck on the toilet. Not glued, but too weak to get herself transferred. Then she wouldn't let me do the transfer, and it sounded like she was in pain. I finally went to go get help and three aides and I all managed to get her standing up, cleaned up, and pants up. What an ordeal.

We sat and visited for awhile, but Mom looked like hell. We left and then Monday night I got a call that she'd been transported to the hospital. I was able to visit her Tuesday after work after being reassured that I didn't need to be on the first thing smokin. The dignosis was sepsis (!!!) possibly due to a UTI or pneumonia or both. I know UTIs in older patients is serious condition, and google tells me I should fear sepsis even more (thank you google, you fucker).

When I got to see her, she was groggy and in pain and the nurse asked me how long she'd been sitting on the toilet. This was Tuesday evening, and I recounted our long wait in the hallway on Saturday. Come to find out that Mom didn't come down for breakfast Monday, which isn't out of the ordinary for her. She didn't come down for dinner either, also not unusual, but in the same day, *that's* a problem. They came and checked on her and found her on the toilet again, throwing up a little and very weak. The nurse asked me about the wound on her butt. Um, what did you say? It appears that she'd been sitting on the toilet long enough to have an open wound in the shape of a toilet seat on her butt, I saw the picture the hospital took.

W. T. F.

Now an Adult Protective Services investigation is underway, initiated by the hospital social worker, who deserves a superhero cape in my opinion. After these many days in the hospital, she is responding well enough to the medical attention (no UTI, pneumonia antibiotics, pain medication, turning in bed, CT scan of head negative... maybe other stuff) that she is being discharged today to a rehab facility where she's been once before.

The goal at the rehab location is to PT to increase strength and tone to help get back to self transfers and to heal the wound. Mom spends a *LOT* of time sitting, except when she's lying down, also on her backside. Her time spent up and walking is ... nothing. It's the time spent transferring from one sit to another sit or lying down.

At her assisted living facility, a couple new services will be added to her account, things previously left to the resident--toileting assistance and skin checks. It sounds a little ... I can't think of the word. It's another assault on her previous adult independence.

She used to have it all together, as much as any of us. Then the stroke, that's the biggest bomb. The paralysis, the aphasia, those insults can fuck up your quality of life. Then my Dad died, her husband and caregiver, the man who loves her--another blow. She had to move across country, in with me and my family, which was chaos. Then move again to an assisted living facility. Some stability for awhile.

Time marches on as they say and her aging made her more susceptible to these new problems, and the indignities in response.

Protip:

Don't have a stroke.
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