Thursday's Tumbles and Stumbles: The Raccoon Mask and Seeing Red

Well I really did it this time. It was an epic stumble and almost tumble if there had been more space. It could almost be categorized under the results of sleep deprivation or not walking will under the influence of medication.

Have you ever sleepily made your way into the bathroom in the middle of the night and dozed when you did your business? I think we all have at one time or other. Have you ever momentarily forgotten how you got somewhere? A brain fart moment? Has medication ever hit your system harder than you expected? Okay, now you have the set up for this week's stumble.

I awoke sitting on the commode. Did I have to pee or was I done? How did I get here? My AFO was on correctly, so I must have been awake long enough to do it. I find I had already finished the chore that I went to the bathroom for. I try to  push forward to rise and my legs don't want to cooperate. "Okay Jo, get it together.  There is a comfortable bed waiting for you. Alley Oop."
I manage to stand and both legs feel like they are made of Jello. I reach forward for the towel rack for support. The beauty of having a 5x7 bathroom. My hand misses the mark.

I pitch forward, more like stumble. The bridge of my nose smashes into the ceramic towel rack and my head pile drives into the wall behind it. Imagine cartoon stars circling my head. If I thought I was dreaming earlier, I was wide awake now, by God. I grabbed the hand towel which was conveniently catching the blood and held it to my nose. I sat back down on the toilet seat and leaned my head back. Ah, the joys of all the muscle relaxers and blood thinners I'm on.

Now the normal procedure for stopping blood flow from the nose is to put pressure near the bridge of the nose, but I wasn't touching it. It hurt too bad. I balanced the towel under my nose and reached for the cold water tap. There's one thing good about having a deep well for water. It's always cold. I put the washcloth under the tap and then wrung it out. I replaced the hand towel with the cold washcloth. I seemed to sit there forever waiting for the blood to stop, but it was more like five minutes.

Finally, the blood stopped.  I got myself cleaned up and wobbled off to bed. I awoke again a few hours later to give my husband his morphine  and went back to sleep thinking I had dreamed it all except from the pain radiating from the small goose egg on my forehead. Back into bed for a few more hours sleep as is my custom.

I awoke later to tiny paw taps and quick flicks of a rough tongue. My furry alarm clock, Lil Bit the cat, has no snooze button. She taps me with her paw and licks me until I get up. She'll wait while I don my sock and AFO always within a paw's and tongue's reach of me in case I doze off. She knows me too well. We have a regular morning routine now since my stroke.

I glanced at myself in the dresser mirror as I passed. Jerking back to stare at my reflection. I saw raccoon eyes and a bruised goose egg on the right side of my forehead. The battle trophies from the night before. Okay, so the circles around my eyes were more of a purplish-grey than black, but still a shocking sight upon waking. There was a definite knot on the bridge of my nose so I think I might have broken it. It's straight so I'm not going to worry the doctor with it. It's all tender to the touch and I'm suffering the after effects of old aged aches and pain throughout my body as I usually do after being hard on my body. The face will heal, but I wish it had improved my looks (as cute as a raccoon) instead of me looking like I'd gone a few rounds with a boxer. Or even had been able to say that I'd had a nose job instead of saying I got this from getting off the commode.

In other news...
I say this news report and saw red a week or so ago on CBS. The story was about a nasty note left on the vehicle of a handicapped person. You can find the news story here.  I've had a blog about handicapped parking before and I've even left messages for people who don't belong in them too. This was so cruel that I was seeing red after I viewed it. It never ceases to amaze me the cruelty of people. It was so disrespectful and down right mean spirited. It makes me want to throttle to writer with my cane!

How has your week been?

Thursday's Tumbles and Stumbles ~Stop Helping Me!

The stumble of the week is being a caregiver to a man with a caregiver/helping spirit. This has actually been going on for over a year now, but it almost made me loose my cool this week.

Credit

As my husband becomes more debilitated and helpless, he continues in wanting to assist me and the hospice aides in his care. He'll struggle to change positions in the bed for better access for us while we are attending to him. This increases his pain levels and leaves him gasping for breath. Reminding me of a fish out of water. It would be funny if it wasn't so serious.

No, I don't want to disable him or hurt his ego, but things would go along so much smoother if he'd stop helping me or us.

He had an accident over Thanksgiving weekend not the spilling something or falling kind, but a bowel issue, of the runny kind. Now mind you, I only have one working hand, but I'm changing pull-ups on a 60+ year old man. He raises his bottom for me to slide a disposable pad underneath him. I was thankful for this even though I could have slid it under him without his help. I grab the wipes, scissors, and a clean pull-up from their bags and I'm ready for action.
Hubby:"What do you want me to do?"
Me: "Nothing. Just be still. I got this."
He grabs the bed rail and rolls. "Well, I could roll on by side."
Me: "No, roll back the way you were and stop trying to help me."
He lets go of the bed rail and flops on his back again. A brown stain appears underneath him.
I grab the scissors preparing to cut the sides of his pull-ups. "Don't move."
Hubby turns towards me, "Huh?"
I just manage to pull the scissor tips away from his belly as he turned. "Don't move!" and I show him the scissors. He nods and turns back onto back. The brown stain is now larger underneath him. I'm beginning to wonder if he really was easier to change a diaper on than my two-year old grandson. If this continued, I'd have to change his sheets too.

I cut the sides of the pull-ups and lower the front half.
He lifts his rear end up before I'm ready. The back portion of the pull-up clings to his buttocks for a moment and then flips mess side down onto the bed.  It was then I noticed it was only half on the pad. The other half landed on his sheets. Just as I had suspected each time he had raised and lowered his rear end, the waste was creeping up over the waist line of his pull-up. Now, both sides had mess on it. I'll have to bathe him to get it all off of him.

I let out an aggravated groan. Now I'd have to change his sheets too. I threw a blanket at him to cover up. "This mess will take a bath to clean up."
Hubby: "Okay."
I returned with a basin of warm water and soap. He had pulled his bedside table next to the bed to make it easier on me."It's warm so it shouldn't be so bad."
I pulled on the bedside table so there would be enough room for me to get close to him for the washing part. It resisted. I pulled harder. The table tilted and the bath water slid off the table. When it hit the floor, the splash upwards soaked my jeans and my shirt. Now I'm cursing under my breath as I pick up the empty basin. "Don't touch the table again."

I cleared it from the bed power cord and positioned it where I needed it. Now not only did I have to clean him up, change his sheets, but I had to change clothes too.
Once I returned with more warm soapy water, I bathed him clean. This time he didn't move unless I asked him to. I pulled the soiled pad out to cover the messy pull-up and put clean pull-ups on him. Changed the sheets before he even realized it.
Hubby: "Do you want to help me into a chair while you change the bed?"
Me: "It's done."
I picked up the soiled bedding and put them into the hamper, changed my clothes, and plopped into the chair by his bed exhausted.
Hubby: "I'm sorry, honey. I was just trying to help."
Me: "Babe, I love you, but please stop helping me!"