sleeping like a log...

... finally, thankfully after I got home about the time it was getting too dark to see. I spent the day on Thursday in south GA with the auntie, getting her in and out of doctor's offices. Returned her to caregivers at Fellowship, then spent three hours driving to get back home, I was mentally and physically exhausted. There is probably some curious graduate student secluded in a brick building filled with computers that can analyze anything, who is running a program right this minute to explain how sitting and doing practically nothing all day can be so tiresome. Will write a paper and win a Nobel Prize or some such fantastic recognition when the complicated algorithm determines how being inert can be so wearying.  I would like to blame it on the heat, as I felt like it must be a million degrees by the end of the day.

She had two Dr. appointments: it was a complete waste of time and effort on my part, but I am sure the Dr. staff will bill insurance and be compensated.  By the time I had loaded her back into the car for the third time, and returned to Fellowship, I knew I would not be doing that again. Even with the light weight chair I was using to get her in and out of offices, it was very stressful. Unless she has reason to be transported to ER by EMS, she is  not going anyplace... ever again.

Part of the problem is that she is simply not ambulatory. She has been immobile for so long, she cannot walk. The staff seems to think she is so fearful of falling, she is unwilling to put the effort into trying to keep her joints limber and maintain any muscle strength necessary to support her body. She seems to be frequently overwhelmed by anxiety, fearful of what the future holds: 'What's going to happen to me?'

And because she cannot transfer herself, and needs to be moved, raised out of the car or chair by someone else, I cannot keep being that person who bears most of her weight. I am not willing to risk personal injury to provide the assistance necessary to get her in and out. I know she cannot remember what someone just said to her, or what she had for her last meal, but it is distressing to think she has forgotten about walking, and taking herself to the toilet.

The slow, sad decline of dementia is disheartening to see, as she gradually looses more and more of the person she used to be, and also frustrating to see her loose interest in things she has long enjoyed like plants, gardening, flowers, reading. I don't spend  much time with her, only going when she has need of transporting, but seeing her often enough to be disturbed by the precipitous decline. Observing the  rapid loss of facilities and abilities she so recently exhibited, walking and feeding herself without assistance.