Back to Reality

Sunrise in Cancun the day we left

OK.  It was a wonderful vacation and I took full advantage of the time away to rest, relax and recharge.  We’re talking pool, beach, daily naps, massage, snorkeling and sightseeing with a good friend.  Before I left,  my physical therapist had told me the best thing I could do for my recovery is to walk.  And, I walked.  Just getting around the resort required a lot of walking in addition to the sightseeing we did.  Part way through the week, I was wishing I had activated a step counter before starting my vacation.  I don’t know the number of steps I walked, but I do know I walked more on the first day than I had been walking at home the past weeks.  But, talk about progress.  The first days on the way out to the pools or beach I had to stop and rest on the way.  By the end of the week, I had gotten so much stronger, I was only using one crutch and walking the distance without rest stops. My pain levels had decreased considerably and my walking and stamina had improved greatly.  I felt so much better both physically and mentally by the time we came home.

It took just over 36 hours after arriving home Saturday night before reality started crashing in.  Sunday morning I went to visit my husband in Memory Care as I had been gone over a week and he was very anxious to see me.  The visit with him went as usual.  He was so glad to see me and we had a nice visit for a few minutes. It didn’t take long before he was into his usual track about why I left him there, why I was going on vacation without telling him, why I couldn’t take him out to have a cigarette, etc.  He wasn’t super agitated like some times, but definitely not happy in his world and just wanted to be home with me.  I don’t blame him one bit.  I know I would feel the same way in his situation.  At the stage he is at, he struggles not only to remember, but he is unable to process information and it is pretty much impossible for him to understand what is happening to him. Explaining what is happening only adds to his confusion and agitation.  He is sometimes aware that his brain is letting him down and just wants out, doesn’t want to live the way he’s living.  I feel so badly for him and it is heart-wrenching to watch him go through this.

After our visit, I returned home.  As I finished a conversation with a friend, pulled into the garage and sat there a moment, all the feelings that come about after a visit were right there to greet me when I got home.  I got settled in at home, playing with Mr. Jones who had stayed with a friend while I was gone.  It had taken only a few minutes of being back at home the night before for him and me to settle into our usual routine of playing, sleeping in my lap and getting ready for bed.  I even got some new scratches to decorate my hands, since the old ones had healed in the sun.  So, Sunday afternoon after I settled in, I was starting to process the visit with my husband and how I was feeling.  The interesting thing for me is that I was able to still hold onto the relaxation and healing I had done mentally and physically.  Although I was feeling the familiar feelings of sadness and grief for his situation, I just felt like I was in a better place to deal with it. I sat with it for awhile, but didn’t sink into the usual abyss of bad feelings, just processed. I was recharged and felt like “I got this.”  It’s just another day in the life, not such an overwhelming time.  I actually felt good and excited to get on with my physical recovery.  Alice and I had made plans to go exercise in the pool the next day and I was looking forward to getting back into my life.

Monday morning I picked up Alice after work.  Before we could go to the pool, it was really necessary to get our energy drinks and my favorite sandwich. Meanwhile, I got a phone call from Memory Care.  They told me my husband had fallen in his room.  When they tried to help him up, his hip hurt too badly for him to get off the floor.  They felt he needed to go to the ER.  I told them which hospital to take him to and I would meet him there.  It turns out at that time we were just a few miles from the hospital.  Hijacked Day.  No exercising now.  Alice offered to come to the hospital with me and I gratefully accepted, even though my first inclination was that I didn’t want to inconvenience her and hijack her day, too.  But I know she’s authentic and wouldn’t offer out of politeness, but genuinely cares about supporting me, as I would her.  So we went to the ER together.

The doctor was pretty sure he had broken his hip, given the position of his right leg and x-rays confirmed it.  We were told he would be admitted to the hospital for surgery on his hip.  They had given him something for the pain and were waiting for a hospital bed for him.  Since he was relatively comfortable and able to rest with the drugs in him, I gave Alice a ride back home that afternoon, fed the cat and headed back to the hospital.  He was still in the ER, still waiting for a room.  About 9:30 that night they got him settled in a room and told us that he was first on the schedule for his surgery the following morning.  I had to go home and “sleep fast” in order to get back for his surgery.  Of course, I had to play with the cat for awhile, so he would settle down and let us sleep.  I was back at the hospital at 6:10 the next morning, just as they were taking him down for surgery.  I sat with him until they took him into surgery and sat down to wait.  I actually snoozed in a chair with my head leaning against the wall for awhile before the doctor came out and told me the surgery went well, no complications.  They had done a partial hip replacement on him and he would be in the hospital for a day or two before being discharged.

He was in very good spirits and I stayed with him until 8:00 that night. The next day I was back at the hospital in the morning in order to be able to talk with the doctor and see what the physical therapist recommendation was.  He was doing very well physically and it was decided that he didn’t need to go to rehab, but could go back to Memory Care because they were equipped to be able to meet his increased care requirements.  I explained to him several times what had happened and why he was  in the hospital.  About 2:00 that afternoon, he started “sundowning” and crashed and burned.  By 3:00 he was kicking me out of his room and I was glad to go.  After getting him some medication and talking to the nurse, we decided I would just leave, I had a physical therapy appointment anyway.  She told me “we got this” and would call me if they needed me.

I went to physical therapy and met up with some friends that were having dinner.  After dinner, I noticed a few calls from the hospital and he called me again, wanting me to come back over to the hospital.  Since I was still closer to the hospital than home, I went back, although with some trepidation, as his mood can change abruptly with no warning.  He was calm and I was  able to keep him that way until I left for hopefully an uneventful night for him.

So why am I telling you all this detail about the last three days?  It’s because something different happened for me with all this.  I wanted you to have an idea of everything that happened in order to understand the effect on me.  It’s so easy to get lost in my head when overwhelmed with circumstances of life.  It becomes a lot of overhead to carry around.  It gets heavy and my mind seems reluctant to part with it.  It often takes some time to regroup and return to sanity.  The last five days were certainly a lot.  But, my attitude from the beginning, is that this is just another day in the life, so all I need to do is take care of business and myself.  I didn’t get overwhelmed and lost in the trauma of our life together.  My primary purpose during this time was to be there for my husband and help him through this experience that is even more overwhelming for him than it could ever be for me.  Meanwhile, staying in touch with my support circle and taking care of myself.  I’m here to tell you that it wasn’t a devastating experience at all.  I just put one foot in front of the other, did what I needed to and put less urgent things on hold until I could deal with them.  My house looks like a tornado hit it.  It was pretty bad in the busyness of leaving for vacation, but now that I’m back and only half-unpacked and everything else where I left it, bills need to be paid and life goes on.  I’ll get to it.

Today I was back at the hospital for his discharge, then over to Memory Care to help settle him back in.  By the time I left this morning, I was dead on my feet.  My whole body ached, my hip was sore as hell.  I went straight home and after playing with the cat, took a 4-hour nap.  Now, I’m rested and ready to move on.  We’ll see how tomorrow goes.  It feels really good to have handled this latest crisis without totally beating myself into the ground.  Progress.  That’s all we can ask for in our healing, and I’ll take it.

Love and Peace

Chick