Archive for the ‘ Poop ’ Category

H is causing trouble…

Author: Krissa

Aug 23

Hello boys and girls. I have been spending time doing things other than reading my blog sites and I am so sorry! I need to get caught up, but I need to do laundry worse. I haven’t been here much in the past few days as Henrietta got herself in hospital. OK, really, the ambulance got her there, but still…

About 3:30 Thursday morning she rang the bell and I went in and she was shaking really, really hard. I felt of her and she had no fever so I thought she was surely having a really bad anxiety attack. She has before, so I got her an ativan and gave it to her and told her not to worry she’d feel better soon and she did and fell asleep within about 10 to 15 minutes. I left her bedside table lamp on and went back to bed. Next morning I went in and looked at her and turned off the lamp and tiptoed out. The anxiety attacks really take it out of her, though she doesn’t have them often, so I wasn’t surprised when she slept in late. I went by her room about 11:30 and she was sleeping but the lamp was on. Strange. So she had been up, but why had she turned the lamp on, it’s daylight and there was plenty of light in the room. I walked over and looked at her and fliped off the lamp and opened the blinds a bit and she opened her eyes and looked at me and started trying to talk. It was like something out of a nightmare. I couldn’t make out what she was saying at first, her words were slurred and she couldn’t talk loud enough at all either. I got down and listened and asked her questions and she said things that made no sense at all. So I started calling people and ended with 911. They came and got her and while they were here assessing her, the hot, young cutie that was doing most of the talking said that yes, she could be having a stroke, but the fact that I was treating her for yet another UTI, (urinary tract infection), told him that she could possibly be septic and the symptoms mimic those of a stroke very closely. I, personally, thought it wasn’t possible, just because her previous UTI had gotten much worse than this one. With this one she didn’t even have any symptoms. I would have never known she had one without the urinalysis they did as a follow up from the previous UTI. In hind site I can see that it was all the same one and the antibiotics from the first one didn’t completely get rid of it.

So H gets hauled off to the hospital and I went with her. My friend, Lisa followed in her car. This was about noon and she went straight to an ER room and stayed there for a few hours and was put in a room by about 9:30. They have, by now run every test under the sun and determined that:

A) She freaks out when in the MRI machine.

B) She did not have a stroke.

C) “She’s a pistol.”

D) When she misses her dose of Miralax she can’t poo.

E) When she gets two doses of Miralax too close together she has diarrhea.

F) When I find out they are running all kinds of stupid tests that don’t make a hill of beans difference, just stress her out, I get pissed off.

G) When I call and have them leave a note on her chart for the Dr. to call me, I mean it and will call and chew out everybody else in the nurse’s station if he doesn’t. (He makes rounds at 6:00AM.)

The night before she had these problems at home, when I changed her diaper and put her to bed, I noticed she had a strange line of diaper rash kinda down on her thigh a little bit. I was telling Lisa about it in the hospital after we got her in a room. I looked down at H and asked her if she’d mind if I showed Lisa her diaper rash. (At this point I should point out that Lisa’s mom died of multiplemyloma and Lisa took care of her up until her death, so she knows at least some, and usually a lot, about every aspect of care giving.) Immediately after I asked her if she’d mind me showing Lisa her rash, without pausing, she looked at Lisa, pulled a deadpan face, and said, “It’ll cost you $20.00.” Lightning fast wit, that one. The nurse came in and she looked at her and said “It’ll cost you 20, too!” She died laughing and we were all giggling uncontrollably. She also told us to tell the EMT that she’s single. My gawd, I’ve got to watch her like a hawk!

H) She charges for a peek at her hooch.

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Filed under: Apocalypse, crazy shit, Henrietta, Poop

Uneventful happenings

Author: Krissa

Aug 16

Would you believe me if I said that I’ve been cooking, baking, and cleaning non-stop for the past few days? No? Well, that makes you a smart little cookie, doesn’t it? If I had a gun to my head and some yo-yo telling me he’d shoot if I didn’t account for my time, I’d be a dead, domestic failure…rather than just a domestic failure. I guess I’m saying things could always be worse.

I did manage to get a few things done today. Sweeping the kitchen, breakfast area and utility room and doing my version of mopping to all of those freshly swept areas. This entails walking around with a spray bottle of one sort of cleaner or another and a handy wipe, bending over spots, squirting, wiping, and moving on to the next spot. Hey, don’t laugh. My floor is clean…er. I put things away left and right that have been slowly piling up for ages and cleaned the kitchen, and did several loads of laundry.

Got H on the bedpan not once, but two times for a grand total of two poos. This normally throws her into a tailspin. As I have discussed here before an unscheduled poo, or U. P. is a force of nature to contend with in this house. She was reciting some panicky sounding prayers the second time I put her on, but other than that she handled it well.

John worked a “close” today and will be home about 11:00 or midnight. He is enjoying his new boss and things are going smoothly so far.

Yesterday I asked him if he had chased any shoplifters through the parking lot lately and he replied, “No, I’m too fat and old for that.” To which I immediately responded, “Your not fat.” He groaned at me. Seriously though, he’s getting older everyday, but he has lost a lot of weight lately. He says he’s getting down to his “fighting weight”. heh, heh, heh.

Pop is going into the hospital next Tuesday to have a defibrillator implanted just under the skin in his chest. It is a battery operated thing that has two little wires that will be attached to his heart and if it stops beating or falters it will shock it into rhythm. I don’t know much more than that about it. Mom will ask more questions, I am sure. I am wondering how long the batteries last and what changing them entails.

I guess that is all I’ve got to report at the moment. I haven’t been doing much of anything or feeling like doing anything. Very blah. I haven’t even been Plurking. I have also been neglecting reading the blogs! And that is very bad of me, for shame and all that stuff!

I’m gonna try to get my shit together and get back here sooner! Promise. And I’ll try to have something to say.

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Filed under: Blather, Henrietta, Housekeeping, John, Mither, Oh crap!, Poop, The reading of THE BLOGS

The goings on at chez HalfAsstic

Author: Krissa

Aug 9

Greetings all. I am up early this morning with many things on my mind and I am quite sure that it will be this evening before I can make sense of it all enough to get it down in a post. Then I will re-read it and think, “So why was that so hard to say and why did I think I had so much to say?” I suppose just because it’s been a while since I was good about keeping up here. I’m not apologizing, cause shit’s been happening. And I don’t even meant he bedpan variety. No. Real, documented and undocumented, shizzle.

Where to start….?

Pop is in the hospital and, actually, is scheduled to get out today. He told me on the phone yesterday that they told him he could leave this morning so he said he was going to get up at about 3:00am and go. I told my mom he said that and she laughed and said she hoped he had a ride cause she wasn’t going to get him at 3:00am. He is such a character.

He has emphysema and COPD problems that got a bit of fluid in his lung. “Pneumonia”, I thought. “No”, the doctors said, “just some fluid in his lung”. Huh? Oh well, my understanding is not pivotal to his outcome, anyway, thank you God.

John got a new boss to work with and it is a vast improvement over the last one. Oops, he isn’t supposed to be there until Monday, so I suppose that’s jumping the gun. No it isn’t, cause anything would be an improvement. Plus he’s worked with this guy before and he’s a pretty good one. So that’s all good.

Henrietta is getting a new caregiver provider and she starts Tuesday. They called and asked me if we would mind someone who mostly speaks Spanish and I said no, I didn’t mind and so did H so that’s a go. As far as I know the hand gestures for indicating you have to poo are a fairly universal thing. Well, that and H throws in some really good facial expressions leaving no doubt as to the amount of urgency/amount of poo ratio.

Got the first semester bill for older child’s college tuition and that was a nasty little shock. It was something like $2400. OK. Well that sucks. And that is after her scholarship was deducted. Shit. Then a day or two later we got an email saying that there had been an error and everyone had been charged $345. for a…something, can’t remember what they called it, but anyway that was an error and they were going to remove it. So, OK great. We looked at her bill and they had deducted the $345. for each of her 4 classes so that just about halved her bill. Yea. Can you say “good news”? We are college tuition bill virgins, (in this millennium) and had no idea what to expect so we were really anticipating having to spend about two and a half thou on it twice a year. Next, text books.

And then there is the discussion of the younger daughter moving to Decatur, Texas to live with Nana and Pop for her last year in high school. Strangely, she wants to do this. She is disillusioned with her friends right now and hates her job and is worried about Pop and Nana both, mostly because they just plain need help. Young, limber, strong backed help. Family help. Adorable, beloved, grandchild help. The only thing keeping her from jumping at the first chance of going? New school. I really can’t say that I blame her. I was always adamant that she and her sister never have to change schools if there was anyway we could help it and they never did. K-12, same school. I guess I wanted this so badly for them because I have attended 6 different schools in my life. I didn’t know I was crippling them with an inability to flex and change. No, I can’t blame her for not wanting to do it. Very scary stuff, walking into a new school for the first time and trying to find your way around feeling like everyone is staring at you. The New Kid.

Of course one of the friends she is disillusioned with is out with her right now and they are getting spray tans, eyebrow waxing and manicures. How really bad could it possible be?

Besides, I am pretty sure she would miss me too much to stay gone for months at a time from me. Yeah. That’s the way I am hoping thinking it would go down.

We’re trying to die in this heat. And not because it’s hot, but because we refuse to be and our light bill is run up to a whopping $600 last month. NOW we’re being hot because that thermostat is turned way up. This house is like an oven in the rooms Henrietta is in without the ceiling fans on. When we are all in the living room and we are getting hot I stand up and turn it on and she looks a bit frantic for a second, (she’s convinced the, “wind will make me sick”), but she doesn’t say anything cause I am fanning my shirt and saying how hot it is. If I get her a light throw or something to wrap up in she says no, it’s too hot for that, so I know she’s not cold. Just weird and full of old wives tales. What can I say, she’s an old wife.

I haven’t been to a movie in years and then about a month or so ago John and I saw the Indiana Jones movie. Really neat. Then again, when he was on vacation last week we went to see the new Batman. Well, Wednesday a good friend of mine came over and we watched The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants #1 on DVD, and made plans to go and see #2 at theater yesterday. We really enjoyed it, also. So I have seen three movies in the past couple of months and before that I bet I hadn’t been in 4 or 5 years. How weird is that?

While John was on vacation, my brother was home from Italy to visit and finalize the adoption of my brand spanking new nephew. Older child had to work and could not attend the family reunion, as it were, but younger girl, John and I met up with Nana, Pop and Cam in in a park in the small town of Buffalo, Texas. We hung out and ate at a near by resturant. It was good to see him and I never know how long it will be until I can see him again.

Here he is with Keelan.

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Filed under: Blather, Cam, crazy shit, John, Keelan, Mither, Nana and Pop, Poop

Marcos

Author: Krissa

Jul 25

On April 23, 2006 my father-in-law, Marcos, passed away after being on hospice for a few months. He had lived with us for about a year and seven months. It all started when Henrietta fell in their home on the way back from the bathroom in the middle of the night. We got a call from Marcos saying she couldn’t get up and we jumped in the car and raced over there. Their house is about 30 minutes away. I called the ambulance on the way there and we made it in about 15 minutes. This is mainly due to no traffic in the middle of the night! *Mental note: have catastrophes in the middle of night, ALWAYS.* So we got there and H had, basically, broken everything. Well, it seemed like it. Tibia, hip, humerus, she was in bad shape. So the little old lady with the severe osteoporosis went off to the hospital and Marcos came home to live with us. John and I and our two teenage daughters in a three bedroom, one bath house. With Marcos. Together.

We got the hell out of that house as soon as we could and moved into a 4 bedroom 3 bath ASAP. This helped a lot, but Marcos was starting to slide into a depression that he never really came out of. I fed him an antidepressant everyday and we tried to keep his spirits up. H stayed in the hospital for months. Marcos went more and more downhill and his mental state deteriorated. He couldn’t be left alone for any length of time. He started falling. He had a walker and refused to use it for the longest time. The things that he determined were his duties, such as making coffee or going out to get the newspaper, became impossible for him to master. He totally screwed up, I don’t know how many coffee makers. Made HUGE messes in the kitchen attempting to make it multiple times a day and at various odd moments all night long. He’d get up during the night over and over and attempt to make it outside to “get the paper”. When I’d point out that it was dark out and night time, he was always very surprised and in the beginning he would voluntarily return to bed. But, eventually, it became harder and harder to convince him of anything.

I got one of the cowbells that H uses to ring for me and and tied it to his walker with a plastic cable tie wrap. That way, combined with the baby monitor there was absolutely no way he could make it out of his room with out me knowing at night. I started jumping out of bed when when I heard him get up and running down the hall and closing the door at the end of it and holding it closed so it would seem locked when he got there after he had used the bathroom and was trying to make it to the front door or kitchen. I remember him standing there kicking the door and fussing, while I was on the other side just praying for him to go back to bed. At first he would. Then it became a matter of he was going to find a way out and do what he wants. The ruckus became bigger and bigger and John would come and try to convince him to go to bed too.

We had always just kept the front door keys in the door, (on the inside, of course), and he would just head out anytime he wanted day or night. So I took the keys out and we started keeping the door locked. All. the. time. He searched the house and even went through my purse until he found the keys. It was like trying to deal with a highly intelligent toddler. The scariest thing going and SO tiring.

The truly strange thing is he didn’t have Alzheimer’s. Just old age senility combined with a HUGE overdose of old fashioned Mexican machismo. That poor little old man had stubbornness in spades. He was slowly dying and it was just not nearly fast enough for him. He got to the point that he refused to take a bath and was only doing so about once every 10 days to two weeks under duress. At some point John was the only one who could convince him. This wouldn’t have been SO bad except he had become totally inept in the bathroom and would end up with shit everywhere. Including on him. He really did try, bless his heart, but he just didn’t have the strength to do anything more than just barely get there. The commode seat and numerous other things in there were routinely smeared with poo. I cannot tell you the amount of latex gloves, paper towels and spray bleach I went through.

By the time he died he was a little dried up husk of a man and I could pick him up in my arms like a baby and carry him to bed. I did this the last time we changed his bed. H was in the hospital with a broken hip from a totally unrelated incident and the continuous care hospice nurse suggested we put him in her hospital bed. It was a good idea and we were changing his sheets anyway. So I just picked him up and put him in her bed. It was the strangest sensation. This larger than life man that had always seemed so dominant was no where in there. I think he died two days later and he had been so ready for so long.

Poor Henrietta was in the hospital and even missed his funeral. When we told her she took it very well. She said she knew he wasn’t going to make it much longer, and I’m sure that’s true. He had a 21 gun salute and honor guard as he was a decorated WWII veteran who was wounded and permanently crippled in the rush on Iwo Jima. He was someone to contend with…even before things were going downhill.

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Filed under: Blather, Henrietta, John, Marcos, Oh crap!, Poop

F.L. A bit worse than a U.P. (Unscheduled Poop)

Author: Krissa

Jul 21

Well, there is more excitement here at the Nut House. Last night when I put Henrietta to bed, her diaper was wet. Not just a little, but soaked, Great. The catheter had failed during the day sometime. Just a little bit of pee in the bag. Sometimes moving her around and repositioning her gets it to start working again so I was keeping my fingers crossed that it would fix itself over night. No. This morning she woke up swathed in wet sheets and nightgown. FREEZING, of course. Everything was soaking wet including a diaper full of shit. I ran in and threw a towel in the dryer and got John to call the nurse while I started trying to strip the bed with her in it and get a dry hospital chux under her. Got the sheets, blanket and mattress protector off the bed and another chux under her, ran and got the towel out of the dryer and put it over her while I went and ran water in a basin and got washcloths and then bathed her off. I was answering questions from John for him to answer the nurse on the phone. He hung up and shouted down the hall that she would be coming at 3:00ish. M’kay, fine. She showed up and DID NOT BRING A NEW CATHER WITH HER. This was a new one for me. She said she thought she’d just wiggle around the old one and see if she could get it to work. She explained that she would need to go back to the office to get one. Well, I had already deflated the old one and removed it, I mean it was just in the way and doing nothing whatsoever. So no way it was going back in. She went out and rummaged around in her car and finally found a kit. I happened to have an extra catheter. So we poked around and never got any urine back and had no more to try with. She left and I scheduled Paula to come and give it a shot after she left the office at the home health care place. She brought 4 catheters and several kits for me to have on stock and we used all but one of them and never got any urine back in the tube. She said it was time to let H have a rest and she’s coming back tomorrow. woo-hoo…