What Is He Doing?

The past few days I can see the same pattern forming in Al’s lips. During the past couple of months Al’s body has went from being able to move his legs to not. His arms would lift, but not now. His head would turn but no more.

Now his mouth and lips are following in the same pattern. Very seldom can he eat soft food. More so of pudding consistency. His lips are not opening far enough to get the straw in or a toothbrush.

I am beginning to swab his mouth more often. When he speaks there is hardly any muscle left in the vocal chords. Al’s eye movement is rare. Most of the time I see him staring into space.

It hurts me so much to see this wild spirit being locked inside of this sick body. I know I can’t fix it, believe me I have tried everything. Two days ago he got an open sore on his side of his leg.

The next day there was another one. Today there is a total of five open sores. They remind me of a surface burn. The top layer of skin is gone and he is leaving blood spots on the sheets.

This weather doesn’t help at all. I have had no help for the past three days. Hospice hasn’t been out. I am hoping that tomorrow with the weather finally being above zero, the bath aides come and it would be wonderful if the nurse showed up. She usually comes on Mondays and Thursdays so I don’t know if she will come on her off day.

Another thing has been going on. I can’t figure out what in the world is happening. Rhino, the cat, sits in the same position as in this photo. He usually is facing the bathroom door.

He sits in the hallway of Al’s bedroom and bathroom. At first I noticed him going to that spot off and on.

Now he goes there  often. He sits very still and he may sit there for minutes.

Last night he went inside the bathroom. He was gone for some time so I crept in softly to see what he was up to. He was sitting in the corner of the bathroom right next to the bathtub.

He was making some weird noises I have never heard him make before. Suddenly he meowed loudly and looked up at the wall.

He jumped up at the wall as if trying to get something. Then he dug at the corner of the floor then jumped back up at the wall. Then he saw me. He went back to his usual spot as you can see in the bottom photo and just sat like a statue. I don’t know what is going on.

I flipped on the lights in the bathroom and I saw nothing. We don’t have mice or any critters inside our home, so I don’t know what in the world he was seeing. But as you can see in the photo he is sitting at attention just listening.