More Changes

I didn’t know whether to go hide in a corner of my room or write to my friends on here. I have tears in my eyes as I have found out the truths that I have been searching for.

I look outside as the snow softly falls and watch it begin to cover the grounds and roads once again. This is what part of me wishes for. Someone cover me with a blanket and bring me comfort.

I would give anything in this world to have my parents back. I would definitely risk the snow storm in order to be in the comfort of their words right now. But alas, I know this will not happen.

I have always believed that God knows all. He works out our problems to our good. I have to cling to this as I have already shredded the ends of the rope hanging right above my reach.

I want to go into the kitchen and find anything and everything to stuff in my mouth; for food blankets me with comfort, but I will not as I realize I will pay the huge price of high sugars later on.

What I learned to be true, and as they say straight from the horse’s mouth is no program is going to allow Al‘s funeral bill to become a legal expense. The wording is wrong on the paper work and there is no way to change it as the originals have already been viewed.

I had already checked into a refund a couple of weeks ago and discovered to my dismay that of all the thousands that have been paid on it will all vanish but one tenth in a refund. This just makes me want to vomit. Not only that and please don’t think of me as hard-shelled but if he passes before me I will then have to pay for another funeral out of my pocket.

This Friday morning I am meeting Al with his driver at our doctor’s office. We will be getting Al an updated physical and also a form which will have all of Al’s diagnosis on it. Then I am to fax this to the correct number.

This in turn will be sent to another department to be approved or denied. What I didn’t know for sure until today is that this is for a waiver that will bring Al back home. He will go to a day program Monday through Friday for eight hours.

The lady working on this case told me that he is eligible and sees no reason why it will not be approved. She says this won’t take long at all. The next step will be Al receiving a case worker and she will then meet with Al and me and they will be checking out our home to see if there are any changes that need to be made for his convenience. I believe these changes are done at their expense.

I won’t mind having Al here because he will be able to go to the day programs. This is something very much he needs. After he comes home then another waiver is introduced and it will be possible that he could move into the group homes if he chooses or if it gets to be too much for me.This waiver is much lengthier and takes quite a bit longer. Either way I know that God is in charge of this whole deal. It will work out. I will have time still for me five days a week and Al will be back here.

What bothers me so bad is that the facility refuses to allow me the funeral home expense. The government sees it as a life insurance policy. I was told I could try to sway the facility to see things from my view to allow the funeral expense each month, but all they could say is we want our money owed to us.

I will never look at nursing homes again with the same eyes. I will never forget them suggesting to me that I sell Al’s personal things out of his room to help pay for his own funeral. First of all he doesn’t have anything of funeral expense value. I will never forget them telling me they don’t have time to chat with him.

I would rather have him  here where I know I love him and he will get better care than he received there. Yes I will be involved again. Yes there is a chance he can go to the group homes eventually, but for now, I refuse to see my brother slip into a deeper depression. For now I am thankful for the waiver to release him from their greedy and non-caring fingers. For the rest of it? the future for Al and me? I have no choice but to place it in God’s hands. He will never do Al or me wrong. I have to believe and trust that God will help me with Al here at home.

I went back and read some of the posts I had written a few months ago, but for some reasons I am not as afraid and worried. Al is weaker. He can no longer come at me. He walks very little and we won’t be together 24/7. He will have a life of his own and he won’t be treated bad nor shunned.

The tears flowing from me now and the urge to vomit come from the heartless people who won’t show any compassion for another human soul. I will not beat myself up for the what I have done’s, but I refuse to keep making the same error over and over.

As Rose would say on the Golden Girls, this facility can all go to He double hockey sticks!!

My one friends uses a common phrase that comes to my mind right now. God is good, God loves me, and life is what it is.

Oh and by the way friends, I prayed so many times for God to save the big snow until after I went to this important meeting for Al. I don’t know if you prayed also but thanks if you did. I know there is a God, I don’t have to see his face, I can see him at work. God held on to those big snow flakes. All there were was snow flakes gently falling. The streets were clear and I was able to go to the meeting and come home. About fifteen minutes after  I returned  home  God let loose of those flakes and now it is snowing like crazy. All the roads are snow-covered and so is my car. Thank-you Jesus for answering my prayer and watching over me and  Al. I praise your name and sing hallelujah!

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Daily Post;Stroke of Midnight/ Daily Post

Where were you last night when 2012 turned into 2013? Is that where you’d wanted to be?

http://dailypost.wordpress.com

Where was I last night when 2012 turned into 2013? Well, you see this picture beneath? This is where I was. I was being fat and sassy in my own comfort  of the bedroom. I had taken my bath and glossed my hair.  I was cuddling in  soft materials, nuzzled on top of a feather topper.

The only fireworks that were going on were outside my home. Others wanted to hoop it up in the freezing cold, but not I. Was I drinking it up? Did I look like I was having an early hangover? Nope, not at all. I don’t believe in making myself crazy.  I am already that without the drink. I guess that explains why I have nine lives and you don’t.

I had my special treat. A bowl  of milk and some bite-size snippets. My master turned her  favorite programs on. Before I tell you the name of the station she watches, I have to remind you that part of her  mind never caught up with time frame we are in now. She is  still partially stuck in reverse in the eighties. She watches TV Land, yes, you understood me. That show that plays all the oldies before I was born?

Her  favorite programs are on Nick-At-Nite. King of Queens, Happily Divorced, Golden Girls. You get the drift don’t you? Well  personally, I would rather be watching the cartoon Tom and Jerry, but I humor the owner of this den, because she feeds me good.

I’m  sure she won’t be  smacking you with the baseball bat hiding behind the door if you did go out and party. If you drank, I hope you drank responsibly. If you left in a car, I hope that a good friend drove you home. If you woke up in a strange bed, I will pray for you! LOL.

I didn’t even watch the big ball drop. I am a real dud, right? Boring boring, but I was safe, happy, content and comfy. What else could I possibly want or need? Well maybe someone to rub my belly. Scratch behind my ears, and how about throwing me an extra tuna treat for heaven’s sakes! I see you heading for the fridge again!

Mind Over Body

How can a person who has what they need in life be so emotional? I woke up this morning

early to the bell jingling from Al, letting me know he is awake. I have never done this before, but I told him it is so early, couldn’t he just go back to sleep for a tad longer? He said nothing but the room got quiet and he did not get up for another forty-five minutes, so I lay back down in my bed and snuggled up under the warm blankets.

I lay there, but immediately my mind started doing the same crap it does so many times when my body is not physically busy. It spins, it won’t settle, it starts going back in time and moving quickly, like watching a tornado come your way, to the front and center.

I hate it, I hate it so bad. I never go back in time too early. I never revisit my childhood. It always goes back to the time when dad was ill. I relive the wonderful times that I was privileged to take care of him while he was sick. My mind goes over the mean woman, that went from nice to meaner than the wicked witch of the west from the Wizard Of Oz, when she found out he had bone cancer. I relive every word, every action she did  and I watched my father fall between the cracks with her, while I tried so hard to remind him that he could leave her clutches and go back home, that I would care for him.

I then move up to five years ago when I started caring for my brother. The guilt that I carry because in the beginning, it was not the special love I had for my dad that would keep no one from doing what I was doing for dad, but now I was caring for my brother, because he needed me.

There was never a great bond between my brother and me growing up, and I can not feel guilt over this, as we were taught not to bond, to just sit and behave. Now four years later, I will do anything to keep my brother happy and safe, even tell dentists off!

How can I sit here only being up two hours and want to cry my eyes out? How can I feel this way when I have my bills paid, and Al is confused but in good spirits, and there is food on the table, and I have so many good friend. How can I be so darn selfish?

It is a pity party, isn’t it? Sometimes I believe it is, and other times, I am not so sure. It seems to be something that just pops up out of nowhere. Maybe it is the holidays coming, maybe it is the stress of wondering how I am going to buy groceries for the Thanksgiving meal, or get the items needed for our new make and bake Christmas.

I worry too darn much, but can’t seem to quit doing it, and I get so disgusted with myself, I want to just go hide under my blankets and go back to sleep. I have no right nor reason to feel this way, but here I am, ready to sob but can not force the tears to come.

I am doing a load of laundry, and I have gotten Al through his breakfast and medications. I even have my favorite television running in the background, The Golden Girls, and I have changed Al’s wet bed and have emptied and cleaned the commode, but inside, I want to sleep.

I have so much to be thankful for, so where is my smile. I so wish I would knock this crap off. I am mourning, I am mourning for the loss of my parents, the loss of a once close sister, the loss of all that was once so common and familiar.

I can not change it, I can not bring back what once was, and I know as I sit here, life will never be the same. I just want to stop, pick up my heart, lift the corners of my lips into a smile, and get excited about the day, but so far it is not happening.

So if I know what I have, why am I allowing this to happen. Hopefully, it will change before noon arrives.

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So What Makes You Laugh

 

Question #1 – TV Show you watch because it makes you laugh each time?

 

Question #2 – Movie you watch because you always laugh? 

 

Question #3 – Book you have read that made you laugh?  

 

Question #4 – Do you laugh at funny animal pictures? 

 

Question #5 –  What joke always makes you laugh?

 

Question #6 – What made you laugh today? 

 

Question #7 – Who is the one person who always makes you laugh and why? 

 

http://tadams4u.wordpress.com/2012/10/24/so-what-makes-you-laugh/

This was in a blog I just read, and the idea behind it is to provide laughter in people’s lives, so I am willing to try this, by answering the questions she has posted. This will be good for me personally also, going back in time to my own funny memories.

 

Question 1 answer The Golden Girls. I laugh through this if I am watching and concentrating on the show. Sophia is my favorite. She has some smug remarks for others that are younger than her!

Question 2- Home Alone, and A Christmas Story. These two movies always make me laugh my butt off, no matter what kind of mood I have been in. The crazy things that happen, getting hit by an iron in the head, paints falling all over their faces, sticking a tongue to a frozen pole. Makes me laugh now as I am sitting here thinking about them.

Question 3- I don’t laugh from books. If I read books they are about slavery, or trying to rediscover who I am, or true stories about people who have been hurt or abused and how they triumphed

Question 4- I do not laugh at funny animal pictures, but I do laugh sometimes until my eyes water, when I see the child in Al making funny remarks over animal commercials or a cartoon, and The Three Stooges

Question 5- Jokes that make me laugh. After thinking about this for several moments, I will have to pass on it, as I have not heard funnies for years, but I do remember the first joke I heard as a young kid, and was proud to repeat it. My mother slapped me for saying naughty things. It was, why is the school-house always red? If you had six periods a day, you would be too! Whack, that is when she slapped me.

Question 6- What made me laugh today? Nothing so far

Question 7- My best friend Lezlie. We have been friends for over 30 years, and she and I will laugh so hard when we go back in time and talk about all of our memories together, especially if we talk about the horse at midnight! You will have to ask me about that silly story later.

Thanks for allowing me a chance to go back in my memory box!!!!

 

Delicate Situation

How do I tell a story without being gross, or making you want to run for the bathroom? I am not sure, but I will do my best to say each phrase delicately.

Al is my brother, in case you new blogger followers do not realize it. Al has Parkinson’s and is mildly mentally challenged. He is also a heart patient. I have been caring for him for almost five years.

In the second year of caring for him, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s. He has gone through many changes in these two years, the latest being urinating in his undies. Here lies the issue of yesterday and today.

I go to a local pharmacy that takes Medicare, and we purchase a gadget called a Texas Catheter. It is very similar to a regular catheter, except it has a condom like look and feel that attaches to the outer part of a man’s private area, instead of a tubing being ran inside. There is a bag that attaches to the leg and a tubing attached to that to let the drippings flow from Al to the bag.

Now, I am sure that most of us are grown ups here and have seen the male specimen. We know that it can do tricks, by hanging low or hanging high. I say this with much blushing!!!

Now picture this, 2012, as Ma would say on The Golden Girls. Bathroom, Al sitting down on the shower chair, sister, me, sitting down across from him on another chair. Cuts open the cover for the bag and the cover for the attachments. I look at poor Al’s eyes and tell him I am soooooooooo sorry, that I have to be with him in such a delicate situation like this, and I will hurry as fast as I can, and if I hurt him, please say ouch!

I put my surgeon’s gloves on and I look at Al’s body part, and ask myself how am I going to get this tight-fitting rubber piece over something that is looking down at the floor and not standing at attention.

I think, tick tick tick tick, and I tell Al, well bud, here goes nothing, but I did not mean actually nothing, because by the tenth time of trying to get this stupid thing on, and it flipping back at me and reminding me it was not going to listen, I had probably made a naked spot on his skin where once there was hair.

The sweat was pouring off my brow and I could feel Alvin holding his breath. It was like doing a delicate operation with no knife. FINALLY, I get the little gadget in place. I attach it to the bag on the leg, and I have him stand up so I can see how it fits when he moves and then sits. We go through these motions a couple of times.

I am disappointed that the tubing is not very long, not giving Al much space, but it was all in place, so I quit. I wet a wash rag and wiped Al’s arms and back down where he had sweated from fear of losing his man hood, then peeled off my gloves, tossing them in the trash, and go to my own bathroom and cool myself off with a shower.

Now all this happened yesterday, before he fell in the early evening, so when he gets up from his nap, he tells me it rolled off. I said what rolled off, and he points to his umm,  his personal area, and says, that! I thought, oh my gosh, it was so darn tight, that his whole thing fell off. I was castrating the poor guy and didn’t even know it! He says that he placed the bag in the trash. I said alright, I will call the pharmacy and tell them this is a disaster for the two of us, and ask if they have any suggestions.

After the fall and checking him out, I go to start supper and guess what is lying in the kitchen sink, THE BAG. Oh how sick! It has been in my sink, quick, get the bleach and a new pair of rubber gloves!!!

I take care of all that and the area is now all sterilized, ready for supper preparation, but I have now lost a bit of my appetite. I go to the computer for a bit, so I can forget the memory of my poor sink, and then later go back to do my duties. I did a load of laundry after supper, and discovered that each pair of undies and shorts were at different levels of wetness, so when the timing was right, I had to tell Al that he would have to wear the depend briefs from now on, and he didn’t say too much.

This morning, I called the Pharmacy and explained the issues, and she said she had longer tubing, that would help Al to move better, therefore the little attachment would stay in place.

To bribe Al to get him out of the house, because I had told him prior, that we would not be going anywhere today, and it is hard to change what was once said, so I knew that Arby’s was having a deal today on their new sandwiches, Turkey sandwiches. A great deal, free! Also, Dairy Queen was having a buy one blizzard get another for ninety-nine cents, so I ask him if he wanted to do these two things, plus ran back over to the Pharmacy. He jumped at the opportunity for blizzards, well not jumped, but did say yes.

We go and get the sandwiches, then go to the Dairy Queen and got the blizzards and then went to the park and ate in the shade on a bench. He is a slow eater compared to me, so after I was done I snapped these photos. After Al was all done, we went to the Pharmacy and picked up the longer tubing, and then I remembered that he needed a new electric razor, so I also stopped at the drugstore and bought one for him.

We go back home and we head to the bathroom. I am explaining to him that this will work much better with this new longer tubing, and since I had one day’s practice with the attachment going on correctly, this would be a breeze today.

Soft tears started flowing from his eyes, and he told me he felt like a little kid. I said that I understood, which I really did, but this old disease was trying to pull one over on us and we had to stay ahead of it.

He took his clothing off, while I put my doctor gloves on and I once again asked myself how was I going to get this on something that was not looking up.

It was no easier for him or me than it was yesterday. He was crying, and I was sweating tears. After several attempts and no progress in works, and no extra hands to help me, and having pulled the last hair I could get by with without being hit, I gave up. I told Al this is the pits, we can not make it work, and I am not going to have you suffer for this, when the bag of briefs was setting right beside us. He shook his head, and he, himself, yanked that nasty rubbery piece off of himself, and he threw it in the trash. I put all the clean items back in the bag that it came from at the store, so now I have all these little gadgets lying here that can’t be taken back. Texas Catheters anyone?? LOL